Lexical Acculturation in Siletz Dee-ni
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2012
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Swarthmore College. Dept. of Linguistics
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Thesis (B.A.)
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Abstract
Lexical acculturation (the creation of new words as a result of contact with other cultures) in the
highly endangered Oregon Athabaskan2 language of Siletz Dee-ni has been primarily influenced
by contact with English since European arrival in the Pacific Northwest and California at the
beginning of the 19th century. Indian removal from southwest Oregon to the Coast Reservation
following the Rogue River War of 1850-1856 profoundly influenced the development of the Siletz
Dee-ni language. Siletz Dee-ni exhibits a preference for basing new lexical entries on native
linguistic resources (Campbell and Grondona 2011), though it exhibits both primary and
secondary forms of lexical acculturation as described by Brown (1996). Whether Siletz Dee-ni
speakers choose to adopt a loanword, extend an existing Athabaskan term, or create a morphemeor
nominal-based neologism for a new lexical item is consistent with naming patterns displayed by
pre-contact words. Siletz Dee-ni speakers have made good use of the language’s affixally
polysynthetic morphology: for instance, creating the word me’-naa-draa-‘a’ ‘telephone (lit.
inside/into one speaks)’, in the same spirit as the native word me'-drvlh-t’es ‘cookhouse (lit. inside
one cooks)’, through a passivization of the verb and the use of the preposition me’. In articulating
the process involved in lexical acculturation in Siletz Dee-ni, it is my goal to provide a resource to
this speech community and support members’ efforts to create new words in Siletz Dee-ni in ways
that are both practical and culturally authentic.
2 Alternately