Notice: Tisquantum (Squanto) Book Reviews; and Evaluation of Questionable Claims

So, I’ve never gotten around to filling out the promised Appendix to my post on Tisquantum (Squanto). Let’s begin remedying that. In anticipation of an about-to-be-released biography of Tisquantum, I’ve added two new offshoot pages of the Appendix: (1) HERE is a list of some relevant key books and articles (including the key primary sources), annotated or, more often with short reviews; and (2) HERE is a collection and exploration of various claims that have been made on Tisquantum and adjacent topics, but which are either wrong, dubious, or at least uncertain. Neither page is yet as complete as I’d originally hoped, since I’ve run out of time to get them totally completed before the new Tisquantum biography is published. (I want as many of my own thoughts on the record before it arrives. The book/article review page can also serve as something of a template, I guess, for my eventual review of the new book, and the “misconceptions” page can be a bit of a measuring stick for how plausible I find the new book’s claims—or an indictment of some of my own arguments, depending on how things go! For better or worse we’ll see how far off the mark I am . . . . )

Also, I should probably note, for those who only read it when I originally posted it, that I made some relatively substantial revisions to the Tisquantum post a couple years back, which may mean some of the references to stuff in the post in these new pages doesn’t make sense. I’m not sure.

Any questions or comments can be left on this post, I guess (or emailed), since apparently I can’t turn on comments for the new pages or turn off comments here . . .

Proto-Algonquian Phonological and Morphophonological Rules

Last updated: April 25, 2024

This post will collect and exemplify the most important phonological and morphophonological processes of Proto-Algonquian; it represents a substantial revision and expansion of a section that was originally found in my post on Proto-Algonquian. (For an overall introduction to Proto-Algonquian itself, you can find that post here, and for an introduction to verb inflection specifically, including some of the technical terms used here, see this one. I have not finished revising these to reflect my current beliefs and knowledge or for consistency with this post, though . . . )

While I make no pretense to total comprehensive coverage—which would be nearly impossible—I hope this can prove of use as, at least, the most comprehensive such list available, consolidated in one place and carefully ordered. Virtually none of the given rules are “new,” but to my knowledge they have never been assembled together like this before, exactly—only smaller subsets, often scattered throughout a work, and usually without statements on ordering. Continue reading “Proto-Algonquian Phonological and Morphophonological Rules” →

The Red River Country in Ojibwe

 

The Red River and some important associated locations
The Red River and some important associated locations. Pembina is located where the Red crosses the US-Canadian border, and Portage la Prairie and Long Plain Reserve #6 are located on the Assiniboine south and southwest of Lake Manitoba. The “double” lake in Minnesota east of Grand Forks and south of Lake of the Woods is Red Lake. (Modified from Wikimedia Commons, CC-by-SA 2.5.)

The Red River of the North is born south of Fargo-Moorhead on the Minnesota-North Dakota border and flows north for 550 miles, passing through Winnipeg, before emptying into Lake Winnipeg. Its banks and watershed have been of great historical importance—a history in which Ojibwe-speaking peoples have played a pivotal role. The Red River country was the site of long-term fur trading and a particularly rich mixture of peoples and cultures—Crees and Anishinaabeg, Assiniboines, Frenchmen and Scots, and more. This mixture created some friction, but also promoted various alliances, and it was a huge factor in giving birth to the Métis people. This was the site of the Selkirk Colony and Pembina; it was the arena of the Pemmican War and the first Métis uprising under Louis Riel and the creation of Manitoba. Anishinaabeg, from Minnesota Ojibwes to Lake Huron Odawas, sojourned or settled here as they gradually pushed onto the Plains and became today’s Saulteaux (or Plains Ojibwes).

For all its significance, I’m unaware of any commonly shared Ojibwe term for the broader Red River country, but in this post I’d like to briefly delve into the closest thing that I’ve found. Continue reading “The Red River Country in Ojibwe” →

Comparative Algic Progress Report

Last updated: October 11, 2023

For several years now I’ve been reexamining the older work done on comparative Algic and the reconstruction of Proto-Algic (PAc), and have gradually developed my own reconstruction of the protolanguage, which builds on this older work but departs from it in some important ways. I hope over the coming months to post some shorter studies that have resulted from this project. In this post I will just outline where things stand at the moment; also (for completeness and my own sake—I don’t expect anyone else to care) what the next steps are. Continue reading “Comparative Algic Progress Report” →

A Few Modest Terminological and Notational Proposals

Last updated: September 27, 2023

An actual relatively restrained post today (!!).

In this blog I’ve used some terminology and notational practices that are either rare or idiosyncratic, and usually fairly new (with one exception). But I haven’t discussed them all in one place, or always fully explained them. So I figured I’d just cover them all here, along with my justifications, and why I humbly think at least some of them would be beneficial for Algonquianists to adopt (or agree on, in the first case). Continue reading “A Few Modest Terminological and Notational Proposals” →