Chinook Jargon

A pidgin language combining words from Nootka, Chinook, Salishan languages, French, and English, formerly used as a lingua franca in the Pacific Northwest.

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright © 2016 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

Chinook Jargon

(Languages) a pidgin language containing elements of Native American languages, English, and French: formerly used among fur traders and Indians on the NW coast of North America

Collins English Dictionary – Complete and Unabridged, 12th Edition 2014 © HarperCollins Publishers 1991, 1994, 1998, 2000, 2003, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2011, 2014

Chinook′ Jar′gon

a pidgin based largely on Nootka, Lower Chinook, French, and English, once widely used as a lingua franca from Alaska to Oregon.

[1830–40]

ThesaurusAntonymsRelated WordsSynonymsLegend:

Noun

Chinook Jargon - a pidgin incorporating Chinook and French and English words; formerly used as a lingua franca in northwestern North America

Oregon Jargon

pidgin - an artificial language used for trade between speakers of different languages

Mentioned in

References in periodicals archive

Among their chapters are linguistic diversity in Oregon and Washington, reviving Chinook Jargon: the Chinuk Wawa Language Program of the Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde in Oregon, indigenous language revitalization in Puyallup Territory, Seattle to Spokane: what what Washingtonians think about English spoken in their state, and what Oregon English can reveal about dialect diversity in the Pacific Northwest.

Northwest Voices: Language and Culture in the Pacific Northwest

Sam is a British Columbia MLA and also former Mayor of Vancouver He spoke to our members about his attempt to promote the revival of Chinook Jargon, the aboriginal trade language once widely used in British Columbia.

Vancouver

We enlisted the girls--Xour wives were 30 years younger then--Xto drive us from the farm at Ta Ta Creek up to Skookumchuck with instructions to meet us at the bridge in a couple of hours (note: skookumchuck means "strong water" in the Chinook jargon).

In the details: a lazy canoe day almost turned to tragedy

Rather, I claim that a set of traits--subtle, persisting in the way that Chinook Jargon did--is what forms the perspective that I report from.

Before Long, in a While

From Wikipedia: a collection of 208 lists about the state, from "fiction set in Oregon" (94) to "city nicknames" (60) to "Chinook jargon place names" (161) to "Yamhill County post offices" (51) to "shipwrecks" (136).

For Oregon trivia fans, a mother lode

He employs Chinook jargon, that liminal "middle ground" idiom, as an effective hook throughout.

John Sutton Lutz, Makuk: A New History of Aboriginal-White Relations

Chinook Jargon consisted of words that were borrowed and adapted from several Native languages, as well as French and English.

Trading language

Saltchuk, which means "saltwater" in the trading language of Pacific Rim Natives called Chinook Jargon, later expanded its holdings to include the Delta Western fuel business in Western and Southeastern Alaska.

A new owner, a new face: NAC celebrates a half-century in Alaska