Exploring the Linguistic Influence of the Iroquois Nation
*This Language Log doubles as my Exploratory Writing for Project 3
I plan on writing a personal essay on how the Iroquois and their language has impacted the region of New York that I live in. This essay will likely have researched elements, as I do not currently feel prepared to write a 2,000 word essay on the topic, but the style will remain personal in nature, and I will take cues from our recent readings on how to incorporate sources without citing them as if the paper was a strictly academic piece. Because this essay should be 2,000 words and not too much larger, I will keep the conversation to how the Iroquois and their language impacted the societal and cultural development of Central Upstate New York rather than, say, the economic development of Central New York. This is a fairly complicated topic, and I believe that if I wanted to dive into the specifics and really research this, this paper could easily go on for 20,000 words, which is the primary reason why I am going to write a personal essay - the other reason being that this is likely one of the last times I will be able to write in such a style due to the nature of my course of study.
I want to take a look at the naming of places around where I live, as that is my primary personal connection with Iroquois culture. I really don’t even know where the Iroquois people even reside in modern day society, which is a topic I will get to later. Specifically I want to look at how Iroquois culture merged with Western culture to shape the unique culture of the region. A foreigner would find the names of towns, villages, counties, and lakes around Central New York quite odd, not just because they sound very Native American, but because a good deal of these names would not be incredibly culturally foreign to a Westerner. For instance, I live in a town called Skaneateles (pronounced Skinny - Atlas), which is clearly an Iroquois name, and it means “Long Lake” - and it is no coincidence that the town is settled on a lake with the same name. The next town over is called Marcellus, which is not Iroquois, but is instead a Roman name. The largest city in the region, Syracuse, is named after Syracuse, Italy, located in Sicily. Syracuse is also the county seat of Onondaga county, which is named after one of the five Iroquois nations that lived in the area. There are more examples I plan to explore in my paper in more detail.
Although I love history and would love to research and write about the history of the Iroquois people, especially because I am surprisingly unfamiliar with it, I do not think that I will write too much about their history for reasons related to word count. However, I do plan on researching Iroquois history fairly extensively for this essay in order to give a more accurate interpretation of how the Iroquois helped contribute to the unique culture of the region and to better differentiate what aspects of society in the Finger Lakes can be attributed to its original inhabitants. Like I mentioned earlier, I will not cite as if this was an academic piece, but that doesn’t mean I won’t do research and have any citations in order to create a better essay.
I plan on writing a personal essay on how the Iroquois and their language has impacted the region of New York that I live in. This essay will likely have researched elements, as I do not currently feel prepared to write a 2,000 word essay on the topic, but the style will remain personal in nature, and I will take cues from our recent readings on how to incorporate sources without citing them as if the paper was a strictly academic piece. Because this essay should be 2,000 words and not too much larger, I will keep the conversation to how the Iroquois and their language impacted the societal and cultural development of Central Upstate New York rather than, say, the economic development of Central New York. This is a fairly complicated topic, and I believe that if I wanted to dive into the specifics and really research this, this paper could easily go on for 20,000 words, which is the primary reason why I am going to write a personal essay - the other reason being that this is likely one of the last times I will be able to write in such a style due to the nature of my course of study.
I want to take a look at the naming of places around where I live, as that is my primary personal connection with Iroquois culture. I really don’t even know where the Iroquois people even reside in modern day society, which is a topic I will get to later. Specifically I want to look at how Iroquois culture merged with Western culture to shape the unique culture of the region. A foreigner would find the names of towns, villages, counties, and lakes around Central New York quite odd, not just because they sound very Native American, but because a good deal of these names would not be incredibly culturally foreign to a Westerner. For instance, I live in a town called Skaneateles (pronounced Skinny - Atlas), which is clearly an Iroquois name, and it means “Long Lake” - and it is no coincidence that the town is settled on a lake with the same name. The next town over is called Marcellus, which is not Iroquois, but is instead a Roman name. The largest city in the region, Syracuse, is named after Syracuse, Italy, located in Sicily. Syracuse is also the county seat of Onondaga county, which is named after one of the five Iroquois nations that lived in the area. There are more examples I plan to explore in my paper in more detail.
Although I love history and would love to research and write about the history of the Iroquois people, especially because I am surprisingly unfamiliar with it, I do not think that I will write too much about their history for reasons related to word count. However, I do plan on researching Iroquois history fairly extensively for this essay in order to give a more accurate interpretation of how the Iroquois helped contribute to the unique culture of the region and to better differentiate what aspects of society in the Finger Lakes can be attributed to its original inhabitants. Like I mentioned earlier, I will not cite as if this was an academic piece, but that doesn’t mean I won’t do research and have any citations in order to create a better essay.
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