Australian Aboriginal Languages

Aboriginal incarceration rates are much higher than the general Australian population. Moreover, indigenous women represent 34% of the total number of inmates. As if this wasn't enough, the legal and welfare systems are removing indigenous children from their families and culture, serving as a mechanism of forced assimilation.

By Suzi Hutchings for Debates Indígenas.

Corresponding with the aesthetic of bir'yun or 'shimmering brilliance' created by the cross-hatching in Yolŋu painting, manikay (song) might also be characterised by a play of colour and movement, generated through the heterophonic interweaving of voices. While bir'yun might be considered a technique that generates emotion or a sense of beauty, the perception of bir'yun is decidedly more than the aesthetic. Bir'yun encompasses constitutional, political and educational dimensions, affirming Wägilak identity and purpose through an interplay of difference, in the diverse voices that enfolded together on the ceremonial ground (bambula). As the experience of bir'yun is enriched by new voices and colours, a productive approach to collaboration between Yolŋu and Balanda (non-indigenous) Australians is suggested: through mutually enriching conversation, a living interplay of voices is generated that brings life to the whole.

This paper extends out of 10 years of music teaching with Daniel Wilfred and our exploration of 'openings' within manikay for collaborative performance.

Presented at the 19th Symposium on Indigenous Music and Dance, National Recording Project for Indigenous Performance in Australia

The results of a study of Bilinarra, Gurindji and Malngin plant and animal knowledge conducted by traditional knowledge custodians with linguistic and biological support are presented. Bilinarra, Gurindji and Malngin names and uses of plants and animals, scientific names and common English names for 214 plants and 277 animals are included. Introductory chapters outline Bilinarra, Gurindji and Malngin terms for seasons, terms for implements and habitat terms. Bilinarra, Gurindji and Malngin biological knowledge is categorised and discussed in later chapters. Indexes of animal common names, plant common names and Bilinarra, Gurindji and Malngin plant and animal names are provided; xx plants and xx animals are illustrated.

German missionaries working in Central Australia were cultural translators who had a strong grounding in philology, a discipline which developed in Germany to a high standard throughout the nineteenth century. The missionaries aimed to translate the Bible and hymnbook containing Luther’s Small Catechism, hymns and prayers, into the Aranda language. Their adoption of Altjira for ‘God’ was radical considering the literalness of their translations and their wariness of syncretism. Soesilo (2007: 176) maintains that “the acceptable translation of divine names is an area of debate in Bible translation in many areas of the world” as “there are missionaries and Christian workers who think that adopting local divine names can lead to confusion and syncretism.” Given concerns about syncretism and considering that Kempe usually borrowed Latin terms for key theological terms, it is surprising that he chose Altjira as the term for ‘God’. Over time Altjira has changed meaning and is now different from the one prior to European settlement of Australia. Changes in meaning are also found in other languages, where meanings have diverged in different ways. [Altjira; Arandic languages; literal translation; interlanguage; loanword]

Academic Reference:

Zuckermann, Ghil'ad & Monaghan, Paul (2012). "Revival linguistics and the new media: Talknology in the service of the Barngarla language reclamation", pp. 119-126 of Foundation for Endangered Languages XVI Conference: Language Endangerment in the 21st Century:Globalisation, Technology & New Media. Auckland, New Zealand.

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Revival Linguistics and the New Media:
Talknology in the service of the Barngarla Language Reclamation


Ghil‘ad Zuckermann

Chair of Linguistics and Endangered Languages
School of Humanities, University of Adelaide, SA Adelaide 5005, Australia
[[email protected]]


Paul Monaghan

Mobile Language Team
School of Humanities, University of Adelaide, SA Adelaide 5005, Australia
[[email protected]]


Abstract

Revival Linguistics is a new branch of linguistics, currently being established at Adelaide. It analyses comparatively and systematically the universal constraints and global mechanisms on the one hand (see Zuckermann 2009), and local peculiarities on the other hand, apparent in revival attempts across various sociological backgrounds, all over the world (see Zuckermann & Walsh 2011). A branch of both linguistics and applied linguistics, it combines scientific studies of native language acquisition and foreign language learning (language reclamation is the most extreme case of Second Language Learning).

The study: The Barngarla language (spelled Parnkalla by Schürmann 1844) is a no-longer spoken Thura-Yura Pama-Nyungan Aboriginal language of the Lakes Cultural Region of South Australia. Most recently Zuckermann, Monaghan and the Barngarla community have launched a reclamation of this sleeping beauty in three major rural/urban centres on the Eyre Peninsula, namely Port Lincoln, Whyalla, and Port Augusta. The presence of three Barngarla populations several hours drive apart presents the revival linguist with a need for a sophisticated reclamation involving ‘talknological’ innovations, such as online chatting, newsgroups, photo and resource sharing through a Barngarla wiki. This paper also examines the tensions accompanying the creation of a Barngarla ‘community of practice’ (cf. Wenger 1998) in a post-traditional Aboriginal context. In important ways, the new talknology poses a direct challenge to existing authority structures relating to the everyday management of knowledge, collaboration and participation. We predict that how the broader Barngarla community negotiates these issues will have an important bearing on the ultimate results of the reclamation project.




Revival Linguistics

Revival Linguistics is a new branch of linguistics, currently being established at Adelaide. It analyses comparatively and systematically the universal constraints and global mechanisms on the one hand (see Zuckermann 2009), and local peculiarities and idiosyncrasies on the other hand, apparent in revival attempts across various sociological backgrounds, all over the world (Zuckermann & Walsh 2011). A branch of both linguistics and applied linguistics, it combines scientific studies of native language acquisition and foreign language learning (language reclamation is the most extreme case of Second Language Learning).

Revival Linguistics complements the established field of documentary linguistics, which records endangered languages before they fall asleep. Revival Linguistics ought to revise the fields of grammaticography (writing grammars) and lexicography (writing dictionaries): Grammars and dictionaries ought to be written for language reclamation, i.e. in a user-friendly way, for communities, not only for linguists. For example, juxtapose Lutheran missionary Clamor Wilhelm Schürmann’s 1844 spelling of the Barngarla word nunyara ‘recovery’, which ignores the English environment, thus resulting in the pronunciation nanYAra rather than NOONyara.

Closely related to contact linguistics, Revival Linguistics changes the field of historical linguistics, e.g. by weakening the Family Tree model, which implies that a language ought to have only one parent. Assisting Aboriginal communities in a realistic, non-purisitic way, without selling them myths, Revival Linguistics promotes efficiency and efficacy in language reclamation.

Certainly Australia has been made the ‘Unlucky Country’ through the historical processes of linguicide (language killing) and glottophagy (language eating). These twin forces were in operation from the early colonial period. In her detailed study of the role missionary language practices in the early years of the South Australian colony, Scrimgeour quotes the following colonial language ideology: ‘Mr Forster afterwards adverted to the present mode of teaching the children in their own language. He, with all respect to the Missionaries, would say, on several grounds, that this was wrong. The natives would be sooner civilized if their language was extinct. The children taught would afterwards mix only with whites, where their own language would be of no use – the use of their language would preserve their prejudices and debasement, and their language was not sufficient to express the ideas of civilized life.  He gave the Missionaries full credit for their talents and zeal, but he thought it would be better to teach the children in English’ (from Report on a public meeting of the South Australian Missionary Society in aid of the German Mission to the Aborigines, Southern Australian, 8 September 1843; Scrimgeour, 2007: 116, italics added).

In the case of glottophagy, Governor George Grey noted: ‘The merchant in London who lays on a vessel for a certain port, regards the affair as a mere mercantile speculation, but could he trace out the results he effects in their remotest ramifications, he would stand astonished at the changes he produces.  With the wizard wand of commerce, he touches a lone and trackless forest, and at his bidding, cities arise, and the hum and dust of trade collect – away are swept ancient races; antique laws and customs moulder into oblivion.  The strong-holds of murder and superstition are cleansed, and the Gospel is preached amongst ignorant and savage men. The ruder languages disappear successively, and the tongue of England alone is heard around’ (Grey 1841: 200-201, italics added). Grey was a strong supporter of Aboriginal languages, encouraging Schürmann’s work documenting the Adelaide language (Kaurna) and Barngarla at Port Lincoln (see below).

With globalization, homogenization and Coca-colonization there will be more and more groups all over the world added to the forlorn club of the lost-heritage peoples. Language reclamation will become increasingly relevant as people seek to recover their cultural autonomy, empower their spiritual and intellectual sovereignty, and improve their wellbeing. There are various ethical, aesthetic and utilitarian benefits of language revival: for example, social justice, diversity and employability, respectively.

Zuckermann (2012) has enthusiastically called for Native Tongue Title and linguistic human rights, suggesting that the Australian government ought to compensate Indigenous people not only for the loss of land but equally importantly for the loss of language. Zuckermann has suggested to the Australian government to define Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander vernaculars as official languages.

Furthermore, it is predicted that in the future the very insights offered by Revival Linguistics will themselves become part of Indigenous Intellectual Property, when Slovenes and Estonians come to Australia and New Zealand to ask Aboriginal Australians and Maori to assist them in their own European language resurrection.

There is an urgent need to produce perspicacious LINGUISTIC and socio-linguistic insights relevant to language reclamation. Otherwise, linguists or language workers would not be able to offer, if asked by Indigenous people, efficient and efficacious advice. There are linguistic constraints applicable to all revival attempts. Mastering them would help revivalists and First Nations leaders to work more efficiently; for example, to focus more on basic vocabulary and verbal conjugations than on sounds and word order – see Zuckermann (2009: http://www.zuckermann.org/pdf/Hybridity_versus_Revivability.pdf.

Revival linguistics would assist revivalists to be more realistic and to abandon discouraging slogans such as "Give us authenticity or give us death!" The following are among the basic principles that the revival linguist encourages in Aboriginal communities:

i. If your language falls asleep: stop, revive, survive!
ii. If you revive a language, embrace the hybridity of the emerging tongue; and
iii. If your language is healthy, assist others in linguistic need.

One day we may invent devices to “inject” a language into our brains. But until then, any attempt to reclaim a hibernating language will result in a hybrid that combines components from the revivalists' and documenters' mother tongues and, of course, the target language. In the immortal words of Jerry Seinfeld: "Not that there's anything wrong with that!"

The Study


Figure 1: Map of Traditional Aboriginal Country after Norman Tindale (adapted from Hercus 1999)

The Barngarla language reclamation project has arisen through partnerships between the University of Adelaide (Linguistics and the Mobile Language Team) and the Barngarla people. Although still in its infancy, consultations began in September 2011, a number of very significant steps have been made towards reclaiming this ‘sleeping beauty’. Without doubt, the key challenge has been to develop a strategy for the reclamation of the language simultaneously and without favour in three major regional centres. In ways that will be elaborated below, this multi-sited, regional or peripheral reclamation makes demands that are very different to those often found in metropolitan reclamation contexts (e.g. Kaurna, cf. Amery...

This paper proposes the enactment of an ex gratia compensation scheme for loss of Indigenous languages in Australia. Although some Australian states have enacted ex gratia compensation schemes for the victims of the Stolen Generation policies, the victims of ‘linguicide’ (language killing) are largely overlooked by the Australian Government. Existing grant schemes to support Aboriginal languages are inadequate, and they should be complemented with compensation schemes, which are based on a claim of right. The proposed compensation scheme for the loss of Aboriginal languages should support the effort to reclaim and revive the lost languages. We first outline the history of linguicide during colonisation in Australia. We then put a case for reviving lost Aboriginal languages by highlighting the benefits of language revival. After evaluating the limits of existing Australian law in supporting the language revival efforts, this paper proposes a statute-based ex gratia compensation scheme, which can be colloquially called ‘Native Tongue Title’.

This research contends that the singular purpose of the material production of four different types of artefact is to provide a religious function for a discrete society of people located in the Pilbara, Western Australia. Integral to this argument is that these Indigenous people, the Yindjibarndi (pronounced Injar-barndi), practise a religion. Although the High Court of Australia, in the case titled Church of the New Faith v Commissioner for PayRoll Tax (Vic) [1983] HCA 40, 154 CLR 120, defined the attributes required for a group of people to be regarded as 'religious', none of the 147 religious denominations officially recognised and listed by the Australian government at Schedule 1 of the Marriage (Recognised Denominations)

At Warruwi, a remote Australian Indigenous community, people use a range of Indigenous languages on a daily basis. Adults speak 3-8 Indigenous languages and these high levels of multilingualism are out of step with current trends which see most Australian Indigenous communities shifting to a single variety be it a variety of English, a contact variety or a traditional Indigenous language. The three Indigenous languages most widely spoken at Warruwi are quite dissimilar as they belong to separate language families. This article discusses three characteristics of language use at Warruwi that are likely to play a role in supporting the levels of multilingualism found there: the diversity of individual linguistic repertoires, receptive multilingual practices whereby interlocutors address one another in different languages and language ideologies that are quite different to those found elsewhere. Characteristics of multilingualism at Warruwi are compared with those reported for other communities with small-scale multilingualism. Francois' (2012) concept of egalitarian multilingualism is used as a starting point for the exploration of models of small-scale multilingualism.

Traditional Tiwi is a language isolate within the Australian language group, traditionally spoken on the Tiwi Islands, north of Darwin. This language exhibits the most complex verb structure of any Australian language. Altogether there are 18 distinct verb slots; 14 prefixes and 4 suffixes. They encode subject, object and oblique arguments, they inflect for tense, aspect and mood, the location and direction of events with respect to the speaker, and the time of day that an event takes place. They also take prefixes and suffixes denoting associated motion, can be argument-raised by a causative or detransitivised by derivational morphology, and can take incorporated nominals, incorporated verbs, and incorporated comitative or privative arguments.
Traditional Tiwi has not been adequately described. Previous descriptions are limited and do not cover verb morphology with enough detail. This thesis brings together previous descriptions, early recorded data, and adds newly collected data and findings to produce an updated description of the language, with special reference to the verb morphology.
I focus in particular on two aspects of the verb morphology: agreement and incorporation. The Traditional Tiwi agreement system of inflecting verbs shows a high degree of complexity due to the interactions between subject, object and tense marking. I argue for the occurrence of an otherwise unreported phenomenon by which agreement affixes can shift between various controllers depending on the morphosyntactic context. Incorporation is also highly complex, as with other northern Australian languages that exhibit this feature. There are four distinct types of incorporation including verb incorporation, comitative and privative constructions, body part incorporation and regular nominal incorporation. I describe these with reference to incorporation phenomena in other Australian languages.
Traditional Tiwi however, is no longer spoken; the last two speakers died in 2012. The majority of the data on which this thesis is based was collected with one of these two last speakers, and therefore represents possibly the last documentary linguistic record of this important language.

The extreme violence that women suffer during conflict does not arise solely out of the conditions of war; it is directly related to the violence that exists in women's lives during peacetime. Throughout the world, women experience violence because they are women, and often because they do not have the same rights or autonomy that men do. They are subjected to gender-based persecution, discrimination and oppression, including sexual violence and slavery.
(Elizabet Rehn and Ellen Johnson Sirleaf. (2002, 10)

Four stars in the night sky have been formally recognised by their Australian Aboriginal names. The names include three from the Wardaman people of the Northern Territory and one from the Boorong people of western Victoria. The Wardaman star names are Larawag, Wurren and Ginan in the Western constellations Scorpius, Phoenix and Crux (the Southern Cross). The Boorong star name is Unurgunite in Canis Majoris (the Great Dog). They are among 86 new star names drawn from Chinese, Coptic, Hindu, Mayan, Polynesian, South African, and Aboriginal Australian cultures.

The book and accompanying DVD shows how coolamons are carved and the types of trees and tools used to make them. Coolamons are an important part of Gurindji culture. They are used to carry young babies, collect bush foods and medicines and they have an important place in many ceremonies.

This paper focuses on a group of geographically-disparate, but related English-based creoles - Bislama (Vanuatu), Solomons Pijin (Solomon Islands), Tok Pisin (PNG) and Kriol (Australia) - spoken in Australia and Melanesia. These languages have been shown to originate ultimately in NSW Pidgin, an early lingua franca of the Sydney region which developed as the colonisation of Australia began. This paper surveys three main aspects of this work: (i) the comparison of the lexicon and grammar of Melanesian and Australian pidgins using historical samples of reported speech from the 1700-1800s; (ii) the historical documentation of the social, work and trade relations between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal people in NSW and Queensland and also between Australia and Melanesia; and (iii) the different types of substrate influences on the emerging pidgins.

Gurindji is a Ngumpin-Yapa language of northern Australia. Ngumpin-Yapa languages have contributed a number of debates in formal theory around non-config- urationality and phrase structure. Gurindji is also one of the contributing languages to Gurindji Kriol which is one of the main mixed languages discussed in the literature on contact languages, largely because it has challenged theoretical assumptions about mixed languages.

Murrinhpatha is an Australian Aboriginal language spoken in a region of tropical savannah and tidal inlets on the north coast of the continent. Some 3000 speakers live mostly in the towns of Wadeye and Nganmarriyanga, though they maintain close ties to their traditional lands, totems and spirit ancestors.

Murrinhpatha word structure is highly complex, and quite distinct from the better-known Pama-Nyungan languages of central and southern Australia. Murrinhpatha is characterised by prolific compounding, clitic clusters, cumulative inflection, irregular allomorphy and phonological assimilation. This book provides a comprehensive account of these phenomena, giving particular attention to questions of morphological constituency, lexical storage, and whether there is really such thing as a ‘word’ unit.

Sociolinguistic variation involves socially constituted categories, and is therefore shaped by the salient categories of a particular social context (e.g. Eckert 1989; Stanford & Preston 2009). Australian Indigenous societies have undergone rapid social change in the last 200 years, and sociolinguistic patterns have changed in response to this. Traditional societies were built upon kin relations, ceremonial status, corporate groups such as clan and moiety, and relations to the land. Sociolinguistic variation reflected these categories (e.g. Sutton 1978; Nash 1990; Wilkinson 1991; Garde 2008). But since colonisation and town settlement there have been changes in social structure, and with it the types of sociolinguistic variation. In town, youth grow up among large groups of peers, and this gives rise to generational or subcultural identities, with associated linguistic variation (e.g. Amery 1985; Langlois 2006; O’Shannessy 2011; Mansfield 2014a). Meanwhile, variation associated with kinship, clans, moieties, territories and social status has been greatly attenuated. Traditional social categories (i.e. those established before colonisation) are still recognised in town life, though the reduction of associated linguistic indexation may reflect a loss of social salience.

Descriptions of natural events, such as fireballs, and meteorite impacts, are found within Indigenous Australian oral traditions. Studies of oral traditions demonstrate that they extend beyond the realm of myth and legend; they contain structured knowledge about the natural world (science) as well as historic accounts of natural events and geo-hazards. These traditions could lead to the discovery of meteorites and impact sites previously unknown to Western science. In addition to benefiting the scientific study of meteoritics, this study can help social scientists better understand the nature and longevity of oral traditions and further support the growing body of evidence that oral traditions contain historical accounts of natural events. In a previous study led by the author in 2009, no meteorite-related oral traditions were identified that led to the discovery of meteorites and/or impact craters. This article challenges those initial findings.

A paper written following my time in the South Pacific, this essay examines how culture and language can have effects on perspective and worldview. Examples from Maori education and religious language as well as Australian Aboriginal language are used, with a final reflection on how this experience has broadened my worldview.

Aboriginal Australians have been observing the stars for more than 65,000 years, and many of their oral traditions have been recorded since colonisation. These traditions tell of all kinds of celestial events, such as the annual rising of stars, passing comets, eclipses of the Sun and Moon, auroral displays, and even meteorite impacts. But new research, recently published in The Australian Journal of Anthropology, reveals that Aboriginal oral traditions describe the variable nature of three red-giant stars: Betelgeuse, Aldebaran and Antares. This challenges the history of astronomy and tells us that Aboriginal Australians were even more careful observers of the night sky than they have been given credit for.

It is widely known that the phonological systems of Australian Aboriginal languages show many similarities right across the continent. One characteristic of these systems that has been
often reported is the lack in most languages of a phonological contrast between voiced and
voiceless stops. This paper is an investigation of the occurrence of such a contrast in a number of widely scattered languages. It will be shown that, in a number of instances, phonological voicing is a recent historical development in the languages which have it, and the contrast has been subject to linguistic diffusion in one of the areas where it is found. Certain generalisations about the types of phonological voicing contrasts that tend to be found in Australia are also advanced.

The Pama-Nyungan language Yidiny has long held an important position in the typology of stress systems. Dixon’s (1977, 1990) original analysis of the system places alternating stress on odd-numbered syllables by default, as in (1a). However, stress is attracted to long vowels (1b), which will cause other, alternating stresses to shift also (1c). Words with an odd number of syllables undergo penultimate lengthening, which in turn shifts stress onto even-numbered syllables (1d). Addition of a monsyllabic suffix (1e) changes the syllable count, with concomitant stress and length adjustments.

(1) a. yábulám-gu ‘lawyer cane-PURPOSIVE’
b. durgú: ‘mopoke owl(ABSOLUTIVE)’
c. yadyí:-ri-ŋá-l ‘walk about-GOING-TRANSITIVIZER-PRESENT’
d. gudá:ga ‘dog(ABSOLUTIVE)’
e. gúdagá-nggu ‘dog-ERGATIVE’

Additional complexities include suffixes which induce lengthening on their base and a late truncation rule, which is subject to lexical exceptions and applies after penultimate lengthening, rendering lengthening opaque. Accounting for these synchronic phenomena is Dixon’s main concern.

The system has proven a stubborn outlier within typologies of stress systems (Nash 1979, Hayes 1980, 1982, 1995, Halle and Vergnaud 1987, Crowhurst and Hewitt 1995, Pruitt 2011), however with the exception of Nash (1979), analyses of Yidiny stress have relied on the printed examples in Dixon’s works and taken the marking of length and stress as given. Here, we provide a new analysis of Yidiny stress, length, and truncation, based on observations from original recordings of the last fluent speakers.

Firstly, these recordings suggest a different analysis of Yidiny stress. We claim that Yidiny primary stress is always located on the first syllable of the word — it does not move to long vowels. We support this with acoustic analysis of recordings made by both Dixon and others of narrative and elicited data, which show the following characteristics:

• long vowels often have higher intensity than short, but not always;
• as in many Australian languages, feet associate with an L+H* pitch accent (Round 2009);
• the H* typically aligns within the first syllable, as a narrow or a broad peak (cf. Bowern et al 2012); this is true even in loan words from English (e.g. jígu:lgu ‘school-DAT’; Hale archive tape 4607);
• however, where a stressed syllable is followed by two unstressed syllables, its associated H* may align late, for example within the next syllable.

Significantly, for trisyllables with a long vowel in the second syllable, the phonetics of the long vowel often match the English cues for stress, as noted elsewhere for other Australian languages (Round 2009). Yet pitch is explained by the distance between stressed syllables, and intensity by vowel length. Therefore we find no need to claim that the long vowel is stressed, or that stress is optionally fronted (Dixon 1977:5), rather primary stress is always initial.

This has ramifications for Dixon’s (1977) analysis of the principles for length and stress assignment, and also for the many subsequent reinterpretations of Dixon’s data. In this paper, however, since we are arguing that the original observation of weight-to-stress is incorrect, we concentrate on the empirical arguments for initial stress; leave further discussion of the implications of this analysis to future work.
Secondly, although previous analyses (e.g. Hayes 1999, Dixon 1977) rely on Yidiny’s trisyllabic penultimate lengthening rule being automatic, we find exceptions to it, just as there are exceptions to truncation. For example, there is no expected penultimate lengthening in words such as jarruga ‘scrub hen’, dadagal ‘bone’ or duburrji ‘full up’ (Hale 4607). Conversely, we tentatively find what may be phrasal-level penultimate lengthening in some four-syllable words, and penultimate secondary stress on words with a long final vowel (e.g. gádigàdi: ‘little things’).

The diachronic sources of these facts are of crucial interest (cf. Hayes 1999). We account for the contemporary lengthening facts by a simple sound change involving penultimate lengthening and truncation, a type of compensatory lengthening well known from other languages (e.g. de Chene and Anderson 1979). Exceptions include loans from neighboring languages (particularly Djabugay). Postulation of a diachronic stress shift away from the first syllable is unnecessary. 

In conclusion, we show the value to phonological theory of revisiting claims made before the advent of easy access to acoustic data. It is now viable in many cases to conduct independent verification of analyses, based on original recordings.

Song and dance are a traditional means of strengthening culture and passing knowledge to successive generations in the Torres Strait of northeastern Australia. Dances incorporate a range of apparatuses to enhance the performance, such as dance machines (Zamiyakal) and headdresses (Dhari). The dances, songs, headdresses and dance machines work together to transfer important knowledge about subsistence survival, social structure, and cultural continuity. This paper explores how celestial phenomena inspire and inform music and dance.

In this paper we discuss the ways in which successive governments have addressed Indigenous affairs, and we argue that the Australian approach is still firmly rooted in colonial attitudes and discourses. Although self-determination is a core concept of neoliberalism, the dominant political ideology for both Labor and Liberal parties in Australia since the 1980s, it does not extend to Indigenous affairs, which is firmly couched in colonial frameworks. In this paper specific examples of education and cultural sustainability (including language development and sustainability) are used as case studies to explore what genuine self-determination would mean in an Australian context. Overall, it is argued that an honest and real neoliberal approach takes political courage and vision, but would place the power to control Indigenous affairs in the hands of the people whose affairs we’re actually talking about.

Les métaphores de la colère ont été documentées et analysées dans de nombreuses langues du monde, et ces travaux ont mis à jour leur remarqua-ble uniformité (et même leur quasi-universalité) à travers les continents. Cet article apporte une contribution supplémentaire sur cette question, et réinterroge le statut particulier des métaphores de la colère à la lumière des données de la langue dalabon (Australie, Territoire du Nord). L'article décrit et analyse les métaphores de la colère du dalabon, en montrant ce qui les distingue d'une part des autres métaphores émotionnelles de cette langue, et d'autre part des métaphores de la colère que l'on rencontre dans d'autres langues du monde. Les métaphores émotionnelles du dalabon ont ceci de particulier qu'elles restent systématiquement ancrées dans des représentations du corps, en s'inspirant la plupart du temps de réactions somatiques aux émotions. Ainsi, en dalabon, les émotions sont toujours représentées métonymiquement comme des états physiques de la personne, et ne sont pratiquement jamais traitées comme des entités indépendantes de la personne, ou encore comme des personnes, des forces etc. Mais la colère se distingue des autres émotions de deux manières. D'une part, elle autorise ce type de représentations : la colère est traitée comme une chose que l'on peut « trouver ». D'autre part, les métaphores dalabon de la colère ne s'inspirent pas de réactions somatiques à cette émotion, mais s'ancrent plutôt dans les connotations morales négatives de la colère. Celle-ci est comparée à une entité vivante et turbulente, ou encore à la maladie, à la pourriture, au poison.

Reduplication is found in almost every language (Inkelas, 2012, p. 378), and hence understanding it well is a priority for linguistic theory.  Yet common to much of the literature is a stated need for more empirical data for making valid cross-linguistic comparisons, and developing and testing associated theories (Urbanczyk, 2007, p. 492; Raimy, 2011, p. 11; Hurch & Mattes, 2009, pp. 303, 318).  This empirical gap is particularly salient for Australian Indigenous languages, with existing typologies displaying a lack of comprehensiveness in their coverage, and detail in their phonological analysis.

This thesis makes significant progress towards filling this gap, by establishing an empirical and methodological framework for the first comprehensive phonological typology of reduplication in Australian languages.  Specifically, the present study reports a detailed empirical survey of reduplication in 43 Australian languages, based on an initial survey of 276 sources, focusing on the phonological patterns and complex phenomena associated with the process in each language. 

The methodology employed sets the survey apart from similar typological studies, both through its exhaustive coverage of documented reduplicative forms within each language, and its finely grained, microvariate approach to documenting and describing the intricacies of each form.  This ensures the full breadth of complexities and idiosyncrasies are captured in each language, and enables more informative and effective comparison and analysis, both at the language level, and cross-linguistically.

The study makes two significant contributions to the study of reduplication.  Firstly, it sets out a comprehensive and finely-detailed inventory of the reduplicative forms, patterns and complex phenomena which exist in the surveyed languages, and assesses the resulting corpus to evaluate prominent claims and questions in the study of reduplication.  Secondly, it establishes a comprehensive and empirically meticulous methodological framework for surveying reduplication, based on highly detailed and consistently applied categorisations of the data.  This opens up the findings to researchers of all theoretical backgrounds, and prepares the language sample to be expanded exhaustively in the future.

What does the historical record tell us about the structures of Aboriginal life at the time lands that came to be known as South Australia were colonised? Colonisation refers to the process whereby the British Crown made claim to these lands and then occupied them. The South Australia Act passed through the British Parliament in 1834, enabling this formal act of possession of the region. King William IV issued the Letters Patent in 1836 which defined the territory of South Australia and proclaimed it a colony. A few months later Governor John Hindmarsh arrived at Holdfast Bay to administer the colony. Until the arrival of Hindmarsh's party no Aboriginal people in the colony were aware of the decisions made on the other side of the globe that would disrupt and undermine their lives, cause high rates of illness and death and dispossess them of their lands. In this chapter I investigate how our current knowledge of Aboriginal South Australia has been formed. Our understanding of the structures of Aboriginal society is influenced by the observations of early colonists and later anthropologists, all of whom grappled with how to conceptualise and describe these Aboriginal groupings. I discuss the distribution of Aboriginal people across what was to become South Australia and how cultural, social, political and linguistic groupings were influenced by a range of factors, particularly ecology and the impact it had on availability of resources. 1 There have been two broad approaches to describing the distribution of Aboriginal people: a regional perspective influenced by ecology; and one that rigidly defines tribal groups with clearly defined territories, languages and cultures. A regional approach describes hunter-gatherers living within one of five ecological zones before the colonisation of South Australia: 3

This paper is a critical evaluation of a number of key themes in Against Native Title: Conflict and creativity in outback Australia. This book is described as an ‘ethnographic biography’ of Ceduna (SA) Aboriginal woman Sue Coleman-Haseldine by author Eve Vincent, who is an anthropologist and environmental activist based at Macquarie University (Vincent 2017). One of the central themes of the book is an attempt by Vincent to understand a long-running conflict between Kokatha- and Wirangu-identifying people in the Ceduna region in terms of their anti- or pro-mining stance. Intersecting this is a theme of a temporally more deeply held Kokatha identity versus a recently reconstructed Wirangu identity. However, Vincent presents an account that is skewed in favour of a supporting a Kokatha connection to country and the strident environmental activism of her biographical subject. This paper exposes this bias in Vincent’s book and not only offers an alternative explanation of the Kokatha-Wirangu conflict but a solution to it.

This paper is a description of the language situation in the region between the Gascoyne and Ashburton Rivers in the north-west of Western Australia. At the time of first white settlement in the region, there were eleven languages spoken between the two rivers, several of them in a number of dialect forms. Research on languages of the locality has taken place mainly in the past thirty years, after a long period of neglect, but details of the past and present linguistic situation have been emerging as a result of that research. The paper includes an annotated bibliography of the Aboriginal languages traditionally spoken in the area.

This is the first part of what is intended to be a comprehensive reference grammar of the Mantharta languages (Jiwarli, Thiin, Warriyangka, Tharrkari) traditionally spoken in the Gascoyne-Ashburton region in the north-west of Western Australia. This version dates from July 2015.

Early ethnographers and missionaries recorded Aboriginal languages and oral traditions across Australia. Their general lack of astronomical training resulted in misidentifications, transcription errors and omissions in these records. In western Victoria and southeast South Australia many astronomical traditions were recorded but, cur- iously, some of the brightest stars in the sky were omitted. Scholars claimed these stars did not feature in Aboriginal traditions. This continues to be repeated in the literature, but current research shows that these stars may in fact feature in Aboriginal traditions and could be seasonal calendar markers. This paper uses established techniques to identify seasonal stars in the traditions of the Kaurna Aboriginal people of the Adelaide Plains, South Australia.

The more than 250 languages spoken in Australia prior to the nineteenth century exhibit both striking similarities to one another and remarkable variation. The exponential increase in what linguists have learned about these languages since the 1960s has been sadly in inverse proportion to the number of people learning them as a mother tongue. This article will review some of the most exciting recent developments in Australianist linguistic research, while also acknowledging the context of language loss and disenfranchisement within which they are situated. The message it offers is ultimately optimistic, however. For the languages still spoken regularly, research into the previously neglected components of the multimodal communicative system that is language in use is adding new depth to the existing documentation. For the majority of Australia's indigenous languages – where economic, social and political pressures have taken their toll – a different set of concerns has emerged. Linguists are now grappling with a range of theoretical and empirical questions regarding the mechanisms of language contact and attrition, even as they continue to contribute new insights into the traditional ‘core’ fields of phonetics and phonology, morphosyntax, semantics and historical linguistics. Moreover, an increasing consciousness of the respective roles of outsider researcher and speech community is changing not only the methodologies of linguists ‘in the field’, but also the research itself. All of these factors will shape the directions of future Australianist linguistic research, as well as the number and nature of languages that remain to be studied.

This bibliography presents annotated entries for 352 theses completed at the University of Queensland between 1948 and 2000 of interest to researchers in the field of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies. The theses included in the Bibliography embody a considerable amount of original research which is not available elsewhere.

The Bibliography is the result of a long-term project undertaken by the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies Unit at the University of Queensland to collect, abstract and index theses with Indigenous Australian content, which were accepted for a degree at the University of Queensland. The project was initiated in response to a perceived need to make the results of postgraduate research available not only to internal and external researchers but also to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities.

University of Queensland theses with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander content have been included in several other thesis bibliographies and lists (e.g. Coppell 1977; Hall 1987; White 1975, 1994). However, these listings are either dated or discipline-specific and do not cover the full range of theses completed at the University of Queensland. More comprehensive searches were therefore carried out using the University of Queensland Library catalogue, supplemented by manual searches of departmental thesis collections and checked against entries in the Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies Library catalogue.

Successful communication hinges on keeping track of who and what we are talking about. For this reason, person reference sits at the heart of the social sciences. Referring to persons is an interactional process where information is transferred from current speakers to the recipients of their talk. This dissertation concerns itself with the work that is achieved through this transfer of information.
The interactional approach adopted is one that combines the “micro” of conversation analysis with the “macro” of genealogically grounded anthropological linguistics. Murriny Patha, a non-Pama-Nyungan language spoken in the north of Australia, is a highly complex polysynthetic language with kinship categories that are grammaticalized as verbal inflections. For referring to persons, as well as names, nicknames, kinterms, minimal descriptions and free pronouns, Murriny Patha speakers make extensive use of pronominal reference markers embedded within polysynthetic verbs. Murriny Patha does not have a formal “mother-in-law” register. There are however numerous taboos on naming kin in avoidance relationships, and on naming and their namesakes. Similarly, there are also taboos on naming the deceased and on naming their namesakes. As a result, for every speaker there is a multitude of people whose names should be avoided.
At any one time, speakers of the language have a range of referential options. Speakers’ decisions about which category of reference forms to choose (names, kinterms etc.) are governed by conversational preferences that shape “referential design”. Six preferences – a preference for associating the referent to the co-present conversationalists, a preference for avoiding personal names, a preference for using recognitionals, a preference for being succinct, and a pair of opposed preferences relating to referential specificity – guide speakers towards choosing a name on one occasion, a kinterm on the next occasion and verbal cross-reference on yet another occasion. Different classes of expressions better satisfy particular conversational preferences. There is a systematicity to the referential choices that speakers make. The interactional objectives of interlocutors are enacted through the regular placement of particular forms in particular sequential environments. These objectives are then revealed through the turn-by-turn unfolding of conversational interaction.

This thesis is a comprehensive analysis of the nominal and pronominal morphology of Ngardi, an
endangered Pama-Nyungan language of the Ngumpin-Yapa subgroup spoken in the western regions
of the Tanami Desert in Western Australia. On the basis of the author’s 2016–2017 recordings of
grammatical elicitation and narratives and pre-existing legacy materials of Lee Cataldi, Tom Green
and Tasaku Tsunoda; this thesis provides a detailed analysis of two core aspects of the Ngardi
grammatical system: nominal case morphology and subclasses (Chapters 2 and 3); and the complex
system of pronominal clitics (Chapter 4). The culmination of these three chapters is a unified
analysis of the interaction of the nominal and pronominal systems and their role in Ngardi
morphosyntax. Throughout this thesis, comparisons with data analyses of other Ngumpin-Yapa
languages are made, revealing a number of similarities and differences among the Ngumpin
languages to the west and north and among the Yapa languages to the east.
Chapter 2 begins by examining the internal structure of nominals and how this structure relates to
the clausal and inter-clausal syntax. Derivational reduplication and suffixation are then described,
as well as morphological number. Case in Ngardi is introduced in Chapter 2 as a highly
polyfunctional component of Ngardi morphosyntax. Case suffixes can be found functioning (a)
derivationally, (b) adnominally, (c) relationally and (d) as subordinators in non-finite (reduced)
clauses. A subset of ‘derivational cases’ are shown to share a set of distributional and functional
properties, in contrast to grammatical and semantic ‘non-derivational cases’. The Ngardi case
system also relates to the complex system of non-finite subordination. Cases in subordinating
function are categorised in terms of their relative tense and control features with respect to a finite
main clause. Furthermore, Ngardi makes notable use of ‘subject-orientation’, recruiting the ergative
case in a referential function to relate various secondary predicates and adverbial modifiers to
transitive subjects. The wide functional range of case also gives rise to the possibility of multiple
layered case marking (‘case stacking’) which is discussed in detail. Taken together, the
investigation of nominals and nominal morphology reveals a number of structural parallels between
Ngardi and its eastern neighbour Warlpiri, a Yapa language.
Chapter 3 explores the nominal subclasses in Ngardi. These show idiosyncratic properties with
respect to (a) their selection of only a reduced set of case morphology, and (b) the idiosyncratic
semantic interpretation of these case suffixes. Nominal subclasses examined include: quantifiers
(including numerals), demonstratives, ignoratives, free pronouns, directionals, locational and
temporal nominals, action nominals and kin terms. This chapter concludes with an analysis of
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possessive structures in Ngardi. Three morphosyntactically distinct types of possessive structures
are described: internal, external and prominent internal possession.
Chapter 4 introduces the system of pronominal clitics. This chapter presents a unified account of the
relationship between nominal case marking and pronominal cross-referencing. Ngardi nominals,
free pronouns and demonstratives all pattern according to an ergative-absolutive case alignment.
The bound pronouns in contrast index certain event participants by using one of three ‘series’: a
subject series, an object/oblique series and a locational series. The locational series constitutes a
distinctive feature of Western Ngumpin languages, and serves to cross-reference locative and
allative case-marked NPs under certain conditions. A typologically unusual feature of Ngardi is the
highly variable positioning of the clitic complex. Bound pronouns are found attached in second
position, but also in other positions in the clause. They may appear following an auxiliary base, or
following other parts of speech. An analysis of the formation of pronominal clitic sequences is
provided.
This thesis forms a robust basis on which to pursue future research with Ngardi speakers and has
broader implications for our understanding of the internal structure of the Ngumpin-Yapa subgroup.
The brief overview of the verbal system within the Appendix provides compelling evidence for the
current genetic grouping of Ngardi with the other Western Ngumpin languages, with close ties to
Eastern Walmajarri and Nyininy. The fact that the nominal morphosyntax of Ngardi resembles
Warlpiri and that the pronominal and verbal system shares significant similarities with Western
Ngumpin languages poses an interesting avenue for further research.

By displacing Aboriginal communities, interfering with their migratorial routes and sacred sites and forcing them into sedentary practices, European colonialism disrupted the closely-knit links between people, space and language that had characterised life in Australia for 40,000 years prior to the arrival of the British. In linguistic terms that meant the disappearance of hundreds of languages, the devitalising of traditions that had been based mainly on orality and, ultimately, the silencing of thousands of voices. In the short story " The Only Speaker of His Tongue " , David Malouf imagines the encounter between a Nordic lexicographer and the last speaker of a certain Australian language. As the lexicographer reflects about the threat that the loss of a language poses to cultural diversity, he also exposes his particular views on the possibilities of language. The aim of this article is to demonstrate that although the encounter between the scholar and the Aborigine is fictitious and the story is extremely concise, it reaches much beyond its fictional status by, both directly and indirectly, raising issues related to the past and present treatment that Australia has dedicated to its Aboriginal peoples, to the complexities of the field of salvage linguistics and to the functions of language itself.