Clatskanie
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Please do not check in a dictionary or online before you try to pronounce the name just by looking at it.
The manager of the inn where I'm staying told me that people from out of town pronounce the name in many different ways. Never mind how they struggle with the first five letters, the greatest variation comes with how to handle the last three letters.
She herself, when she first came to the town from Portland about ten years ago, pronounced the ending as "nine", and many other outsiders do too. I have a theory about where that final "n" comes from, but will wait to see if anyone else can explain it first.
People from surrounding towns sometimes make fun of the name by jeering "Clatskaninny".
The town was originally called Bryantville after the large family who were among the first filers of Donation Land Claims in the area in 1852-53. However, the first postmaster, Enoch Conyers, who was married to one of the Bryant daughters, changed the name to Clatskanie after the Tlatskanai Native American tribe.
"Bryant" and Conyers are among the street names in the town still today.
Kwalhioqua–Clatskanie (Kwalhioqua–Tlatskanai, Lower Columbia Athabaskan) is an extinct Athabaskan language of northwest Oregon and southwest Washington state, along the lower Columbia River.
Also, does anyone have a theory about why "Tla-" evolved into "Cla-"? Again, I have an idea, but will wait to see if anyone else has one of their own.
Selected readings
- "The Dalles, Dallesport, Dallas" (10/17/24)
- "Local toponymic pronunciations in northwestern Ohio and northern Indiana" (7/4/22)
- "Southern Ohioisms" (9/23/17)
- "The many sights and sounds of 'Buchanan'" (8/26/21)
martin schwartz said,
October 27, 2024 @ 6:25 pm
Re "Tla-" > "Cla-", I'm sure the underlying Athabaskan phoneme
was a voiceless alveolar lateral stop. Look up the latter in Wiki,
and you'll get some audible examples. The phoneme occurred in Chinook, whence Klamath, north of us across the Oregon border,
has its Kl- as English approximation of such a sound such a sound. In Syria, '3' tlæ:ta is pronounced with such an initial, and in the dialect spoken by Jews I've heard klæ:ta.
Y said,
October 27, 2024 @ 7:46 pm
Indeed, Clatskanie/Tlaskanai are both English rederings of Chinook iłáck’ani 'those of the region of small oaks' (after Michael Silverstein, quoted in <Handbook of North American Indians 7:532). Klamath, also spelled Tlamatl in some early records, is a rendering of Chinook łámał 'they of the River' (id., ibid. 12:464). Likewise the ethnonym Tlingit, now usually pronounced /klɪŋkɪt/, represents łìngít.
Julian said,
October 27, 2024 @ 8:45 pm
Joke/urban myth:
A young Australian overseas has lost his passport. Goes to the consulate to get a replacement.
The official has to check his bona fides of course.
"Where do you come from, mate?"
"Mungindi."
"You're good. Only someone who comes from Mungindi would know how to say that."
Barbara Phillips Long said,
October 27, 2024 @ 10:05 pm
Initial reaction: CLAT skah nee
I grew up in Schoharie County which may have influenced my pronunciation. Many folks also find regional upstate New York place names such as Schoharie, Schenevus, or Schenectady challenging.
Chas Belov said,
October 28, 2024 @ 12:50 am
Here is my take:
KLAT skan ee
First two syllables to rhyme with CAT Scan.
Ee to rhyme with "bee".
Andreas Johansson said,
October 28, 2024 @ 2:03 am
My initial guess was that it was Slavic, so approx. [tslatskanie].
Philip Taylor said,
October 28, 2024 @ 3:41 am
For me, /klætskæni/ — although I can understand a possible uncertainty regarding the final "nie" (is there an implied y-glide ?), I cannot see how anyone could "struggle with the first five letters" ("Clats") which combine elements of two common words ("claps" and "spats").
AlexB said,
October 28, 2024 @ 7:55 am
@Andreas Johansson
That was my guess as well.
Coby said,
October 28, 2024 @ 8:26 am
Wikipedia gives /ˈklætskɪnaɪ/.
Cheryl Thornett said,
October 28, 2024 @ 11:27 am
In the UK, people who don't speak Welsh are often advised to pronounce 'll' as 'tl' to approximate the Welsh ' voiceless alveolar lateral fricative sound (IPA: [ɬ])', as in Llanelli. (To my ear, it's 'chl' with something like the 'voiceless velar fricative /x/ ' of Scottish English, as in 'loch', or the similar German 'ch'. Not being very expert in IPA, I'm taking Wikipedia's word for it, just making the point that a tl/kl/chl transition may have parallels.
Selly said,
October 28, 2024 @ 12:56 pm
My friend who’s family has a dairy farm nearby says Klats-skein-ee. His family is an interesting mix of Norwegians married to Calabrians which might affect their speech.
The K or T business is found in other places in the Pacific Northwest. Old maps of Tillamook label it as Killamook. A young inhabitant of a Tlingit village pronounced it in a way that sounded like Klingit to me.
Bob said,
October 28, 2024 @ 4:20 pm
The Yiddish word for 'run away' is antlejfn (Litvish vowels there) (cf. German entlaufen), but some dialects or idiolects say anklejfn. tl > kl. That's strange because it's become less analyzable, less compositional.
martin schwartz said,
October 29, 2024 @ 2:44 am
My mother's Brisk (Brest-Litovsk) Yiddish had (ant)loyn and (ant)leyfn
koyfn and keyfn (I'm using the YIVO system here), but most in other words oy = Germ. au (and o:). antkleyfn, eh? Live and learn.
In Germanic there seem to be instances of tv- > kv-, e.g. German Quer < *tver(h) vel sim., Scandinavian kvist < *tvist-.
martin schwartz said,
October 29, 2024 @ 2:46 am
My mother's Brisk (Brest-Litovsk) Yiddish had (ant)loyn and (ant)leyfn
koyfn and keyfn (I'm using the YIVO system here), but most in other words oy = Germ. au (and o:). antkleyfn, eh? Live and learn.
In Germanic there seem to be instances of tv- > kv-, e.g. German Quer < *tver(h) vel sim., Scandinavian kvist < *tvist-.
THE FRIGGIN' DUPLICATION ROBOT THINKS I'VE ALREADY SAID THE ABOVE. GO TRUST MACHINES! FEH!
martin schwartz said,
October 29, 2024 @ 3:29 am
typo for antloyfn etc.
Hmm, the machine was messin' with me. OK.
Jarek Weckwerth said,
October 29, 2024 @ 9:23 am
tl to kl happens because English doesn't have kl in its phonotactics, i.e. it isn't a grammatically legal onset cluster. But kl is, do it's a good candidate for replacement.
Keith said,
October 29, 2024 @ 11:03 am
At first glance, I thought that this might have been a Polish word, pronounced more or less /t͡slat͡skanje/. (I just noticed that @Andreas Johansson suggested that it looked Slavic).
Now that I've read the rest of the post, I'm reminded of a common pronunciation of the word "bottle" in England as if it was written "bokuw"/ The "uw" is typically South-Eastern or Estuary English, while "tl" -> "k" is widespread.
Coby said,
October 29, 2024 @ 11:05 am
Jacek: Spanish doesn't have tl (which I think is what you meant) either, and yet Mexicans have incorporated it (from Nahuatal): tlapalería, Tlatelolco…
Philip Taylor said,
October 29, 2024 @ 11:31 am
Jarek — "tl to kl happens because English doesn't have [tl]* in its phonotactics" — Well, the LPD admits of "Tlingit"†, so there is at least one attested /tl/ onset in the English language.
* where the square brackets denote an editorial emendation, not a phonetic IPA sequence
† (A member of) an indigenous people of the coasts and islands of south-eastern Alaska and adjacent British Columbia.
Tom Dawkes said,
October 29, 2024 @ 12:06 pm
Apart from being a foreign name Tlingit is actually pronounced [ɬɪ̀nkɪ́tʰ]. There are English dialect studies — read long ago but not noted – where [tl] occurs in place of [kl], for example [tli:n] for [kli:n] 'clean'
CuConnacht said,
October 29, 2024 @ 2:10 pm
I was thinking it was Scottish and pronouncing it like Sally's friend.
CuConnacht said,
October 29, 2024 @ 2:12 pm
^Selly's friend, that is. And stress on the middle syllable.
Philip Taylor said,
October 30, 2024 @ 3:01 am
Tom — "Apart from being a foreign name Tlingit is actually pronounced [ɬɪ̀nkɪ́tʰ]" — well, is it ? If I were to assert that Paris is pronounced [pa.ʁi], then I could legitimately assert at the same time that Paris is a foreign name. But you and I both know that in English Paris is pronounced [ˈpær ɪs] and is a (naturalised) English name. Now the LPD asserts that Tlingit is pronounced [ˈtlɪŋ ɡɪt ] (tho' I confess that the audio that accompanies the transcription might well have an [ɬ] onset), and so if the LPD transcription can be believed then I believe that one can reasonably argue that Tlingit is a (naturalised) English name.
Jo said,
November 1, 2024 @ 8:25 am
@Andreas Johansson
Also, from the point of view of a Western South Slavic speaker it resembles "klackanje/клацкање" (verbal noun from "klackati", meaning 'to rock'). Wiktionary gives [ˈkɫat͡skaɲɛ] as the pronunciation in Macedonian, for example.