Monday, April 20, 2020

Paiwan Every Day 44: sudju // kisudju

From Raleigh Ferrell's Paiwan Dictionary (1982), three undergradate students in the Philippines found a number of interesting terms Paiwan people use for relationship, such as
  • makadju: begin courting
  • kisudju: to find a sweetheart
  • maretsekel: husband and wife
  • tjaumalj: the second spouse or stepmother / stepfather
  • tjautatekaz: newlywed couple who have not yet been given seeds to plant by chief, not yet blessed
  • kiraqa: to cheat on
It is interesting to learn about indigenous peoples through the languages they speak. Often this tells more. 

nu uri kisudju sun, nakuya kicakaw. 

In English:
If you want to fall in love, it is not good to hide. 

Glossary:
  1. nu: if or when
  2. uri: want to 
  3. ki-sudju: to court or find a lover. ki- 'to get or obtain'; the root is sudju 'lover, sweetheart'. 
  4. na-kuya: it is bad to do something. The root is kuya 'bad, ill luck'. 
  5. ki-cakaw: to mean or act stealthily or slyly. The root is cakaw 'steal'. 
Reading: 

2 comments:

Theo said...

I think it'd be maretsekelj, though I guess i know why you wrote it as tsekel, because it has any if none j element with. Still, it's not the same as l, which is more r-like.

Yedda Palemeq said...

Yes, Yeh, if I were to write the word (instead of copying it from the paper), I would put 'marecekelj' with 'lj' at the end and 'c' instead of 'ts'. That spelling was from the 1970s when the writing system we use now did not exist.

What's interesting is the difference between this example and yours. Differencce has nothing to do with right or wrong, perhaps except that it makes teaching and learning more difficult. Nevertheless, I support the difference.

Thanks for sharing.

Paiwan Every Day 668: pai

pai, kinemnemanga tiamadju tu kemacu tua ljigim nua kakinan.   Free translation : Now, they decided to take their mother's sewing needle...