Words
Every time I hear someone utter the euphemism "enhanced interrogation techniques," I feel their soul die a little. I am forced to scream obscenities to protect my own soul.
For twenty years I've thought that Robyn was from the Grovon tribe, which I figured was a word from their language. Just this morning Google taught me that she's actually saying Gros Ventre, and Wikipedia explains that, "Gros Ventre is a name that was given to the people by the French who misinterpreted their sign language." (I know that "gros" means big, but what does "ventre" mean?) I also learned that the writer James Welch is Gros Ventre. His Winter in the Blood was too downbeat for words when I read it in college, but I've always been curious about his later novel, Fool's Crow, which is apparently a magical realist novel set in the 19th century American West and imagining the world as perceived by a Native American of that era. It's also interesting to read the description of Winter in the Blood at the link above to see how perspectives can differ: "Welch's first novel is extraordinarily depressing for white readers. My American Indian students at the University of North Dakota, on the other hand, thought it was very funny, which in itself is a lesson in cultural relativism. And they felt that it accurately represented reservation life in the Northern Plains region, which was the land and life most of them knew intimately."
For twenty years I've thought that Robyn was from the Grovon tribe, which I figured was a word from their language. Just this morning Google taught me that she's actually saying Gros Ventre, and Wikipedia explains that, "Gros Ventre is a name that was given to the people by the French who misinterpreted their sign language." (I know that "gros" means big, but what does "ventre" mean?) I also learned that the writer James Welch is Gros Ventre. His Winter in the Blood was too downbeat for words when I read it in college, but I've always been curious about his later novel, Fool's Crow, which is apparently a magical realist novel set in the 19th century American West and imagining the world as perceived by a Native American of that era. It's also interesting to read the description of Winter in the Blood at the link above to see how perspectives can differ: "Welch's first novel is extraordinarily depressing for white readers. My American Indian students at the University of North Dakota, on the other hand, thought it was very funny, which in itself is a lesson in cultural relativism. And they felt that it accurately represented reservation life in the Northern Plains region, which was the land and life most of them knew intimately."