self designations

Hey.

Today I found out what the Tepa called themselves, and I was
rather surprised. Alma Walker always referred to them in his
journals as 'Miamoquitch', which is obviously the Southern
Paiute /mia?mookkwI?tS/ 'little Hopi'. It seems that they only
ever referred to themselves as _wakakate sakenkiha_; this phrase
has the following parse:

    wakakate sakenkiha
    wa- ka<ka>te    s=   a=   0- kenki -ha
    1-  dwell<COLL> OBL= DET= 3- cliff -house

More or less, "We live in the house (pueblo) under the cliff."

The name Tepa apparently is my own invention, from the root
_tepa_ speech. While it may be an appropriate name for their
language, it won't do for the people anymore, I'm afraid.

What names do the speakers of your languages use to refer to
themselves? Are the names morphologically transparent? How did
these names come about?

Dirk

--
Dirk Elzinga                          dirk.elzinga@m.cc.utah.edu

"The strong craving for a simple formula
has been the undoing of linguists."               - Edward Sapir

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