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Gunwinyguan Languages
The Gunwinyguan languages (Gunwinjguan, Gunwingguan), also core Gunwinyguan or Gunwinyguan proper, are a possible branch of a large language family of Australian Aboriginal languages in Arnhem Land, northern Australia. The most populous language is Bininj Kunwok, Kunwinjku, with some 1500 speakers. Gunwinyguan languages have a Fortis and lenis, fortis–lenis contrast in plosive consonants. Lenis/short plosives have weak contact and intermittent voicing, while fortis/long plosives have full closure, a more powerful release burst, and no voicing. Languages The list here is based on Green (2003). However, Green believes the similarities among these languages are due to shared retentions from Arnhem languages, Proto-Arnhem, and are not indicative of an exclusive relationship between them.Rebecca Green, 2003. "Proto-Maningrida within Proto-Arnhem: evidence from verbal inflectional suffixes." In Nicholas Evans, ed. ''The Non-Pama-Nyungan languages of northern Australia''. *Gunwingg ...
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Arnhem Land
Arnhem Land is a historical region of the Northern Territory of Australia. It is located in the north-eastern corner of the territory and is around from the territorial capital, Darwin, Northern Territory, Darwin. In 1623, Dutch East India Company captain Voyage of the Pera and Arnhem to Australia in 1623, Willem Joosten van Colster (or Coolsteerdt) sailed into the Gulf of Carpentaria and Cape Arnhem is named after his ship, the ''Arnhem'', which itself was named after the city of Arnhem in the Netherlands. The area covers about and has an estimated population of 16,000, of whom 12,000 are Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. Two regions are often distinguished as East Arnhem (Land) and West Arnhem (Land). The region's service hub is Nhulunbuy, east of Darwin, set up in the early 1970s as a mining town for bauxite. Other major population centres are Yirrkala (just outside Nhulunbuy), Gunbalanya (formerly Oenpelli), Ramingining, and Maningrida. A substantial proportio ...
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Arnhem Languages
The Macro-Gunwinyguan languages, also called Arnhem or Gunwinyguan, are a family of Australian Aboriginal languages spoken across eastern Arnhem Land in northern Australia. Their relationship has been demonstrated through shared morphology in their verbal inflections. Many of the languages have a fortis–lenis contrast in plosive consonants. Lenis/short plosives have weak contact and intermittent voicing, while fortis/long plosives have full closure, a more powerful release burst, and no voicing. Languages Rebecca Green (2004) reconstructed the paradigms of 28 Proto-Arnhem verbs. The languages included by Green are as follows, though Green only accepts Maningrida as a demonstrated branch: * Macro-Gunwinyguan ** Maningrida *** Burarra *** Guragone *** Djeebbana *** Nakkara ** ? East Arnhem: *** Nunggubuyu *** Ngandi *** Anindilyakwa (Enindhilyagwa)* ** ? Marran: *** Marra *** Warndarang *** ? Yugul *** ? Alawa* *** ? Mangarayi ** Kungarakany ** Gaagudju ...
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Language Family
A language family is a group of languages related through descent from a common ancestor, called the proto-language of that family. The term ''family'' is a metaphor borrowed from biology, with the tree model used in historical linguistics analogous to a family tree, or to phylogenetic trees of taxa used in evolutionary taxonomy. Linguists thus describe the ''daughter languages'' within a language family as being ''genetically related''. The divergence of a proto-language into daughter languages typically occurs through geographical separation, with different regional dialects of the proto-language undergoing different language changes and thus becoming distinct languages over time. One well-known example of a language family is the Romance languages, including Spanish, French, Italian, Portuguese, Romanian, Catalan, and many others, all of which are descended from Vulgar Latin.Lewis, M. Paul, Gary F. Simons, and Charles D. Fennig (eds.)''Ethnologue: Languages ...
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Australian Aboriginal Languages
The Indigenous languages of Australia number in the hundreds, the precise number being quite uncertain, although there is a range of estimates from a minimum of around 250 (using the technical definition of 'language' as non-mutually intelligible varieties) up to possibly 363. The Indigenous languages of Australia comprise numerous language family, language families and language isolate, isolates, perhaps as many as 13, spoken by the Aboriginal Australians, Indigenous peoples of mainland Australia and a few nearby islands. The relationships between the language families are not clear at present although there are proposals to link some into larger groupings. Despite this uncertainty, the Indigenous Australian languages are collectively covered by the technical term "Australian languages", or the "Australian family". The term can include both Tasmanian languages and the Kalaw Lagaw Ya, Western Torres Strait language, but the Genetic relationship (linguistics), genetic relations ...
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Bininj Kunwok
Bininj Kunwok is an Australian Aboriginal language which includes six dialects: Kunwinjku (formerly Gunwinggu), Kuninjku, Kundjeyhmi (formerly Gundjeihmi), Manyallaluk Mayali (Mayali), Kundedjnjenghmi, and two varieties of Kune (Kune Dulerayek and Kune Narayek). Kunwinjku is the dominant dialect, and also sometimes used to refer to the group. The spellings Bininj Gun-wok and Bininj Kun-Wok have also been used in the past, however Bininj Kunwok is the current standard orthography. The Aboriginal people who speak the dialects are the Bininj people, who live primarily in western Arnhem Land. There are over two thousand fluent speakers in an area roughly bounded by Kakadu National Park to the west, the Arafura Sea to the north, the Blyth River to the east, and the Katherine region to the south. As a recent umbrella term for a group of mutually intelligible dialects, Bininj Kunwok itself is not included in the Australian census, however the individual dialects are. In the 2021 ce ...
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Fortis And Lenis
In linguistics, ''fortis'' ( ; Latin for 'strong') and ''lenis'' (, ; Latin for 'weak'), sometimes identified with 'tense' and 'lax', are pronunciations of consonants with relatively greater and lesser energy, respectively. English has fortis consonants, such as the ''p'' in ''pat'', with a corresponding lenis consonant, such as the ''b'' in ''bat''. Fortis and lenis consonants may be distinguished by tenseness or other characteristics, such as voicing, aspiration, glottalization, velarization, length, and length of nearby vowels. ''Fortis'' and ''lenis'' were coined for languages where the contrast between sounds such as 'p' and 'b' does not involve voicing (vibration of the vocal cords). History Originally, the terms were used to refer to an impressionistic sense of strength differences, though more sophisticated instruments eventually gave the opportunity to search for the acoustic and articulatory signs. For example, tested whether articulatory strength could be det ...
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Gunwinygu Language
Bininj Kunwok is an Australian Aboriginal language which includes six dialects: Kunwinjku (formerly Gunwinggu), Kuninjku, Kundjeyhmi (formerly Gundjeihmi), Manyallaluk Mayali (Mayali), Kundedjnjenghmi, and two varieties of Kune (Kune Dulerayek and Kune Narayek). Kunwinjku is the dominant dialect, and also sometimes used to refer to the group. The spellings Bininj Gun-wok and Bininj Kun-Wok have also been used in the past, however Bininj Kunwok is the current standard orthography. The Aboriginal people who speak the dialects are the Bininj people, who live primarily in western Arnhem Land. There are over two thousand fluent speakers in an area roughly bounded by Kakadu National Park to the west, the Arafura Sea to the north, the Blyth River to the east, and the Katherine region to the south. As a recent umbrella term for a group of mutually intelligible dialects, Bininj Kunwok itself is not included in the Australian census, however the individual dialects are. In the 2021 cen ...
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Kunbarlang Language
Gunbarlang, or Kunbarlang, is an Australian Aboriginal language in northern Australia with multiple dialects. Other names are ''Gungalang'' and ''Warlang''. Speakers are multilingual in Kunwinjku and Mawng. Most of the Gunbarlang people now speak Kunwinjku. The language is part of a language revival project, as a critically endangered language. Classification Gunbarlang has been proposed to be included into the ''marne'' group of Gunwinyguan family, making its closest relatives the Central Gunwinyguan languages Bininj Kunwok and Dalabon. The label ''marne'' refers to the phonological shape of the benefactive applicative affix common to all three languages (as opposed to the ''bak'' languages to the east, e.g. Rembarrnga, Ngandi and Wubuy/Nunggubuyu).Alpher, B., Evans, N. & Harvey, M. 2003. "Proto Gunwinyguan verb suffixes." In Nicholas Evans (ed.), ''The non-Pama-Nyungan languages of northern Australia: Comparative Studies of the continent's most linguistically complex ...
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Jawany Language
Jawoyn (Jawonj, Jawany, Djauan, Jawan, Jawony; Adowen, Gun-djawan), also known as Kumertuo, is a moribund Gunwinyguan language spoken only by elders in Arnhem Land Arnhem Land is a historical region of the Northern Territory of Australia. It is located in the north-eastern corner of the territory and is around from the territorial capital, Darwin, Northern Territory, Darwin. In 1623, Dutch East India Compa ..., Australia. Phonology Consonants can be heard as either a tap or a trill . Vowels References Merlan, Francesca and Jacq, Pascale. (2005). ''Jawoyn-English dictionary & English finder-list''. Northern Territory: Diwurruwurru-jaru Aboriginal Corporation, Katherine. Merlan, Francesca C. (2016). ''Tricksters and Traditions: Jawoyn Stories and Storytellers''. (Asia-Pacific Linguistics, 31.) Canberra: Asia-Pacific Linguistics. External links * ELAR archive oJawoyn Gunwinyguan languages Indigenous Australian languages in the Northern Territory {{ ...
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Dalabon Language
Dalabon is a Gunwinyguan language of Arnhem Land, Australia. It is a severely endangered language, with perhaps as few as three fluent speakers remaining as of 2018. Dalabon is also known as Dangbon (the Kune or Mayali name), Ngalkbun (the Jawoyn name), and Buwan (the Rembarrnga name). Classification Dalabon belongs to the Gunwinyguan languages branch of the Arnhem languages; its nearest relatives are Kunwinjku, Kune, Mayali (varieties often grouped together as Bininj Kunwok), and Kunbarlang. Its next closest relatives are Rembarrnga, and other languages within the Gunwinyguan family, including Jawoyn, Ngalakgan, Ngandi, Wubuy, and Enindhilyakwa. Official status Dalabon has no official status. Local schools spent years holding sporadic programs teaching Dalabon, but these operations did not receive enough governmental support. Therefore, the condition of the programs is still vulnerable. Dialects Given the limited number of Dalabon speakers, the study of d ...
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Rembarrnga Language
Rembarrnga (Rembarunga) is an Australian Aboriginal language. It is one of the Northern Non-Pama–Nyungan languages, spoken in the Roper River region of the Northern territory. There are three dialects of Rembarrnga, namely Galduyh, Gikkik and Mappurn. It is a highly endangered language, with very few remaining fluent speakers. It is very likely that the language is no longer being learned by children. Instead, the children of Rembarrnga speakers are now learning neighbouring languages such as Kriol in south central Arnhem Land, and Kunwinjku, a dialect of Bininj Kunwok, in north central Arnhem Land. Fluent speakers of Rembarrnga currently (2015) live in the remote towns of Maningrida and Ramingining Ramingining is an Aboriginal Australian community of mainly Yolngu people in the Northern Territory, Australia, east of Darwin. It is on the edge of the Arafura Swamp in Arnhem Land. Wulkabimirri is a tiny outstation (homeland) nearby, and M ..., and in nearby outstations s ...
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