Neal McLeod: Cree Word Study 5.30.2013

Stolen (with all appropriate reverence) from Neal McLeod‘s Facebook feed:
most-: stem morpheme: by itself, plain, straight forward

derived from Arok Wolvengrey’s “nêhiyawêwin itwêwina” (all mistakes are mine and due to my poetic irreverence)

mostakocîs: automobile [mosta- by itself + kocî- to move]; literally the thing that moves itself. semantically, this is similar to sêhkêpayis (which is “the thing that moves itself- derived from “sêhkê”- car and “payi” to move. “mosta” and “sêhkê” (I think it is a stem now that is no longer used widely) are overlapping morphemes. “mostapayis” is also another possible word for automobile. as well as “sêhkêkocîs.”

mostâskamik: on the surface of the ground mostastâ: to place something on the ground; could also mean “to place something in a straight forward manner”

mostawê; mostamo: to say something in a straight forward manner mostawisitwâwi: to act in a straight forward manner; could be a way to translate “straight shooter”

mostamîcisowin: plain, bland food mostapihcikê: to make something bare; plain, even clear (*could be used to describe the colonization process)

mostapêkasê: to be nude mostapêkasê-tâpasinahikê: to draw from a nude (e.g. art school) mostapêkasêwasinahikan: those magazines you find under your uncles’ shop

mostapêkikâtê: to be bare legged mostapêkispitone: to have bare arms

mostapêkicihcê: to have bare hands

mostawâpoy: a straight forward, pre-Starbucks cup of Joe

don’t write essays about WHY indigenous languages are important; just USE them

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