Posted on 12/11/2022 3:03:52 AM PST by fluorescence
Vancouver’s Sir Matthew Begbie Elementary School has a new name. It’s now called wək̓ʷan̓əs tə syaqʷəm, which in English means “the sun rising over the horizon.”
The name is written in the Musqueam language hən̓q̓əmin̓əm̓, which uses the North American phonetic alphabet instead of the Latin alphabet used for English.
It was selected in collaboration with the Musqueam language and culture department in recognition of Vancouver’s Hastings Sunrise neighbourhood where the school is located, according to a news release Friday from the Vancouver school board.
As for the pronunciation of the new school name, the Musqueam Nation prefers not to provide an English pronunciation guide, and asks people to listen to it instead. People can listen to Musqeuam elder Larry Grant pronounce wək̓ʷan̓əs tə syaqʷəm on YouTube.
A shortened version of the name, wək̓ʷan̓əs Elementary, is grammatically correct and considered a respectful interpretation, according to school board. That word translates to “sun rising.”
The board and Musqueam nation held a renaming ceremony Friday for the school, at 3150 Kitchener St. in Vancouver. They also celebrated the completion of the new seismically safe school.
As part of the province’s seismic mitigation program, B.C. spent $22.4 million to replace the school. The original school was constructed 100 years ago.
“Hən̓q̓əmin̓əm̓ is the language our ancestors spoke for thousands of years, which was systematically taken from us to the point that there are no longer any fluent hən̓q̓əmin̓əm̓ speakers in Musqueam,” said Chief yəχʷyaχʷələq (Wayne Sparrow) in a statement provided from the school board. Article content
“Being asked to share our language with partners, and provide hən̓q̓əmin̓əm̓ names to replace names associated with colonization, is an important step toward rights recognition, reconciliation and hən̓q̓əmin̓əm̓ revitalization. Musqueam looks forward to continuing to strengthen our relationship with VSB and schools throughout our territory,” he added.
Board superintendent Helen McGregor said asking Musqueam to give the school a hən̓q̓əmin̓əm̓ name is one way for the school district to show its commitment to reconciliation.
“It increases the knowledge, awareness, appreciation of and respect for Musqueam history, language, tradition, culture and contributions,” she said.
The MLA for Vancouver—Hastings, Niki Sharma, said the collaboration between the Musqueam and the school district’s Indigenous education department on selecting the new name is an important example of reconciliation in schools.
“I’m looking forward to seeing how the new facility and name will support families and shape the wək̓ʷan̓əs tə syaqʷəm school community in the years to come,” said Sharma, in a statement.
According to the board, the new, seismically safe school was built with Canadian mass timber, a new type of engineered wood that reduces greenhouse gas emissions.
Begbie was B.C.’s first chief justice and a controversial figure known as the hanging judge after Tsilhqot’in chiefs, who thought they were attending peace negotiations, were seized and put on trial for murder in the 1800s.
During the Chilcotin War of 1864, several members of the Tsilhqot’in Nation killed workers constructing a road through their territory, according to the B.C. government. The attack and several other small skirmishes between this group and settlers in the area resulted in the deaths of 21 people. Article content
A colonial militia was formed and, soon after, several Tsilhqot’in members agreed to come to the militia camp for peace talks, according to the B.C. government. Instead, the peace party was seized and put on trial for murder. The trial was presided over by Begbie, who sentenced them to hang.
A sixth chief was later captured and hanged in New Westminster.
In 2014, premier Christy Clark apologized to the Tsilhqot’in people. In 2018, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau exonerated the chiefs and offered an apology to six of the current Tsilhqot’in Chiefs on the floor of the House of Commons.
F*ck Kanada.
So will "indigenous" kids be taught alien western rationalism and scientific materialism, or will they be taught their own mythologies as historical truth?
Using the white mans alphabet is cultural appropriation.
Your ESG score will suffer if you mispronounce that name.
In Israel, signs are in Hebrew, Arabic and English. And where I live, also in Russian. But people actually speak those languages, as well as French, Amharic and Yiddish. So they kept it down to three. The only language that was aggressively pushed was Hebrew, revived from being a purely liturgical and scholarly language to colloquial. The only language that was aggressively suppressed was Yiddish, but it’s still around, so that failed.
Lately, Eastern Christians have taken a hankering to speaking Aramaic again, since the Palestinian Authority’s behavior in Bethlehem and Beit Jaleh has thoroughly alienated them from continuing to identify as “Palestinian Christians,” so a lot of them are dropping Arabic as a lingua franca in favor of Aramaic.
Demographics of Vancouver: 46% Asian (principally Chinese, Phillippino), 43% White, 3% Black, 2% Indigenous. So whose Idea was this? A Black “diversity consultant” from Ottowa. The school board on the other hand is snowflake white:
Elementary education • Kristie Lindholm • 360-313-1010
Secondary education • Jim Gray • 360-313-1011
Special education • Daniel Bettis • 360-313-1250
Human resources • Kathy Everidge • 360-313-1080
Nutrition services • Mari Ovens • 360-313-1190
Transportation • Grace Elligott • 360-313-4800
Safety • Dave Bennett • 360-313-1044
Communications office • Pat Nuzzo • 360-313-1230
Education ombuds • Rachel Cason • 360-313-1187
Any of these sound like Asian names to you? First Nations?
(I kinda got a chuckle about the nutrition services member “Marry Ovens.”)
I’m for whatever people actually want to speak.
In the eastern third of The Ukraine, that was Russian, and suppressing the Russian language after the U.S. sponsored Maidan Coup (not taught in schools, not used in any govt buildings/official proceedings) is a big part of the reason for the current war. It formalized that Russians were 2nd-class citizens in Ukraine, from east to west and north to south.
If you have to make up a new alphabet out of whole cloth, instead of phoneticizing one of the in-use alphabets, betrays the “divide and conquer” strategy.
Good grief, the English conquered Ireland and supplanted Irish with English, but Irish is so hard to learn, even the Irish stick with English. And Roman letters.
I remember an old joke that “Waxahachie” means “watch your step” (the settler was about to step in a cow pad).
Believe it or not, Ripley asserted that when a British explorer pointed at a bouncing local animal and said “What do you call that?”, one of the Aboriginals replied in his native dialect “Kan ga roo”, which means “I don’t understand.”
There can be one official state language, or more. And that is no contradiction to people speaking whatever language they’re most comfortable with among themselves. In Europe, Latin was once the official language everywhere. And every region had its own lingua franca, which was whatever it was.
I went to Begbie in the sixties. Grade 3 through 6. I remember the big picture of the hanging judge in the hallway by the office. It was a beautiful old school. I do believe it was torn down a year or two ago and replaced. Looks like they have replaced more than the structure :(
I do:
Whiskey Tango Foxtrot...
They have no written language, in the real world that means they are turd world and proud of it.
It is like what the non-african blks say, it is not impotent what was said, but the tone brah.
Apparently this school is not located in some remote area where the students speak the language used for the name (Musqueam). It’s in the city of Vancouver — map (https://i.imgur.com/pJ5mQf8.jpg). That’s an old map. Now cartographers will have to contend with the new name (along with everybody else).
Man, I miss that guy. One of the all time greats on SNL. He carried that show for many seasons.
Isqueam
Yousqueam
We Musqueam
For Isqueam.
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