I can't help from putting in my two cents worth. My son-in-law, Russell
Payson, an avid birder, sent me the following on the subject some time
back. (But see my personal experience following the quote).


>>> [ Home Page | Message Boards | News | Archive | Ask
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Previous Week | Recent Columns Index ] Is
"squaw" an obscene insult?
17-Mar-2000 Dear Cecil: Here in Maine, the state legislature is taking
up a bill to ban the use
of the word squaw in place names. Native Americans contend that it
is a vulgarity, meaning prostitute or c*** rather than woman. Was
this a general word that was used in many languages, or was it
specific to one or two? Are there any old Native American songs or
poems that might use this word in a more ordinary sense, revealing
that it is not as degrading as they might contend, or is it absent from
N.A. literature, indicating that it is indeed vulgar? If it is found in the
literature, are other "vulgar" words used as well? --Paul Mattor,
Hollis, Maine Cecil replies: Let's cut the pretense of scholarship, Paul.
What you really want to know is, DOES SQUAW MEAN C***, OR WHAT? Answer:
No. I'm not saying it's not an insult. It's just not an obscene insult.
The idea that squaw means vagina (to use the polite term) first found its
way into print in a polemical 1973 book, Literature of
the American Indian, by Thomas E. Sanders and Walter W. Peek. Sanders and
Peek, without offering evidence, advanced
the theory that squaw derived from the Mohawk word ojiskwa' (sources vary
on spelling), meaning vagina. This notion
appealed to a certain mind-set and was circulated widely in the activist
community. In 1992 it was revealed to the world at
large on Oprah by Native American spokesperson Suzan Harjo: "The word squaw
is an Algonquin [sic] Indian word meaning
vagina, and that'll give you an idea of what the French and British fur
trappers were calling all Indian women, and I hope no one
ever uses that term again." This marked the beginning of organized efforts
to remove the word squaw from place names, a
campaign that continues today, so far with mixed success. Hey, free
country. Except that squaw doesn't mean vagina. "It is as certain as any
historical fact can be that the word squaw
that the English settlers in Massachusetts used for 'Indian woman' in the
early 1600s was adopted by them from the word squa
that their Massachusett-speaking neighbors used in their own language to
mean 'female, younger woman,' and not from
Mohawk ojiskwa', 'vagina,' which has the wrong shape [sound], the wrong
meaning, and was used by people with whom they
then had no contact. The resemblance that might be perceived between squaw
and the last syllable of the Mohawk word is
coincidental." This comes to us from Ives Goddard, a specialist in
linguistics and curator at the Smithsonian Institution, writing in
News From Indian Country, mid-April 1997. Massachusett (no s), one of the
Algonquian family of languages, was spoken by Native Americans in eastern
Massachusetts.
As is common with "first contact" languages, Massachusett and its
Algonquian cousins contributed many terms, including
papoose, sachem, skunk, opossum, and raccoon, that thereafter became
standard English words, even in parts of North
America where Algonquian languages weren't spoken. The first recorded use
of squaw in English dates from 1622, and it had
been adopted into the language by 1634. The Mohawks were 200 miles away,
spoke a completely different language
(Mohawk is part of the Iroquoian family of languages, not Algonquian,
Harjo's statement notwithstanding), and were hostile to
the Massachusett Indians. Having deep-sixed . . . hmm, not the best choice
of terms. Having dispatched the squaw = c*** angle, let's turn to the more
general issue: is squaw considered an insult by Native American women? Lots
of them sure think it is, although to what extent
that's due to misinformation about the term's origin is debatable.
"Documented uses of the word squaw in clearly derogatory
senses are in fact hard to find," writes University of Colorado linguistics
expert William Bright in a forthcoming article. One early
example: "the crafty 'squaw' . . . the squalid and withered person of this
hag," from James Fenimore Cooper's Last of the
Mohicans. (Squaw, squalid--you can see a problem right there.) On the other
hand, tribes such as the Navajo use terms like
squaw dance to this day. One doesn't want to get overly PC about it, but
the protesters have a point when they say special terms for minority women
are
inherently demeaning. Think about it. Negress. Jewess. Sixty years ago
these terms were in common use. Now they make your
flesh creep. Next picture some pot-bellied slob in a cowboy hat: "Why, if
it ain't a injun and his squaw." In 1967, 143 place
names containing the word nigger were changed to Negro by order of the U.S.
Board on Geographic Names. Squaw Valley
may not be in the same league as Nigger Lake on the offensiveness scale.
But it's up there with Pickaninny Creek. --CECIL ADAMS [Comment on this
answer] Cecil Adams can deliver the Straight Dope on any topic. Write
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Personal Comment: Most of my working life was spent as a surgeon at the
Indian Hospital in Phoenix. I can testify that the indian nurses did not
like being referred to as squaws even in fun. Most of them did not like to
be called indians either. Calling them Navajo or Apache was ok. The idea of
Indian Brotherhood is a new concept. The southwest tribes fought each other
for centuries before the whites arrived and still don't like each other.
The religious tradition for most, if not all of the tribes, states that
they are the chosen people. This is much like the Judeo-Christian tradition
and continues to haunt the Jewish people (and the Latter Day Saints) to
this day.

Bob Norton
Joyce (near Port Angeles), WA
norton36 at olypen.com