Talk:Tsilhqotʼin

Linguistic redundancy

 * ''The name Tsilhqut’in is derived from the Chilcotin name for themselves: Tŝinlhqot’in.

Huh? I gather that may originally have been "The name Chilcotin is derived from the Chilcotin name for themselves: Chilcotin" with the rider that Tŝinlhqot’in is only ONE possible spelling according to different spellings systems; Tsilhqut’in is simply another, as is Tsilhqot’in which is the usual transliteration of this name in English, i.e. when it's not "Chilcotin". The pretentiousness of the orthographic game played by native-language politicos and linguists gets tiresome when so many near-misses are presented as if "correct", while an anglicization like "Chilcotin" is for some reason considered incorrect....even though it's pronounced darned-near the same way. My main beef with the sentence quoted above is it's a non-sequitur; there's such marginal difference between Tsilhqut'in and Tsinhlhqot'in that it makes the sentence rather pointless; especially when the meaning "people of the ochre-coloured earth" is absent. Add in the reality that "the Chilcotin name" itself is a phrase meaning "the Chilcotin language word for"; you'd think the Tsilhqot'in name for the language would be used in such a p.c.-environment. The issue also remains here of recent edits with the Tsilhqut'in spelling, vs. the usual Tsilhqot'in.Skookum1 00:39, 16 December 2006 (UTC)
 * I agree. We have every possibly spelling for these people in the first line.  This sentence doesn't need to really be there.  OldManRivers 21:14, 3 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Thx for popping by; this page is really old and mirrors a lot of what's on Chilcotin District; both need rewriting and this one needs a lot more proper ethno content; but I got stuck on that line - not stuck exactly, more like put off - and will be bold and revise/delete what's out of place here, and also try and flesh out the ethno content as best I can, so this isn't about the Chilcotin Country as it currently is. BTW to OMR do you see the kind of thing here I was on about when we had our first encounters over Squamish/Skwxwu7mesh?  The hard part with all this stuff is deciding on what the primary spelling should be, in this case Tsilhqo'tin but often individual bands may have different ways of spelling their local groups, varying from their own website to a different version on the tribal council website, still another on the treaty directories; I went through this with the Wuikinuxv (Owekeeno) and Oowekyala-Wuikyala language articles and others - note there that two different spelling systems are used between the ethno page and the language page; because the language page was started first, mostly, and Wuikinuxv was a much later creation (otherwise I would have titled Wuikyala instead of making it a redirect).  Secwepemctsin and Syilx'tsn and Nlaka'pamuxtsin at least have standard spellings, and I'll never get used to that plosive-t /t'/ in St'at'imcets/Stl'atl'imxts; similar issues gonna crop up with Halkomelem names I think, plus/and/or all their English variants.Skookum1 23:27, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

And just a quick note - that "Tsilhqut’in" spelling brings to mind the hokey/cowboy way to say Chilcotin - ChilCOOtin, or ChilliCOOTin. Who knows, it might even be more accurate.Skookum1 23:32, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

Requested move

 * The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section. 

The result of the move request was: Moved. Nathan Johnson (talk) 19:21, 25 May 2013 (UTC) Chilcotin people → Tsilhqot'in – Moving this to its current title in June 2011 was not only controversial, and should have been a proper RM rather than a speedy move (by User:Kwamikagami as was the case. He cited COMMONNAME and ENGLISH as the rationale, but the latter does not apply, as CANENGL applies (whatever the proper wiki-shorthand for "using Canadian English in Canadian articles", and "Tsilhqot'in" is now the standard in Canadian English and is so-used by the media and both local and national media to refer to these people; it's also obviously used on most of the cites given, including the Tsilhqot'in National Government's webpage at http://www.tsilhqotin.ca. It doesn't matter if the ethnolinguistic community outside of Canada see "Chilcotin" as the most common name; it's not in Canada, and is considered by the people themselves "a white man's usage".....they also use it to distinguish themselves from the other uses of Chilcotin. If this name change stands - and it never should have been allowed IMO - then the complications of renaming Category:Tsilhqot'in will follow, as they have for what is now Category:Squamish; perhaps the templates have also been affeced, which means TfDs...all because someone pulled a speedy without considering the consequences, and by mis-citing COMMONNAME and ENGLISH....ever heard of MOSFOLLOW? This is not the only case of such ill-advised and arbitrary imposition of "outside language" on Canadian topics, particularly on FN/indigenous topics. Indigenous endonyms are now common fare in Canadian English and are, in fact, the expected standard. Oh, for the sake of argument, the google stats for "Tshilhqot'in" are phttps://www.google.co.th/search?q=tsilhqot'in&aq=f&oq=tsilhqot'in&aqs=chrome.0.57j0l3.4644&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8 42,700] - for "Chilcotin people" they're only 6,740. Skookum1 (talk) 12:39, 10 May 2013 (UTC)


 * Oppose per WP:COMMONALITY if nothing else. Many people have heard of the "Chilcotin". Hardly anyone has heard of the "Tsilhqot'in", which AFAICT does not even have an English pronunciation.
 * ENGVAR, btw, is about orthography and punctuation. — kwami (talk) 06:09, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
 * It's pretty much the same pronunciation, given that most anglophones who aren't from the area don't know how to make the 'lh' sound or to make a 'thin' "ch" that the "tsilh" part requires. "Many people" you have yet to cite for any of these RMs though you make that claim repeatedly, despite the obvious facts demonstrated by the google results given.  "many people" haven't heard of the "Chilcotin region" either.....do you want that translated to "people of the red ochre river region" to anglicize it? your attitude is incredibly parochial and colonialist and insensitive to the current cultural polity in Canada, given the preponderance the "Tsilhqot'in" usage their own organizations use, and this terms prevalence in Canadian media and academic as well.Skookum1 (talk) 06:50, 11 May 2013 (UTC)

Tsilhqot'in /tsɪlˈkoːtɪn/ ▶ noun 1. a member of an Athapaskan people inhabiting the basin of the Chilcotin River valley, between the Coast Mountains and the Fraser River in BC. 2. the Athapaskan language of this people. ▶ adjective of or relating to this people or their culture or language. Origin: Tsilhqot'in, = ‘ochre river people’, in reference to red and yellow mineral substances used for dyes.
 * Support move to restore: An ethnic group should be called what THEY want to be called, not some basically racist name imposed upon them by outsiders. It isn't an WP:ENGLISH issue, we aren't talking about Munich versus München here, we are talking about an express decision by the people so labeled.  (This is akin to proerly saying "African-Ameican" as opposed to something more archaic or offensive...)  Montanabw (talk) 23:53, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Support: Also Chilcotin language → Tsilhqot'in language. --Kmoksy (talk) 00:12, 12 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Oppose Naming conventions (use English). If there is no way to pronounce it in English - it is not a good English Language Wikipedia article title. Rmhermen (talk) 00:57, 12 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Comment Neither are Tuktoyaktuk, Iqaluit, Chibougamau, Sheshatshiu, Antigonish, Keremeos, Tsawwassen or, for that matter, reaching far outside of List of aboriginal placenames in Canada, are Lac la Hache or Craigellachie. And none fit "English" pronunciation "rules" either, but are all part of Canadian English (other than the French one, I defy you to pronounced those for me, maybe you'll get Tuktoyaktuk which is kinda easy, but "Craigellachie" you won't, unless you speak Scots Gaelic...or know the place.  You know, that other form of English in North America, the one where aboriginal endonyms are no commonplace and "standard".....when English-language organization names include such as Tsilhqot'in and the normal media usage when referring to the people is the same (to distinguish them from the region named for them), who are you to say it's not English?  I could provide you a host of article-names, and not just from Canada, that are not English in origin and which don't have obvious English pronunciations - but which are used in English.  The chauvinism towards endonyms "not being English" is remarkable to me, especially given the historical background to these and other FN peoples, many of whom still alive had their native languages and names beaten out of them as children for not speaking English or having English names imposed upon them.  The revival of the native languages in Canada also meant, for them, the right to call themselves what they want and to use those names in English.  There's a bunch of now-legal names resulting from the Nisga'a Treaty like Gingolx (another one that's decidedly not English, its "anglicization" was Kincolith.  Gitanmaax is the legal, in-use name of Old Hazelton, same as Port Simpson, British Columbia is Lax Kw'alaams and in use by the media; the name "Port Simpson" is just not heard anymore.  Sechelt and Ucluelet also come to mind, among, wow, dozens of others, if not hundreds.  Imposing "global standards" of "what is English" when Canadian English has accepted and absorbed these usages and treats them as the norm is not for you to decided is wrong, or to insist on the imposition of global English on Canadian terms.  Pangnirtung, Shubenacadie, Eddontenajon........and re people names the Tsuu T'ina are no longer called the Blood Indians; Anishinaabe is a huge hierarchy of articles and titles with native-only names.  Same with Gitxsan which is "normal English" in Canada now, and there is no English name (a "more English" spelling is Gitksan, which is now out of date; the name means "People of the Skeena River" ('Ksan which is also the name of one of their main historic towns and a national heritage site).  The name Tsimshian also means "people of the Skeena River" but in a different (though related) language.  Then there's Wuikinuxv, the latest transliteration of Owekeeno, who in English were known as the Rivers Inlet people or, incorrectly, as the Northern Kwakiutl (also not an English word).  Then there's Slavey and Dogrib, older English forms no longer in use for the names of the peoples where those will redirect to "Tli Cho" for one of them,  I think.Skookum1 (talk) 03:13, 12 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Well, I was wrong about Slavey, who are the Sahtu or Deh Cho, depending on which group, and who don't refer to themselves by the usual English "Slavey" or "Slave"....I looked to see if that article-name had been changed, it hasn't, but it says straightout in it that they prefer to call themselves Dene; I added a citation tag to the claim that "Dene.....is not of much use in English". The gall and chauvinism around this attitude throughout these discussions, apparently coming from the ethnolinguistic community who you'd think would be more sensitive to Aboriginal English and native sensibilities is really quite shocking.Skookum1 (talk) 03:40, 12 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Support: Skookum1 is correct that there are English-based organizations that are referenced, known, and used with the term Tsilhqot'in. I support this move. OldManRivers (talk) 03:23, 12 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Support move to restore: per nomination, and beginning to get a little tired of RMs to revert undiscussed moves of this sort that fail to take into account acceptance of indigenous names in recent English publications, including recent Indian place name RMs. In ictu oculi (talk) 05:06, 12 May 2013 (UTC)
 * I've just written a contact at the BC Ministry of the Attorney General's "Counsel General of British Columbia" office, whose citation helped resolve the hyphen vs. en-dash problem with the items in Category:Regional districts of British Columbia about what their style guides and standards may/probably do exist for native names. Will take a day or two for a reply, as it's Saturday night in Victoria.  Someone in one of these RMs said official names don't count in Wikipedia; to me that's hotly contestible when the preponderance of all government materials, and as reflected in national and local media usage, is not in favour of "Wikipedia doesn't have to pay attention to official names".....a guideline that sorely needs revisiting.  A section on indigenous names/terms clearly has to be added to ENGVAR's Canada section.Skookum1 (talk) 05:15, 12 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Oppose. Not English. --JorisvS (talk) 09:44, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Comment "Not English" is totally wrong, it may not be your English, but these names are the new norm in Canadian English and have been for a good twenty years and more. 'Ksan and Gingolx aren't "normal" English either, nor is Nuu-chah-nulth or Kwakwaka'wakw or Mi'kmaq or Inuit or Sto:lo, yet these are all common in Canadian English.  You know, us funny folks that say "aboot" and use "-re" on "centre" and "-our" on "labour" and such.....and we embrace, including officially, indigenous words all the time...have a look at List of aboriginal place names in Canada and check it out.  I suppose your position is that the Nisga'a article should be moved to the archaic Nishga people, too, huh?Skookum1 (talk) 10:06, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Comment User:Capmo has provided for the Shuswap/Secwepemc RM two of these links; the third I found for the Kutenai/Ktunaxa RM and it applies across the board and is also from the Ministry of Education like one of the two provided by Capmo:
 * Pronunciation Guide to First Nations in British Columbia, Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development Canada
 * Pronunciation Guide, BC Ministry of Education, resource docs.
 * Pronunciation guide on map used by BC Ministry of Education, and don't bitch that it's a map of native peoples with their native names; that's a fact of the curriculum in English-language education in BC.
 * That not enough for you? Any more irrelevant excuses to adjudge these words as not being part of English usage in BC (in education, forestry, health, parks and regional/municipal governance as well as media and common speech).Skookum1 (talk) 09:38, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Support move - Concurring strongly  with User:Montanabw. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 11:29, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Comment This essay on the federal government's Translation Bureau cite discusses the "rise of the endonyms" in recent decades and is relevant to this discussion, though it doesn't mention the Tshilqot'in though it does mention the Secwepemc, Nlaka'pamux, Ktunaxa and St'at'imc.Skookum1 (talk) 12:18, 17 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Support move per my comments here.(olive (talk) 14:34, 17 May 2013 (UTC))
 * Oppose. As noted above, the name of the Chilcotin is well known, but the name of the Tshilqot'in is obscure.  Wait until this spelling gains much more currency in common publications than is demonstrated by links provided as arguments for moving.  Nyttend (talk) 20:21, 17 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Comment "Chilcotin" is indeed well-known as the primary usage for the region. The Tsilhqot'in spelling does have currency.  Maybe not in Indiana or Australia or Japan, but it certainly does in Canada, and particularly in the region in question (meaning BC, not the Chilcotin region).  How many citations from BC media and the various "national" sites of the Tsilhqot'in people themselves is it going to take for this "gains more currency" argument to be put to bed?Skookum1 (talk) 09:09, 18 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Support And as I've been doing on other pages like this, here's the relevant entry from the Canadian Oxford Dictionary, 2nd. edition, 2004. Interesting to me how they don't even say "formerly Chilcotin" or "also known as Chilcotin", as they do for similar entries on indigenous people. Pfly (talk) 20:32, 17 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Comment I've just received a reply from author and reporter Terry Glavin, who used to write for the Vancouver Sun and is a very notable writer on First Nations and other aboriginal issues. This is a direct quote from his reply: "What a profoundly exotic line of argument, and against this? "The St'at'imc, Tshilqot'in, Secwepemc, Ktunaxa and Nlaka'pamux names, if not so much Skwxwu7mesh, are now a standard part of Canadian English and the accepted norms." That sentence is completely and unambiguously and (one would have thought) uncontroversially true. These (except for perhaps Skwxwu7mesh, I don't specifically recall) were the correct spellings at the Vancouver Sun while I was covering aboriginal affairs more than 20 years ago for goodness sake. The Vancouver Sun isn't exactly a linguistics newsletter."  The profoundly exotic line of argument he's referring to is the "it's not English because nobody knows how to pronounce it" and "we don't do official names" criticisms of the proposed version(s).  Also received a note from my CBC reporter contact that the CBC's name/pronunciation system is an internal database and can't be linked/quoted easily.  Still awaiting word from the Counsel-General (who's back at work today) and CTV.  But between federal and provincial government citations and documents, two or three crown corps, munis/RDs and the government sites of the peoples themselves, I have yet to see any citation proving the other claim that the archaic/discredited names are "most common" or that "these terms don't belong in English-language Wikipedia".Skookum1 (talk) 06:15, 21 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Comment I've received a reply about these matters from the BC Attorney General's ministry's Legislative Program Coordinator in the Office of the Counsel General, who is responsible for the government's style and usage guide. I'll quote it verbatim rather than try to summarize it, and she pretty much covers all the ground, including cites, I've already posted here and elsewhere.
 * ''As we know, orthography is a system used to standardize how a particular language is written. The problem with aboriginal languages has a lot to do with three things. The first is that the aboriginal peoples did not have a written language, it was all oral and their history was passed down through their stories. The second point is missionaries were the ones to write down the language. They created the written form while sitting there and listening, and applied this method to all aboriginal languages . While this is not entirely accurate, I would suggest that phonetics sometimes had their place, as has Anglicization of words. The third point is that though some have adopted the international phonetic alphabet, there are many in British Columbia that have their own orthographies. There is an interesting description of “current” versus “other” names at this page: http://maps.fphlcc.ca/language_index_other


 * ''The B.C. Government, through the Ministry of Aboriginal Relations and Reconciliation and the Ministry of Education, has recognized the rights of First Nations to develop and educate their children in traditional languages. A common goal in B.C. and other jurisdictions is promote self-government. Of interest to this issue would be these pages—
 * First Peoples’ Cultural Council under Ministry of Aboriginal Relations and Reconciliation http://www.gov.bc.ca/arr/cultural/fcf/language.html


 * B.C. Language Initiative under Ministry of Aboriginal Relations and Reconciliation http://www.gov.bc.ca/arr/cultural/fcf/bcli.html
 * The link on the this page doesn’t work, but here is a related link: http://maps.fphlcc.ca/ and specific to languages: http://maps.fphlcc.ca/language_index


 * ''In addition, when my office is working with aboriginal names and naming, it is necessary to have the orthographic character as used by that aboriginal peoples. While my office works with Queen’s Printer for this, we do often refer to sites like this one to find what we need: http://www.languagegeek.com/index.html The purpose, of course, is respect for the First Nations peoples language and sensitivities. This is often a negotiated thing, particularly with parks, conservancies and reserves.


 * ''There is a statute that guides British Columbia: First Peoples’ Heritage, Language and Culture Act, see section 6. Under this Act is the establishment of the First Peoples’ Cultural Council. The website for the Crown Corporation: http://www.fpcc.ca/, I think you will find this page most interesting: http://www.fpcc.ca/about-us/Publications/


 * ''And if you’re looking for examples of usage of regionalism, go to the Protected Areas of British Columbia Act, where you will find names that identify parks, conservancies and reserves that are in both regional and aboriginal references.

From that point on she lists park names that exist either in both languages (whichever language it is), legally and formally, and some that have only native names; it's a set of HTML boxes, most reflected already in Category:Provincial parks of British Columbias many titles. If anyone needs "proof" of this email or thinks I fictionalized it, "email this user" and I will gladly forward it.Skookum1 (talk) 06:49, 22 May 2013 (UTC)
 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

point of information from IP user
This was placed in the RM box, re-adding it here, IP user: "

I would suggest that the Tl’etinqox Nation is not Alexis Creek, it is Anaham. The Tsi Del Del First Nation was forced from Alexis Creek to Redstone in the early 1900's, due to the farmland around Alexis Creek being so good and that is why Tsi Del Del is sometimes known as Alexis Creek. Tl’etinqox have always lived many km away from Alexis Creek, down the river. Also, Tatla Lake is another (white) community in the Chilcotin. The surrounding area of Tatla Lake probably has a larger (white) population than Alexis Creek now." I'll try and fix that part, or another user also more familiar with the area will (User:Tatlayoko, who I'll notify just now.Skookum1 (talk) 06:09, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

IPA is wrong
the -teen ending is very wrong (/tʃɪlˈkoʊtiːn/ chil-koh-teen; maybe in the Tsilhqot'in language it's "teen" as with some other Athapaskan peoples, but in real-world usage in BC it's "-tin" as in the metal; or glottal-stop-n as often in Canada where we "swallow" the /t/ to a glottal stop as in Edmon7n.  I don't know IPA enough to fix that; surprised I never noticed it before; the First Peoples of BC citation for the name has the Tsilhqot'in language pronunciation, not how it's used in English.  I'll change the basic one, not sure what IPA character to replace [i:] with.  Who added that anyways?`Skookum1 (talk) 06:05, 29 June 2014 (UTC)

Assessment comment
Substituted at 01:16, 22 May 2016 (UTC)