#catawbanation

[princessalethea]

Beware of beasties, children, if you run off into the woods… . #yehasuri #fairytales #nativetales #catawbanation #yapyeiswafestival #november #2022 https://www.instagram.com/p/CoqKeBgI4NW/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

[carolyndemerittstuff]

Anna, Catawba Nation, SC #portrait #portraitphotography #film #filmphotography #filmisnotdead #blackandwhite #blackandwhitephotography #nativeamerican #americanindian #catawbanation @flakphoto #womeninphotography #igerssc

[practicingtheliberalarts]

Endangered Langauges Challenge: Catawba

ALSO KNOWN AS: Catawaba

CLASSIFICATION: Siouan, Catawban

CODE AUTHORITY: ISO 639-3

LANGUAGE CODE: chc

LOCATION: Catawba Nation of York County, South Carolina, USA

LANGUAGE STATUS: 9 (Reawakening). Language of registered tribe: Catawba Indian Nation (Catawba Tribe of South Carolina).

LANGUAGE DEVELOPMENT: Dictionary. Catawba Nation’s Cultural Preservation Program is engaged in a language revitalization effort (Golla 2007).

This graph shows the place of Catawba within the cloud of all living languages. Each language in the world is represented by a small dot that is placed on the grid in relation to its user population (in the vertical axis) and its level of development or endangerment (in the horizontal axis), with the largest and strongest languages in the upper left and the smallest and weakest languages (down to extinction) in the lower right. The population value is the estimated number of all users (including both first and second language speakers); it is plotted on a logarithmic scale (where 100 = 1; 102 = 100; 104 = 10,000; 106 = 1,000,000; 108 = 100,000,000). The value for the development versus endangerment dimension is the estimated level on the EGIDS scale. (See the pages on Development and Endangerment for a fuller explanation.)

Catawba is represented by a large, colored dot. When the population is unknown, a color-coded question mark appears at the bottom of the grid. When there are no known users, an X appears at the bottom of the grid. The color coding matches the color scheme used in the summary profile graphs on the navigation maps for the site. In this scheme, the EGIDS levels are grouped as follows:

Red = Dying (EGIDS 8a-9) — The only fluent users (if any) are older than child-bearing age, so it is too late to restore natural intergenerational transmission through the home; a mechanism outside the home would need to be developed.

How do you pronounce the word "Catawba"? What does it mean?Catawba is pronounced "cuh-TAW-buh," and it comes from the Catawba placename Katapu, which means "fork in a river." Among themselves, the Catawba usually called themselves Ye Iswa, which means "river people."  Where do the Catawbas live?The Catawbas are original residents of North and South Carolina. Most Catawba people still live in South Carolina today, although others were forced to move to Oklahoma along with the Cherokees in the 1800's.  How is the Catawba Indian nation organized? The Catawba tribe has a reservation, which is land that belongs to them and is legally under their control. The Catawbas have their own government, laws, police, and other services, just like a small country. However, the Catawbas are also US citizens and must obey American law. In the past, the Catawba tribe was ruled by a chief from a leading clan. Today, the Catawbas are governed by a tribal council whose members are elected. What language do the Catawbas speak? The Catawba people speak English today. In the past, they spoke their native Catawba language. Unfortunately, no Catawba Indian people are fluent in this language anymore. However, some Catawbas are working to learn to speak their language again. If you'd like to know an easy Catawba word, hawoh (pronounced hah-woh) means 'thank you.' You can also read this picture glossary of Catawba Indian words. What was Catawba culture like in the past? What is it like now? Here is a link to the home page of the Catawba Cultural Preservation Project, where you can learn about the Catawba Indians past and present. 

[wardoftheedgeloaves]

Rightward vowel exchange in Crow-Hidatsa: what’s going on?

I have previously alluded to ��matethesis” in Crow-Hidatsa, a proposed change (cf. Larson ‘16) whereby Proto-Siouan *CV₁CV₂ become CV₂CV₁.

Here is a list of all forms that the CSD says have rightward vowel exchange.

1) ‘armpit’, Proto-Siouan *roksí. Normal reflex rohcÉ in Hidatsa but swapped reflex daččuá in Crow with ‘the addition of a final syllable’.

2) ‘ask’, PS wųxÉ, Crow (či)báxxu, Hidatsa (h)kiwáxxu with what I assume is the iterative prefix. The geminate /x/ is unexplained but might (?) be connected to unexplained vowel length in Mandan -wą:xe- (which also has the iterative ki-).

3) ‘to burn’, PS xú:-re, Hidatsa šaru-he: with fricative ablaut.

4) ‘cache/cellar’, PS ó-xe, Hidatsa wa:xu-he: vs. Mandan wų́x. The wa- prefix is also attested in Dakotan and Chiwere, but not Dhegiha, and Mandan wų- seems to have a cognate in Biloxi max.

5) possibly ‘cottonwood’, Crow báhkuhpa/Hidatsa máhku, if from earlier *wúhka, but this may not necessarily be cognate with other Siouan forms in wá:xE at all. (Perhaps a borrowing?)

6) ‘dove’, ‘pigeon’: PS wayú:tka ~ warú:tka, Hidatsa marahkú(a).

7) ‘end, point, tip’, PS *-tpE, but there is vowel exchange only within Crow-Hidatsa: Crow has uhpá, Hidatsa ihpú. Proto-Crow-Hidatsa is reconstructed with uhpÉ, but the Mississippi Valley languages all have *itpE or a reflex, except for Chiwere--possibly bimorphemic.

8) ‘fish’, Crow buá, Hidatsa wúa/múa, as if from earlier wúha; the rest of the family has *wi-hó:, and Mandan suggests an original word-final *ʔ. If cognate, it’s not clear how--and rightward vowel exchange seems not to have applied.

9) The Mandan word for “friend” and something about a cognate Hidatsa form with vowel exchange that isn’t given either here or on the CSD. The Hidatsa Nation’s online dictionary has iragúa (irakúa?) vs. Mandan wąrąku, Pre-Mandan *w(a)rųka--did Mandan borrow from Hidatsa? who can say?

10) ‘male’, PS *wiró:/waró:-, Crow bulá, which has “inexplicably transposed a/o, counter to the usual rightward vowel exchange”--but, uh, isn’t this what we expect? I’m confused (edit: ah, it’s because exchange usually has to involve an *u)

11) ‘mouse’, Proto-Crow-Hidatsa i:tuha, Crow í:su:ka:ta, Hidatsa i:tahú, with usual t > s change in Crow, where -ahu = Crow u: and -ka:ta is another morpheme.

12) Hidatsa pirapu:ri (no definition given), perhaps from earlier pirupari and thus cognate to *pru-/*wru- ‘powder’, whence Lakota blú ‘fine’. I can’t find pirapu:ri anywhere, so who can say?

13) ‘younger sister’, Crow iso:ka, Hidatsa ita:ku, but “vowel exchange typically affects u, not o”. 

14) ‘sitting, be sitting’, Proto-Siouan-Catawban *wų > Proto-Siouan rą́: (wat): proto-Crow-Hidatsa rá:kE, ráhku < *rųk-ka-- but the attested forms all lack ru- or thereabouts, so there is (to my mind) no reason to propose a proto-Crow-Hidatsa form *rųk-ka, which neither explains the extant forms in Crow-Hidatsa nor looks cognate to the rest of the family, unless...

...but do they show ao -ru-? It...is not clear to me that they do!

In conclusion, who knows, but I’m not seeing any vowel swapping in this root.

15) ‘thunder’: Crow sú:a, Hidatsa táhu/tahú, and tu:hÉ in Proto-Southeastern-Siouan. But Crow -ú:- is regular for -ahu-, with the final -a being added later (there is also an archaizing suú), so the implication is that vowel exchange occured in PCH.

16) ‘tree, bone’: PS -hú:(-re), Crow (i:-)hú:li, Hidatsa hirú. 

17) ‘bobcat’, PCH *itapu:, Hidatsa ítupa, Crow i:špí:wiška. Lots of oddness here, Crow form possibly not showing vowel interchange like Hidatsa does.

18) wrist: the words are not actually listed in the CSD (?!) but Mandan has ų́kite while Hidatsa has i:kúti, but “alternatively, Mandan may have subjected the form to folk etymology, as the current structure is a compound of ‘hand (2)’ plus some unknown element.” where hand (2) is Mandan ųke. (It seems likely they’re connected in some fashion, in any case...)

OK, so what do we make of all this? First, note that a *u or *ų is involved in all cases except 1), 8), 10), 13) and perhaps 4), but all of these involve *o. Secondly, if Crow shows vowel swap, Hidatsa does too, except in 1) and 13), and those both involve *o, and short *o was raised to /u/ in Hidatsa, so perhaps:

1. Vowel swap, only involving /u/ (remember: nasalization is just plain lost in Crow-Hidatsa) starts in Hidatsa, at about the time it starts peeling off from Crow but before *o-raising. (There’s consensus that this is about the time it begins.)

2. It spreads sporadically to Crow (because Hidatsa has prestige?). Because Hidatsa is already (?) undergoing o-raising, Crow speakers start overapplying it to words that have CVCu in Hidatsa but CVCo in Crow, though, uh, what the hell is going on with “armpit”? CSD doesn’t comment on it, but we should be seeing, what, ruhcé or rehcú or something in Hidatsa with raising. I can’t find anything you could borrow it from, either...and Crow č is usually from palatalization of *k--maybe *ks regularly does a Pali? But the only other two tokens of PS *ks in the CSD are *-ksE ‘break, break off’ which gives Crow -ttači (but does give Hidatsa  -hcakE, apparently regularly) , and *ksá:pE ‘wise, smart, mature’ which has no reflexes in Crow or Hidatsa.

[amphitheresarewingednoodles]

Spanish, Japanese, German, Catawban*, Arabic

*the tribe is trying to revive it, so if I could magically have full fluency in it that would help 'em out a lot.

@icecreamwithmysprinkles would you resurrect Latin and ancient Greek? (We'd finally know for sure if they said Vs like v or w)

If you could instantly be granted fluency in 5 languages—not taking away your existing language proficiency in any way, solely a gain—what 5 would you choose?

[practicingtheliberalarts]

Endangered Language Challenge: Catawba

From wikipedia:

Catawba (/kəˈtɔːbə/; Katapa [kataːpa]) is one of two Eastern Siouan languages of the eastern US, which together with the Western Siouan languages formed the Siouan language family.

The last native speaker of Catawba died before 1960.[1]Red Thunder Cloud, apparently an impostor born Cromwell Ashbie Hawkins West, claimed to speak the language until he died in 1996 (Goddard 2000). The Catawba tribe is now working to revive the Catawba language.

From The Catawba Indian Nation’s website:

The Catawba Indians have lived on their ancestral lands along the banks of the Catawba River dating back at least 6000 years. Before contact with the Europeans it is believed that the Nation inhabited most of the Piedmont area of South Carolina, North Carolina and parts of Virginia. Early colonial estimates of the Catawba population when settlers arrived are between 15,000-25,000.

Early Catawbas lived in villages which were surrounded by a wooden palisade or wall. There was a large council house in the village as well as a sweat lodge, homes, and an open plaza for meetings, games, and dances. The homes were rounded on top and made of bark. The dwellings were small with extended families living in a single structure. Catawbas were farmers. They planted crops like corn and squash along the banks of the river. They also fished and hunted. The Catawbas were a large and powerful group and waged war with neighboring tribes, especially the Cherokee.

First contact with the Catawbas was recorded in 1540 when the Spanish explorer Hernando de Soto marched his troops through the Piedmont while headed west looking for gold. There was little contact between the Nation and early settlers because the new colonies were barely surviving. Once the Virginia colony of Jamestown and the Carolina colony of Charles Town became more established this changed.

The tribal people called themselves yeh is-WAH h’reh, meaning “people of the river.” The colonists who came to trade began calling all the tribes along the Catawba River Valley by the name Catawba. By the late 17th century, trade began having a major impact on the Catawba society. The Catawba traded deerskins to the Europeans for goods such as muskets, knives, kettles and cloth. The Catawba villages became a major hub in the trade system between the Virginia traders and the Carolina traders.

Settlers began to move into the Piedmont during the 18th century. The Nation always carried a philosophy of brotherly love and peace when it came to the settlers. This did not serve them well though because the settlers brought disease with them. In 1759, smallpox swept through the Catawba villages for a fourth time in a century bringing the population of the Nation to less than 1,000 by 1760. Colonists believed the Nation was dying out.

Catawba warriors were known as the fiercest in the land. The Nation claimed at least eleven other tribes as enemies. Leaders of the state of South Carolina knew this and kept relations with the Nation friendly. King Hagler was chief from 1750 to 1763. He is remembered as a friend to the English but also a firm defender of the rights of his people. The Nation’s friendship with the English helped both sides. The colonist received protection from other tribes that may try to threaten them and the Nation received supplies that aided in their survival. During the Revolutionary War, the Catawba aligned with the patriots and fought with them against England to help them gain their independence. In 1763 the Catawbas received title to 144,000 acres from the King of England. It was hard for the Nation to protect the land from colonists and eventually they began renting land to settlers. The first tenant was Thomas Spratt who leased several thousand acres of farmland.

Eventually the settlers who had leased land from the Nation wanted the land for themselves. They put pressure on South Carolina to negotiate with the Nation. This was during the Removal Period when many tribes were being moved west. In order to avoid this, the Nation and South Carolina negotiated the Treaty at Nations Ford. The treaty stipulated that the Catawbas relinquish to the State of South Carolina their 144,000 acres of land. In return, South Carolina promised the Nation a new tract of land in a less populated area and to pay the Catawbas money. By 1847, South Carolina Governor David Johnson said, “They are, in effect, dissolved.” However, that was not the end of the Catawbas. References: Merrell, James. The Catawbas. New York: Chelsea House Publishers, 1989.

Again from Wikipedia:

Terminated as a tribe by the federal government in 1959, the Catawba Indian Nation had to reorganize to reassert their sovereignty and treaty rights. In 1973 they established their tribal enrollment and began the process of regaining federal recognition. In 1993 their federal recognition was re-established, along with a $50 million settlement by the federal government and state of South Carolina tor their longstanding land claims. The tribe was also officially recognized by the state of South Carolina in 1993. Their headquarters are at Rock Hill, South Carolina.As of 2006, the population of the Catawba Nation has increased to about 2600, most in South Carolina, with smaller groups in Oklahoma, Colorado, Ohio, and elsewhere. The Catawba Reservation (34°54′17″N 80°53′01″W), located in two disjoint sections in York County, South Carolina east of Rock Hill, reported a 2010 census population of 841 inhabitants. The Catawban language, which is being revived, is part of the Siouan family (Catawban branch).

[yeli-renrong]

Eastern North America might look like a case of contrast loss from founder populations, but I wonder if it was instead the other way around, with increased complexity catalyzed by Na-Dene contact -- like how, according to Fortescue, Itelmen developed ejectives from contact with Dene-Yeniseian.

Maybe not! Proto-Siouan is reconstructed with ejectives and apparently the urheimat is somewhere around West Virginia... but the reconstruction I found looks to be actually Proto-Western Siouan, i.e. excluding Catawban, which lost ejectives.

And of course the Mayan stuff wouldn’t be connected.

As for South America, wouldn’t the relevant dimension be north vs. south?