newsminer.com

The great thing about the Internet is that ever-present potential of finding something that feels just like a new toy.

Today I feel like a kid at Christmas. Not only do I have a new “toy” on the Internet, it’s something we’ve made on our own site for all to share.

Athabascan Word of The Week has been a feature of the Our Town page in the newspaper since we redesigned back in June. It’s a neat feature, but the weakness is that the words don’t always translate directly into English and spelling out pronunciations is basically impossible.

So along comes Susan Paskvan, with the Yukon Koyukuk School District, and Eliza Jones, co-author of the Koyukon-Athabascan Dictionary with a great idea. They have been working with students and others to send photographs, illustrations and audio recordings to Mary Beth Smetzer, our community news editor, and now we are able not only to post the items online, but offer them as a podcast feature in the Our Town section of newsminer.com.

The first installment is called “Seasons” and you can follow along on a chart that shows the months and seasons of the year as Eliza Jones pronounces the words.

I’ve been trying my hand, but so far I think I Eliza and Susan would be laughing at me. The nice thing is I can just keep replaying and trying again.

I can keep at it and learn to say the seasons of the year in Athabascan with this. How cool is that? And this is just the first installment.

I think I’ve just about got Yoo ‘en yaats’ene, down. That is the phrase for the season around the time of late February and March, or “other side of the mountain.”

March is one of my favorite times of year and, being a hunter, this phrase for “other side of the mountain” will probably be easy to remember because that’s generally where the game I’m chasing seems to be.

I’m a little premature in announcing this, as the Our Town section still needs a little design work online, but it is all perfectly functional. I just couldn’t wait to share this feature that is, definitely, a very cool feature of our town.

To find the feature, click here, or go to the home page and find the Our Town section and look for Athabascan Word of the Week on the right-hand side.