As I was cleaning up the Barn Suite this afternoon I came across some paperback books with red covers (see photo to the right). I gave them to my wife once I learned what they were about. Here’s what ChatGPT said about them:
These are educational language resources from the Cowichan Tribes (Quw’utsun) on Vancouver Island.
Here’s what each book is:
- “Quw’utsun Hul’q’umi’num’ Category Dictionary” – a vocabulary reference organized by category (such as family, animals, nature, tools, etc.). It’s meant to support learners, teachers, and language revitalization workers in the Hul’q’umi’num’ dialect of the Halkomelem language, which is spoken by several Coast Salish peoples of southeastern Vancouver Island and the lower Fraser Valley.
- “Cowichan Tribes’ Beginning Hul’q’umi’num’: A Language Guide for Parents, Teachers and Learners” – this is an introductory textbook used in classrooms and community programs. It teaches pronunciation, sentence structure, greetings, and everyday phrases to help new learners start speaking and understanding the language.
Both books are produced by Quw’utsun Syuw’entst Lelum’ (Cowichan Tribes’ cultural education department). They’re part of the Coast Salish language revitalization movement, preserving and teaching one of British Columbia’s important Indigenous languages.
They’re not mass-market items, but usually distributed for educational or community use, especially in Hul’q’umi’num’ territory.
Our neighbor Carolyn went out by her sister-in-law to celebrate her birthday this evening. She needed someone to babysit her German Shepherd puppy Nishka (see photo to the left) so my wife volunteered. Nishka would play with us for a bit and then get tired and go nap for a bit. The love birds were chatting in the background and apparently Nishka pretty much ignores them, along with Barney the cat.
TalkPal had a FANTASTIC Black Friday Deal on their premium service so I signed up for only $4.11 per month. I will be using it to learn Tagalog and it has all the “AI Learning Features” enabled! If I spend only 15 minutes per day ChatGPT tells me I will be at the intermediate level of the language.