The Bagandji language
... Maternal ancestry derives mainly from two language groups, Paakintji and Ngiyambaa , whose land was taken for pastoral purposes, with very little being recorded of the language and history before numbers were drastically reduced by genocide and introduced disease (Hardy 1976; Donaldson 1980, pp. 2–13; Hercus 1982 Hercus , 1993, pp. 2–18). ...
... Maternal ancestry derives mainly from two language groups, Paakintji and Ngiyambaa , whose land was taken for pastoral purposes, with very little being recorded of the language and history before numbers were drastically reduced by genocide and introduced disease (Hardy 1976; Donaldson 1980, pp. 2–13; Hercus 1982 Hercus , 1993, pp. 2–18). ...
The mitochondrial D-loop hypervariable segment 1 (mt HVS1) between nucleotides 15997 and 16377 has been examined in aboriginal Australian people from the Darling River region of New South Wales (riverine) and from Yuendumu in central Australia (desert). Forty-seven unique HVS1 types were identified, varying at 49 nucleotide positions. Pairwise analysis by calculation of BEPPI (between population proportion index) reveals statistically significant structure in the populations, although some identical HVS1 types are seen in the two contrasting regions. mt HVS1 types may reflect more-ancient distributions than do linguistic diversity and other culturally distinguishing attributes. Comparison with sequences from five published global studies reveals that these Australians demonstrate greatest divergence from some Africans, least from Papua New Guinea highlanders, and only slightly more from some Pacific groups (Indonesian, Asian, Samoan, and coastal Papua New Guinea), although the HVS1 types vary at different nucleotide sites. Construction of a median network, displaying three main groups, suggests that several hypervariable nucleotide sites within the HVS1 are likely to have undergone mutation independently, making phylogenetic comparison with global samples by conventional methods difficult. Specific nucleotide-site variants are major separators in median networks constructed from Australian HVS1 types alone and for one global selection. The distribution of these, requiring extended study, suggests that they may be signatures of different groups of prehistoric colonizers into Australia, for which the time of colonization remains elusive.
... 'guljaruba'; Bagandji language, lower Darling region of New South Wales, meaning 'emu' (Hercus 1982), considered a noun in apposition. ...
A new emu (Emuarius guljaruba, sp. nov.) is described
from the Late Oligocene Etadunna Formation (Ngama Local Fauna), based on a
complete tarsometatarsus. While exhibiting evidence of cursorial abilities
advanced over those of cassowaries (Casuarius), this
taxon was not as cursorially adapted as the living Emu
(Dromaius novaehollandiae). This taxon is provisionally
referred to the genus Emuarius, although a definite
generic assignment cannot be made.
Ngiyampaa First People in the all-Indigenous community of Murrin Bridge, central-western New South Wales, Australia colloquially refer to happiness as ‘enjoying life’ and ‘being well’. They maintain particular emphases on people’s personal positioning in kin-related networks (relatedness) with others; and the ways in which the social presence and engagements of their bodies within that network are vital for people’s constituting of what it means to be well and to enjoy life. Leonie and Carl’s story present two amongst numerous other examples from Murrin Bridge that are typical expressions of those meanings, locally. What each of their stories illustrate is that the social presence of people’s bodies is understood as vehicles expressing the relationship between Indigenous, communal, internal experiences and their connections with others. If culturally safe and, hence, commonly, appropriate acknowledgements of those understandings are to be achieved, this point is vital and is to be considered both an inherent component and continuing priority.
This paper explores the expression of mistaken beliefs – as in for example the boy mistakenly believes that the turtle is dead (whereas in fact it is alive) – in the Indigenous languages of Australia. It is shown that some mode of expressing this meaning is attested in around 40% of the languages in a selection of 149 language varieties. In over 90% of the languages showing some mode of expressing the target meaning, it is – or can be – achieved through grammatical morphemes or constructions more or less dedicated to the expression of mistaken beliefs. These include particles, enclitics and various types of complement construction involving verbs of thinking, that frequently also convey meanings of saying, doing and hearing, rarely that specify the thought as mistaken. In just four or five languages, however, the meaning is attested only as a pragmatic implicature of a general statement of belief. To the extent possible given the limitations of the sources, the paper examines the range of meanings and uses of the morphemes/constructions expressing mistaken beliefs.
Change is an inherent feature of all aspects of language, and syntax is no exception. While the synchronic study of syntax allows us to make discoveries about the nature of syntactic structure, the study of historical syntax offers even greater possibilities. Over recent decades, the study of historical syntax has proven to be a powerful scientific tool of enquiry with which to challenge and reassess hypotheses and ideas about the nature of syntactic structure which go beyond the observed limits of the study of the synchronic syntax of individual languages or language families. In this timely Handbook, the editors bring together the best of recent international scholarship on historical syntax. Each chapter is focused on a theme rather than an individual language, allowing readers to discover how systematic descriptions of historical data can profitably inform and challenge highly diverse sets of theoretical assumptions.
As new tools for large-scale phonological typology emerge, it has become possible to examine and understand continent-level variation among Australian languages in more detail than previously, and thus to add insightful nuance to the frequent characterisation of Australian phonologies as strikingly uniform (Busby 1980; Dixon 1980; Evans 1995a; Hamilton 1996; Dixon 2002; Butcher 2006; Fletcher and Butcher 2014; Baker 2014). In this chapter I examine linear segmental phonotactics, and in the previous chapter segment inventories. In both, the starting point is classic observations about Australian similarity and diversity, but the primary aim is to move beyond these. To approach that goal, I observe variation in terms of major genealogical groupings of languages, comparing variation among them and within them, drawing on a large empirical dataset covering three hundred thousand lexical entries from over two hundred and fifty language varieties. These are the kinds of tools and methods which will increasingly dominate the practice of typology and the theoretical disciplines that rely on its findings in this century (Gasser and Bowern 2014; Macklin-Cordes and Round 2015). For Australian languages, they reveal a new degree of precision about phonological diversity, and in some cases qualitatively new insights.
Section 11.1 introduces the main characteristics and parameters of variation in consonant phonotactics. Section 11.2 examines vowel phonotactics, specifically statistical harmony between vowels in adjacent syllables. Section 11.3 addresses issues at the intersection of segment inventories and phonotactics, namely contour segments such as prestopped nasals. Section 11.4 concludes. The preparation and sources of the dataset are described in Section 11.5.
Suppletion for case and number in pronominal paradigms shows robust patterns across a large, cross-linguistic survey. These patterns are largely, but not entirely, parallel to patterns described in Bobaljik (2012) for suppletion for adjectival degree. Like adjectival degree suppletion along the dimension positive < comparative < superlative, if some element undergoes suppletion for a category X, that element will also undergo suppletion for any category more marked than X on independently established markedness hierarchies for case and number. We argue that the structural account of adjectival suppletive patterns in Bobaljik (2012) extends to pronominal suppletion, on the assumption that case (Caha 2009) and number (Harbour 2011) hierarchies are structurally encoded. In the course of the investigation, we provide evidence against the common view that suppletion obeys a condition of structural (Bobaljik 2012) and/or linear (Embick 2010) adjacency (cf. Merchant 2015; Moskal and Smith 2016), and argue that the full range of facts requires instead a domain-based approach to locality (cf. Moskal 2015b). In the realm of number, suppletion of pronouns behaves as expected, but a handful of examples for suppletion in nouns show a pattern that is initially unexpected, but which is, however, consistent with the overall view if the Number head is also internally structurally complex. Moreover, variation in suppletive patterns for number converges with independent evidence for variation in the internal complexity and markedness of number across languages.
Aboriginal people in the community of Murrin Bridge, central-western New South Wales, Australia derive traditionally from a Ngiyampaa language-based background. Today, local Aboriginal people refer to happiness in terms of ‘being well’ and ‘enjoying life’, providing a particular emphasis on people’s personal positioning within a kin-related network of relatedness with others. The social presence and engagements of their bodies within that network are vital for people’s constituting what it means ‘to be well’ and ‘to enjoy life’. Leonie and Carl’s story present two examples from Murrin Bridge that are typical for the expression of those meanings, locally. What those stories illustrate is that people’s social presence is to be understood as vehicles expressing the relationship between Aboriginal internal experiences and their connection with others—if culturally appropriate acknowledgements of those understandings are to be achieved.
ResearchGate has not been able to resolve any references for this publication.