| 释义 |
‖ Wai-Wai, n. (and a.)|ˈwaɪwaɪ|
Also Wai Wai, Waiwai, (in early use) W(o)yowai.
[Origin uncertain: app. unrelated to Wapishana wai manioc.]
a. (A member of) a Cariban people inhabiting the upper reaches of the Essequibo and Mapuera Rivers in Brazil, Guyana, and Surinam.
b. The Carib language of this people. Also attrib. or as adj.
1840R. H. Schomburgk in Descr. Brit. Guiana i. 50 The Woyawais, a race who inhabit the regions between the head waters of the Essequibo and the affluents of the Amazons, number about 650. 1883E. F. Im Thurn Among Indians of Guiana vi. 163 Omissions from the classification here suggested are the Maopitiyans, Tarumas, and Woyowais. 1958N. Guppy Wai-Wai x. 162 Manatá says that he and ‘Sam’ are the only real Wai-Wais still living. 1960Folk II. 83 The Waiwái were living in two groups separated by the Akarai Mountains. 1964E. A. Nida Toward Sci. Transl. x. 236 In Waiwai, a language of British Guiana, indirect quotation is preferable when the writer is understood not to have been present, direct quotation when he is presumed to have been at the scene. 1971Advocate-News (Barbados) 17 Sept. (Guyana Suppl.) p. v (caption) These are members of the Wai Wai tribe of remote Kanoshen beyond the Acarai Mountains. Their ancestors were the original people of Guyana. 1986New Yorker 24 Mar. 94/1 At the Oriximiná headquarters of some Catholic missionaries working with the Wai-Wai, we met a member of the tribe, a twenty-year-old named Rocinaldo, who spoke a little Portuguese. Ibid. 102/1 Maria sang two hymns in Wai-Wai. |