Re: self designations

dirk elzinga wrote:

> What names do the speakers of your languages use to refer to
> themselves? Are the names morphologically transparent? How did
> these names come about?
The Tokana call themselves "Tokana"--in fact, they adopt "Tokana" as
a surname when dealing with other peoples (not unlike the use of
"Singh" by Sikhs).

The name "Tokana" is not morphologically transparent, and is of
uncertain origin.  The Tokana themselves believe that their name is
derived from the root "tok" = "bird of prey", found in words such as
"hitokan" = "hawk" and "kotetok" = "black eagle" (the Tokana name
for the constellation Orion).  However, this is probably just a folk
etymology.  More likely, the "toka" part is a shortening of "te
oka", which means "the people".

Matt.