Chinookan language
- noun
- /tʃɪˈnʊkən ˈlæŋɡwɪdʒ/
:
idioma chinookan
- The Chinook, who spoke the lower Chinookan dialect of the Chinookan language, lived on the north bank of the Columbia River.
Examples
-
Many words from the Chinookan language have been adopted into the regional English dialects of the Pacific Northwest.
-
The Chinookan language group includes several dialects spoken by the Native American tribes of the Pacific Northwest.
-
Linguists study the Chinookan language to understand the cultural heritage of the Chinook people.
Synonyms
A native language the Chinook people speak near the lower Columbia River
A language once spoken by the Native American people who lived near the mouth of the Columbia River
A Native American language that the Chinook people speak in the Pacific Northwest
Surface Forms
Morphology
The meaning is directly compositional: 'Chinookan' names the people/ethnic group or their speech and 'language' denotes a system of speech, so a learner who knows both constituents can infer this refers to the language spoken by the Chinook people. The '[X] language' construction is cross-linguistically common and follows a standard, transparent noun-noun naming pattern.
Etymology
Chinookan language names the speech of the Chinookan people who lived along the Columbia River in the Pacific Northwest. The word Chinookan points to the people and place and language means their way of speaking, so the phrase means 'the language spoken by that group'.
