Monday, August 08, 2005

 

Halito, Chim Achukma?

I am gettin' off my erudite yet lethargic, post-grad-school butt and am going to take a Choctaw language class next month.

That's "Hello, how are you?" in the headline.

Next up: How do ya say "fixin' to" in Choctaw?

This ain't just for fun. It will satisfy a language requirement if I ever decide to go for a Ph.D.

My master's thesis had to do with the editorial comments and opinion expressed in two Choctaw newspapers published in 1849-1852, recall.

The papers, the Choctaw Telegragh and the Choctaw Intelligencer, were bilingual. I studied the heck out of the English stuff. My aim is to be able to go back and study the Choctaw columns, and see how they differed.

Step 1. Get off erudite but lethargic butt. Check.

2. Call about the class. Check.

3. Show up and enroll on first day of class. That's in September.

Oh boy, oh boy oh boy. Now I have somethin' to look forward to! :-)

Go here for more Choctaw words.

--ER

Comments:
I hope you realize how cool that is.
 
:-) And it's rightcheer in OKC! I was afraid I'd have to drive to Norman. (They have an on-line class, but you know me: I am being dragged kickin' and screamin' into the twentieth century!
 
It sure sounds like it's for fun, and I agree with braingirl it is cool. (You shouldn't be afraid to drive to Norman. It's not football season -- yet.) :)
 
Dyed-in-the-wool sooner fan at work transferred his MBA work from ou to OSU this fall because, as he put it, the "elitest" attitude at Norman keeps them from meeting adult learners where they are -- which is on the Internet. He will be able to do his MBA using distance learning. The experience left a bad taste in his mouth. It ain't just the arrogance of sooner fans that pisses me off. The whole dang system is eat up with itself. :-)
 
You DO know some of us went to OU and were perfectly happy with the experience, don't you?
 
ER, I don't mind telling you that I am more than a little jealous.
The only foriegn language I speak is English. (My native tounge is Eastern NC Redneck.) ;)
Good job, Bro.
I look forward to learning a few more Chocktaw words by osmosis!
 
Whoever that is...
 
Tee hee hee...
 
Osmosis -- wasn't she the mean woman on The Apprentice?
 
Trix, no offense!

There's room for 2 universities in this state. Crystal just baited me -- and I bit! We go waaaaaay back that way. ;-)

Tug, I thought I detected a soft Carolina O. (Comes out ooooh, y'all. I have Never met a North Carolinian who didn't enucciate his O's real soft like.)
 
Chapel Hill, huh? A college town much like the one I lived in (Olympia, Washington) for four very interesting years: tiny, but populated by members of bands that are nonetheless internationally famous. Kind of like Asheville.
Sort of like Athens, Ga. was, back in the '80's.
And Choctaw! There's a number of polyglots in my scene, but I'm pretty certain that none of them speak that one. I'm sure that you already are aware of the role that language played in military intelligence in WWII.
 
That is soooo cool. I've always wanted to take Cherokee myself. Is Choctaw at OU?
 
Rich, yes, although the Comanche codetalkers seem to get more latter-day press; I'm not sure why.

Jodie, this is a class by some entity of the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma, taught in southwest OKC at the OK Choctaw Alliance building, I think it's called. It's not for college credit, but that's OK; for my purposes (aside from just the coolness of it), I just need to demonstrate the ability to read the language, although you can't really do that without learning to speak it , too.

There are Cherokee classes around Tahlequah, I think; I don't know about OKC.

Three&Eight (Dr. ER), As you know, I've been to NC -- to Clinton Township to a corporate hog farm, to Tarheel, where guards at the Smithfield Farms plant chased me and a photographer away from the place (we never got off the right-of-way of the highway, where we had every right to be, y'all; I am no Geraldo Rivera); and to Fayetteville. Needless to say, I was nowhere to fall in love with.
 
Then you need to go back to NC, ER, and try again. I highly recommend staying at the Carolina Inn at Chapel Hill for your next stay. It's very historical and beautiful and near some cool shops and you'll appreciate the "erudite" atomosphere. And my older sister just bought a condo a few minutes from the beach in Wilmington, so I hope to make many, many trips there in the future.
 
I spent four days in the attic of a goat farm in North Carolina one December. I found Cheatham County to be a wonderful place, full of artists with exquisite vision. But that could have been the goats talking.
 
Crystal, do you mean my former Sunday school teacher? :-)

Trixie, that sounds like the beginning of a song. :-)
 
That sounds super, super cool. I'm jealous. Espanol seems so boring by comparison.
 
ER: My sister was a Sunday School teacher??
 
Yer sister M, way back before she fell out of an airplane, was either the teacher or a helper for a Sunday schoool class that a little bitty ER attended regularly.
 
How cool is that! M knew you before I did? Wow. I had totally forgot she did that. It's good to have someone around who can fill in the gaps of my history -- someday we'll have to sit down so you can tell me what happened between 1983-1989. :) Hey, (speaking of history) did you know my Grannie, God bless her, is buried just a few steps from your Dad? But I digress...yes, it's M, but she is far from settling down. She's still somewhere on the other side of the world -- literally. But at least she's kinda thinking about settling down now, at least enough to commit to buying her own place. (Geez, I hope she's not the reason you're estranged from the SBC now!) :)
 
And Brother ER thought she was hot. :-)

One of these days, someone will have to fill me in on MY history from 1979 to present. :-)
 
M is very cool and one of the few people I actually listen to when she speaks. Your brother has good taste. :)

1979? You were still wet behind the ears then, surely you can recall some of that era!
 
Here's a great website where you can practice your Choctaw skills:

Choctaw wiki browser
 
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