OSAGE ORTHOGRAPHY

[goodtracks at peoplepc.com]

It was great to see Carolyn Q at the Osage Iroshka Society Dances last weekend.  The weather was reasonable.  Always a blessing there to be had.

Last year, I learned that the Osage Language Committee decided to invent a new writting system to express sounds not in English, which will be "easier" for the children and adults learning Wazhazhi.  At the Saturday noon feast of theDrumKeeper Cameron LookOut on the 24th June,  (the grandson to Moogri LookOut, the main Osage teacher), there were plastic glasses and napkin setting which held an inscription in Osage.  Last year, I could read the entire passage.  This year, they have advanced their new writting systems with more characters/ symbols.  The first word read or spelled out was:

W (an inverted "V")(a period)(what looks like a 3-pronged hay fork)(inverted "V") O (a period) L (an inverted half circle) (a hatchek).

Together with Ardeena Moore, Osage & Quapaw speaker and independent O&Q teacher, who attended the SxCaLangLingConf last year at Kaw Nation, we determined that this first word was:

"Waxakolin" = People in the Thorny Thicket. (CURRENT PRONUNCIATION)
[LaFlesche Dictionary, p207 "Waxa'gaugthiN"]

Ardeena said she received the study book and CD of the system and would "try" to understand it, but in her opinion.... it was nice that they were inventing a non-historical orthography, but did not believe it would be successfull unless the children were immerged regularly and consistantly in the script.  She herself would continue to write, building on the already known English Roman letters, which her students would more readily understand. 

Neither she nor I attempted to wade thru the rest of the undeciphered characters which beared a resemblance to Cherokee syllabary.
Jimm
   
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