Poem: "His Fearsome Horse"

[ysabetwordsmith]

This is spillover from the April 7, 2015 Poetry Fishbowl. It was inspired by a prompt from mama_kestrel. It also fills the "phobias" square on my 3-16-15 card for the genprompt_bingo fest. Based on an audience poll, it has been sponsored by the general fund.


"His Fearsome Horse"


Once there was an Oglala warrior
so skilled in battle that he was named
Tȟašúŋke Kȟokípȟapi, because
his enemies feared him so much
that they would run away from his horse,
even if he was not on it.

But the wašíču translators did not
understand or respect his name.

They rendered it as Man-Afraid-of-His-Horse,
or worse yet, shortened it to Man-Afraid,
hiding the true meaning.

Other times they made it
His-Horses-Are-Afraid,
which was hardly better.

People thought -- as perhaps
they were meant to think --
that he was a coward.

The bad translation made him sound bad,
combing causality in the wrong direction.

Later on, a better translation emerged:
They-Fear-Even-His-Horses.

By then the damage had been done, though,
and people remembered the funny name instead of
the great warrior and brilliant negotiator
sitting on his fearsome horse.

Now Láadan has words upon words
for language and the handling of it:

héedan -- to translate

rahéedan -- to mistranslate

rahéelhedan -- to mistranslate,
deliberately and with evil intent.

While there is no proving a crime
committed so long in the past,
a look across the many mistranslations
of tribal names does make a good case
for either incompetence or malice
or some combination of both.

Speak, then, of Tȟašúŋke Kȟokípȟapi,
They-Fear-Even-His-Horses,
or if you must have a shorter form,
Fearsome Horse.

Speak, and let history be restored.

* * *

Notes:

Read about Tȟašúŋke Kȟokípȟapi.  The Dakota-Nakota-Lakota Human Rights Coalition cites him as Chief Young Man Afraid Of His Horses.  I favor original language names myself, but where there's a tribal consensus, I'll back them for public use purposes and reserve my personal preference for my own writing.

Wašíču is a rude word for the European invaders and their descendants.

Comments

[redsixwing]

Learned a thing today; thank you. This is beautiful and sad and educational all at once.

(And Wikipedia notes that the mistranslation is a mistranslation and then uses it all through the document. GRAH.)

Wikipedia

[dialecticdreamer]

Has been proven to be biased and slow to correct itself. This just gives us all a fresh peek behind the curtain!

Re: Wikipedia

[redsixwing]

True, but that rarely stops my annoyance levels from increasing when I find another example.

Re: Wikipedia

[ysabetwordsmith]

Yes, that's true, but in this case an accurate representation of the widespread cultural bias. Notice that all other cultures have their names transliterated into vernacular text, not (mis)translated. It's just tribal people who aren't allowed to use their real names, which is bullshit.

Me, I'm fussy about my name. I don't want it altered. I take a new one when I'm learning a new language. That's the standard for good foreign language classes. My Japanese class wouldn't do it, and I got into a big fight over that. Stubborn bard is stubborn.

And remembers shit like this from tribal issues, so.

Re: Wikipedia

[dialecticdreamer]

Is there a way for /me/ to fight that bias which doesn't come across as cultural appropriation? See, I don't have a lot of the cultural ties which could have come with the bloodline, and that makes me VERY aware of how others would perceive my efforts as /encroaching/ rather than supporting.

Re: Wikipedia

[ysabetwordsmith]

Yes. Find out whatever tribal folks are lobbying for -- land rights, not having their children kidnapped by the government, getting healthcare, changing the racist mascots/names of sport teams, protecting important plants/animals, language survival, etc. -- and back them. Boost the signal. Donate funds. Vote accordingly.

Watch for projects by tribal people and support those. Some of the artisans and other creative folks are getting into crowdfunding now. I've seen a steady trickle of film and animation from this direction. There's a superhero one but even the trailer creeped me the fuck out. ("Every superhero has a weakness ... what's yours?") So it's fun to watch and see what happens.

Re: Wikipedia

[dialecticdreamer]

Family survival, languages, and land rights FAR outweigh sports team BS in my book. I'm going to start there. Plus, there are charities specifically for places like Pine Ridge Reservation, which I've already studied.

Re: Wikipedia

[ysabetwordsmith]

>> Family survival, languages, and land rights FAR outweigh sports team BS in my book. <<

Pick what overlaps your interest. There is plenty of activism to go around for everyone!

>> I'm going to start there. Plus, there are charities specifically for places like Pine Ridge Reservation, which I've already studied. <<

:D Pine Ridge is "my" reservation: the one we visited when I was younger, because we have (distant but meaningful to us) marriage ties there. So I keep the closest watch on that one.

Thoughts

[ysabetwordsmith]

>> Learned a thing today; thank you. This is beautiful and sad and educational all at once.<<

Yay! That's what I was aiming for.

>> (And Wikipedia notes that the mistranslation is a mistranslation and then uses it all through the document. GRAH.) <<

I can understand them citing the name that is in most books so people will recognize it. But after that, it should be corrected if they're going to translate it at all, instead of using his real name as is done for all other languages.

Maybe a wiki editor will fix this.

Names

[dialecticdreamer]

I get annoyed when people cannot spell my given name. I don't expect many to know the original Hebrew word it's derived from, or the implied meaning as a result.

But I expect them to /try/ to get it right.

That there's STILL a problem with a reference citing the /mistranslation/ decades after it was first corrected, well, that says a lot about why it's hard to break down cultural barriers in certain parts of the US. (And frankly, makes me wonder how my great-grandparents even MARRIED.)

Still thinking about meanings and implications...

Re: Names

[ysabetwordsmith]

>> I get annoyed when people cannot spell my given name. I don't expect many to know the original Hebrew word it's derived from, or the implied meaning as a result.

But I expect them to /try/ to get it right. <<

For me it's the last name.

And last night's dance performance? In the program book one of the guys is named Woodrow Dick, III ... and goes by Woody.

>> That there's STILL a problem with a reference citing the /mistranslation/ decades after it was first corrected, well, that says a lot about why it's hard to break down cultural barriers in certain parts of the US. (And frankly, makes me wonder how my great-grandparents even MARRIED.) <<

Yes, it's a problem.

Re: Names

[technoshaman]

So tell me about your name. I know what it *is*, I don't know what it *means*, and since (*admires new ring*) I have a rather strong connection to Jewish culture myself, I'd like to know....

Re: Names

[dialecticdreamer]

My given name is Sarah, from the Hebrew word for "princess"-- and here in California, the 'h' has apparently begun migrating to other positions in the word, at random. I spell it for the person, they write or type SOMETHING, and I get official mail -including, memorably, the DMV(!!!) which spells it everything from Shara, Sahra, Sarha, and the ubiquitous 'Sara.' NONE of those are my name, and for bills, medical and legal documents like the DMV, I have had to go MULTIPLE rounds to insisit upon corrections.

Even when spelling it out letter by letter and insisting they read it BACK to me, I get at least one error a year that MUST be fixed.

Follow his own people's usage

[thnidu]

I'm a wiki editor, and after reading this discussion I went to the page.

The only section on the talk page of the article is titled Move to a correctly translated name version. Here's my addition to that discussion:
=====

Oppose. I saw discussion of this issue outside Wikipedia and came here for a look, intending a possible change. Having read this discussion and copyedited the article, I now oppose the change. The Dakota-Lakota-Nakota Human Rights Advocacy Coalition is one of the three external links for this article, and their page on him is titled "Young Man Afraid Of His Horses". However noble our motivation, we are not — at least, I am not — of his people, and if we wish to be their allies, we should not second-guess them.
=====
Note that the article lists and discusses alternate translations, including the more accurate ones, in the infobox and the lede paragraph. I've also redistributed the boldface in that paragraph to emphasize the accurate translations of the name.

Re: Follow his own people's usage

[ysabetwordsmith]

Thanks for looking it up. I don't particularly agree, but if there's a consensus on the tribal side, I'm not inclined to oppose that in public. I can still follow my own preference in my own writing. *ponder* But I will include that footnote.

Re: Follow his own people's usage

[thnidu]

PS: There are redirects to that page from the following pages:

• Chief Young Man Afraid of His Horses
• His Horses Are Afraid
• Man Afraid Of His Horses
• They Even Fear His Horses
• They Fear Even His Horses
• Young Man Afraid Of His Horse
• Young Man Afraid of His Horses
• Young Man Afraid of his Horse
• Young-Man-Afraid-Of-His-Horses

Re: Follow his own people's usage

[ysabetwordsmith]

Wow. It just goes to show that translation is not a simple thing!

Re: Follow his own people's usage

[thnidu]

PPS: The discussion hinges on WP policy points, most directly Wikipedia:Article titles § Use commonly recognizable names, which begins:
#####
Names are often used as article titles – such as the name of the person, place or thing that is the subject of the article. However, some topics have multiple names, and this can cause disputes as to which name should be used in the article's title. Wikipedia prefers the name that is most commonly used (as determined by its prevalence in reliable English-language sources) as such names will be the most recognizable and the most natural.
#####

[thnidu.livejournal.com]

"Speak, and let history be restored."

So mote it be.

Thank you!

[ysabetwordsmith.livejournal.com]

I'm glad you liked this.