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Kya Morden wrote:
> On Sun, 30 Apr 2000 16:21:26 GMT, "Jeff Stembel"
> <aulddragon@wamalug.org> wrote:
>
> > I try to be pollitically correct because I see it as being polite. Also,
> > sometimes politically correct is just that: Correct. For Example, I try not to
> > call Native Americans "Indians" because they are not from India. :)
> >
> > Jeff
>
> And...I try to call them by their proper tribal name bacause Hopi are
> not Sioux, who are not Navajo, etc... (now watch someone tell me I
> managed to mangle the spelling of one of those, so I can tell them
> that those are transliterations into English and don't really have a
> "correct" spelling.... yeah, that's it. (Ah, the wack opinions one
> gains from Anthropology classes.
Wack or wacky? ;) They have somewhat opposing meanings, so I'm just trying to
figure out if you liked Anthro or thought they were nuts--not that both can't be
correct. Oddly enough, the term "Sioux" is dragged through *two* languages, first
Odawa (Ottawa) and from there French. IIRC they call themselves "Lakota" and are
also known as "Dakota." I heard somewhere that since Sioux was what the Odawa
called them, it was dimunitive (meaning "outsiders" or "them strangers over thar"),
but I haven't seen any academic references to that anywhere so it may be apocryphal.
It's interesting that you bring up the transliteration thing. People are still
struggling with a standard transliteration for most Asian languages (Japanese
perhaps being the notable exception; there was a Nihongi(sp?) and a Romaj-kai IIRC
and the latter won out) but there really doesn't seem to be a whole lot of debate in
the mainstream about Native American spellings. In my old part of the country
(Michigan and Ohio Valley), some peoples had two names depending on who you asked
(French or English, or any of various Native nations). The Huron/Wyandot are a fair
example of this. Besides that, some spellings dating from the 1700s (Chippewa,
Ottawa) have been jettisoned by those people for various reasons, usually having to
do both with the desire to represent the pronunciation faithfully *and* the need to
exert control over how their name is carried into the written language that has
hegemony over their lives. The new spellings (Ojibwe, Odawa) are often hard to
recognise as the same group, and sometimes have difficulty finding adherents among
the more affluent members of a given Nation. There are lots of reasons for this,
but no need to bore anyone further with discussions of tribal politics. ;)
Speaking of indigenous groups' efforts to exert control over words and speech, can
any Hawaiian residents (or is that "Hawai'ian residents?) tell me what's going on
there with that apostrophe? For example, U-H Hilo doesn't use it, but U-H Manoa
does. Where did it come from? (If anyone says "Polynesian," I'll have to send you
a Timmy head.)
Anyhow, this has been Useless Academic Trivia Moment™ (With Lots of Parenthesis) for
1 May 2000. Have a great day!
best
Lindsay
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