Stepping through a course - Lesson 4

In this lesson, the notes I found in the forum http://anishinabemowin.21.forumer.com/ made little sense, considering the order in which the dialog was presented. I had to do a bit of digging for vocabulary. There's a great Ojibwe dictionary at Freelang that I have been using. They also have a downloadable dictionary, too.

I also took the liberty of rearranging some of the dialog from the original notes. They seemed to be out of order. There may even be dialog that's missing. I don't have the audio, so I can't be sure.

On with the dialog for Lesson Four.

Dialog -

M: Imbakade.
F: Ninisidotam. Ginisidotam na?
M: Henh. Ninisidotam.
* * * * * * * * * * * *
M: Giin na ginisidotam?
F: Henyanh. Ninisidotam niin.
M: Gaawiin niin. Ninisidotanziin.
F: Zhaaganaashi aawi.
* * * * * * * * * * * *
M: Anishinaabe-inini na a'aw?
F: Gaawiin. Anishinaabe-inini aawisii. Zhaaganaashi-inini a'aw.
* * * * * * * * * * * *
F: Zhaaganaashiikwe na a'aw?
M: Gaawiin. Zhaaganaashiikwe aawisii. Anishinaabe aawi.
F: Zhaaganaashi na gidaaw?
M: Gaawiin. Anishinaabe indaaw.
F: Giga-waabamin miinawaa.

Line by line breakdown:

M: Imbakade.

• This is a new word, a verb. The root form of the verb is "bakade", meaning "to be hungry". The "Im" attached to the beginning of the wor is "I". Remebber that because bakade begins with a "b", "in" becomes "im".

• So he's saying "I'm hungry."

F: Ginisidotam na?

• "isidotam" is the verb "to understand". "Gi" attached at the beginning is "you" and we also know that "na" is a question marker.

• So she is asking "Do you understand?"

M: Henh. Ninisidotam.

• We already know "henh" is how a man says "yes". We can also deduce from the above sentence that "Ninisidotam" means "I understand", since the "ni" attached at the beginning means "I".

• So he says 'Yes, I understand."

* * * * * * * * * * * *
M: Giin na ginisidotam?

• This is another way to ask "Do you understand?" It is considered more formal and usually used before the question is even asked.

F: Henyanh. Ninisidotam niin.

• And this would be the more formal response - "Yes (female). I understand."

M: Gaawiin niin. Ninisidotanziin.

• We already know that "gaawiin" is "no". We emphasize it with "niin" - "I" or "me". When we add "ziin" to the end of "ninisodotam".

• So his complete phrase is "No (not me). I don't understand."

* * * * * * * * * * * *
F: Zhaaganaashi aawi.

• This new word "zhaaganaashi" means "English" or "Anglo", but colloquially is used to mean any non-native or a white person. So she is saying "He/she is white (not of the people."

* * * * * * * * * * * *
M: Anishinaabe-inini na a'aw?

• We remember that "inini" attached to Anishinaabe makes the person male. The "a'aw" signifies "that one".

• So she is asking "Is that man Anishinaabe?"

F: Gaawiin. Anishinaabe-inini aawisii. Zhaaganaashi-inini a'aw.

• Further up we learned that by attaching "ziin" to a noun makes it negative. this is changed to "sii" when attached to a word that doesn't end in a hard consonant.

• So her answer is "No. That man isn't Anishinaabe. That man is white (not of the people)."

* * * * * * * * * * * *
Here's the conversation in reverse, and asking about a woman:

F: Zhaaganaashiikwe na a'aw?

• "Is that woman white (not of the people)?"

M: Gaawiin. Zhaaganaashiikwe aawisii. Anishinaabe aawi.

• "No. That woman isn't white (not of the people). That woman is Anishinaabe."

* * * * * * * * * * * *
To ask and answer in second and first persons, we use the words "gidaaw" and "indaaw" which we learned in Lesson One.

F: Zhaaganaashi na gidaaw?

• "Are you white (not of the people?"

M: Gaawiin. Anishinaabe indaaw.

• "No. I'm Anishinaabe."

So the new words we learned are:

• Bakade (imbakade) - To be hungry (I'm hungry)
• nisidotan (ninisidotam, ninisidotanziin, ginisidotam) - To understand (I understand, I don't understand, you understand)
• Zhaaganaashi (-inini, ikwe) - White, Anglo person (man, woman)
• a'aw - that one