The Ritharnggu language (Ritharrŋu, Ritharngu, Ritarungo) is an

Australian Aboriginal Aboriginal Australians are the various indigenous peoples of the Mainland Australia, Australian mainland and many of its islands, excluding the ethnically distinct people of the Torres Strait Islands. Humans first migrated to Australia (co ...

language of the

Yolŋu language The Yolngu or Yolŋu ( or ) are an aggregation of Aboriginal Australian people inhabiting north-eastern Arnhem Land in the Northern Territory of Australia. ''Yolngu'' means "person" in the Yolŋu languages. The terms Murngin, Wulamba, Yalnumat ...

group, spoken in Australia's

Northern Territory The Northern Territory (abbreviated as NT; known formally as the Northern Territory of Australia and informally as the Territory) is an states and territories of Australia, Australian internal territory in the central and central-northern regi ...

. Dialects align with the two kinship moieties of the

Ritharrngu The Ritharrngu (Ritharrŋu, Ritharngu) and also known as the Diakui (and variant spellings), are an Aboriginal Australian people of Arnhem Land in the Northern Territory, of the Yolŋu group of peoples. Their clans are Wagilak and Manggura (of t ...

people, one of several

Yolngu The Yolngu or Yolŋu ( or ) are an aggregation of Aboriginal Australian people inhabiting north-eastern Arnhem Land in the Northern Territory of Australia. ''Yolngu'' means "person" in the Yolŋu languages. The terms Murngin, Wulamba, Yalnuma ...

peoples: (a) Ritharnggu (Yirritja

moiety Moiety may refer to: __NOTOC__ Anthropology * Moiety (kinship), either of two groups into which a society is divided ** A division of society in the Iroquois societal structure in North America ** An Australian Aboriginal kinship group ** Native Ha ...

), and (b) Wagilak language (Dua moiety). The Manggurra (the other Dua clan) now speak Ritharnggu, but apparently shifted from Nunggubuyu.

Language revival

, Wägilak/Ritharrŋu is one of 20 languages prioritised as part of the Priority Languages Support Project, being undertaken by First Languages Australia and funded by the

Department of Communications and the Arts The Australian Department of Communications and the Arts was a Government department, department of the Government of Australia charged with responsibility for communications policy and programs and cultural affairs. In December 2019, prime mi ...

. The project aims to "identify and document critically-endangered languages — those languages for which little or no documentation exists, where no recordings have previously been made, but where there are living speakers".

Grammar

Ritharnggu has a

split ergativity In linguistic typology, split ergativity is a feature of certain languages where some constructions use ergative syntax and morphology, but other constructions show another pattern, usually nominative–accusative. The conditions in which ergat ...

system. Pronouns use nominative/accusative alignment, humans and higher animals a

tripartite Tripartite means composed of or split into three parts, or refers to three parties. Specifically, it may also refer to any of the following: * 3 (number) * Tripartite alignment, in linguistics * Tripartite motto, or hendiatris, a figure of speech ...

system, and everything else ergative/absolutive.

References

Yolŋu languages Endangered indigenous Australian languages in the Northern Territory {{NorthernTerritory-stub