SEPTEMBER 1, 2016 // 23
BOOK SHELF // GLIMPSE // WILDLIFE // POP CULTURE // WORDS // Q&A // FOOD // FUN
NW
word
nerd
By RYAN HUME
Cascadia
[kæs•ked•di•ə]
noun
1. a bioregion that
stretches from Northern
California through the
Pacifi c Northwest and
across British Columbia into
southeast Alaska. Including
the entire Columbia River
basin as well as the nearby
Pacifi c Ocean ecosystem,
the boundaries of the
bioregion are based on
distinct vegetation, climate
and other environmental
similarities as opposed to
man-made borders
2. a proposed inde-
pendent nation state and
social, political and envi-
ronmental movement that
encompasses all of the
bioregion, reaching across
Idaho and into western
Montana as well. The move-
ment’s philosophy purports
that the various peoples
of the region have more in
common socially, econom-
ically and environmentally
than they do with the
eastern governments of the
United States and Canada.
Some supporters stop short
of calling for secession and
merely aim to strengthen a
sense of common regional
identity and create trans-
national cooperation as it
relates to transportation,
economics and the envi-
ronment. Critics maintain
that the formation of an
independent state is unlike-
ly for a number of reasons,
including the fact that no
state or territory has ever
successfully seceded from
the U.S. or Canada
3. Cascadia Subduc-
tion Zone: Also known as
AP PHOTO/RICK BOWMER, FILE
ZACH URNESS
The word “cascadia” means “land of falling waters.” Multnomah
Falls, located in the Columbia River Gorge National Scenic
Area, is the United States’ second-tallest year-round waterfall.
STATESMAN-JOURNAL VIA AP
WIKIMEDIA COMMONS
This fl ag, designed by Alexander Baretich during the academic
year of 1994-1995, represents the bioregion of Cascadia.
the Cascadia fault, this
600-plus-mile “megathrust”
fault line runs from Van-
couver Island, B.C., down
through Cape Mendoci-
no, California, and is the
combustible site of where
the oceanic Juan de Fuca
plate is lodged beneath the
continental North American
Plate
Origin:
The fi rst known use of the
term cascade in the Pacifi c
Northwest is around 1811
and attributed to the Astor
expedition, which mapped
a narrow, dangerous set of
rapids on the Columbia River
near the mountain range and
noted the passage as Cascade
Rapids. It is widely believed
that botanist David Douglas
was the fi rst to refer to the
range itself as the Cascades in
1825. He would go on to name
a tree after himself about a
year later.
A small unincorporated
community in central Oregon
is credited with fi rst attaching
the suffi x to create Cascadia,
Oregon in 1892. By 1898, the
community had a post offi ce
and hotel, but the property
was sold to the state in 1940
and is currently Cascadia State
Park in Linn County. The term
Cascadia fell dormant for a
number of years before being
revived in the 1970s by natural
scientists aiming to describe
the geographical region. In the
late 1970s, the term began to
gather political implications,
most notably when a Seattle
University sociology profes-
SUBMITTED PHOTO
As the Juan de Fuca, Gorda and Explorer plates are pushed
eastward, they are forced to subduct beneath the North Amer-
ican Plate. Strain builds up where they have become stuck
(locked) and will be released one day in a great earthquake,
which will also cause a tsunami.
sor, David McCloskey, began
teaching a course entitled
“Cascadia: Sociology of the
Pacifi c Northwest.” McCloskey,
who has drawn the fi rst as
well as the most current maps
of the proposed indepen-
dent state, summarizes the
meaning of the term as “land
of falling waters.”
Cascade enters English
less than 200 years before it
was applied to the Colum-
bia River’s rapids, borrowed
from the French of the
same spelling in 1641 and is
linked to the Italian cognate
cascata, meaning waterfall,
which can be traced back
to the Latin cāsum, the past
participle of cadere, to fall.
This photo taken Sept. 8,
2015, shows an island and
the blue expanse of Summit
Lake with Diamond Peak in
the background, in the De-
schutes National Forest near
Oakride. Summit Lake is one
of the great secret places in
the Cascade Mountains not
just because of its islands,
but also because of the clear
water and views of Diamond
Peak.
“Using data with an unprecedent-
ed level of detail, a team of interna-
tional researchers, including some
from Oregon State University, have
found that a major earthquake along
the Cascadia Subduction Zone is more
likely than previously thought.”
“Further, Cascadia is a word
euphonious and round with a
sound-ending ‘ia’—meaning ‘land
of…’, a pleasing parallel to California,
Columbia, and so on.”
—Kale Williams, “Odds of Big One
revised upward,” The Daily Astorian, Aug.
11, 2016
—David McCloskey, “Name,” Cascadia
Institute, http://cascadia-institute.org/
name.html, 2010
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