Bungandidj language

Last updated

Bungandidj
Buwandik
RegionSouth-east South Australia
South-west Victoria
Ethnicity Bungandidj
Extinct (date missing)
Pama–Nyungan
  • Southeastern
    • Victorian
      • Kulin–Bungandidj
        • Bungandidj
Dialects
  • Bungandidj
  • Pinejunga
  • Mootatunga
  • Wichintunga
  • Polinjunga [1]
Language codes
ISO 639-3 xbg
Glottolog bung1264
AIATSIS [2] S13
ELP Buandig

Bungandidj is a language of Australia, spoken by the Bungandidj people, Indigenous Australians who lived in an area which is now in south-eastern South Australia and in south-western Victoria. According to Christina Smith and her book on the Buandig people, the Bungandidj called their language drualat-ngolonung (speech of man), or Booandik-ngolo (speech of the Booandik). [3] As of 2017, there is a revival and maintenance programme under way for the language. [4]

Contents

Historical variants of the name include: Bunganditj, Bungandaetch, Bunga(n)daetcha, Bungandity, Bungandit, Buganditch, Bungaditj, Pungantitj, Pungatitj, Booganitch, Buanditj, Buandik, Booandik, Boandiks, Bangandidj, Bungandidjk, Pungandik, Bak-on-date, Barconedeet, Booandik-ngolo, Borandikngolo, Bunganditjngolo, and Burhwundeirtch.

Phonology

Bungandidj phonology is typical of Australian languages generally, sharing characteristics such as a single series of stops (no voicing contrast) at six places of articulation, a full corresponding set of nasals, laminals at all four coronal places of articulation and two glides. [5] Extrapolating from historical written sources and knowledge of surrounding languages, Blake posits the following consonant inventory: [5]

Consonants

Peripheral Laminal Apical
Bilabial Velar Dental Palatal Alveolar Retroflex
Plosive p[ p ]k[ k ]th[ ]tj[ c ]t[ t ]rt[ ʈ ]
Nasal m[ m ]ng[ ŋ ]nh[ ]ny[ ɲ ]n[ n ]rn[ ɳ ]
Flap/Trill rr[ r ]
Lateral lh[ ]ly[ ʎ ]l[ l ]rl[ ɭ ]
Approximant w[ w ]y[ j ]r[ ɻ ]

Vowels

Front Central Back
Close i[ i ]u[ u ]
Open a[ a ]

Notes on orthography

A poem

Smith (1880), on pages 138–139, records a poem written in Bungandidj : [3]

yul-yul, thumbal (Fly beetle, bat, night)
kallaball, moonarerebul (Fly, march-fly, beetle)
nana nan molanin (parrot, little parrot.)
korotaa, king nal (wattle bird,)
yongo birrit. (minah bird.)

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Allophone</span> Phone used to pronounce a single phoneme

In phonology, an allophone is one of multiple possible spoken sounds – or phones – used to pronounce a single phoneme in a particular language. For example, in English, the voiceless plosive and the aspirated form are allophones for the phoneme, while these two are considered to be different phonemes in some languages such as Central Thai. Similarly, in Spanish, and are allophones for the phoneme, while these two are considered to be different phonemes in English.

Click consonants, or clicks, are speech sounds that occur as consonants in many languages of Southern Africa and in three languages of East Africa. Examples familiar to English-speakers are the tut-tut or tsk! tsk! used to express disapproval or pity, the tchick! used to spur on a horse, and the clip-clop! sound children make with their tongue to imitate a horse trotting. However, these paralinguistic sounds in English are not full click consonants, as they only involve the front of the tongue, without the release of the back of the tongue that is required for clicks to combine with vowels and form syllables.

In phonetics, a nasal, also called a nasal occlusive or nasal stop in contrast with an oral stop or nasalized consonant, is an occlusive consonant produced with a lowered velum, allowing air to escape freely through the nose. The vast majority of consonants are oral consonants. Examples of nasals in English are, and, in words such as nose, bring and mouth. Nasal occlusives are nearly universal in human languages. There are also other kinds of nasal consonants in some languages.

Velars are consonants articulated with the back part of the tongue against the soft palate, the back part of the roof of the mouth.

Labial consonants are consonants in which one or both lips are the active articulator. The two common labial articulations are bilabials, articulated using both lips, and labiodentals, articulated with the lower lip against the upper teeth, both of which are present in English. A third labial articulation is dentolabials, articulated with the upper lip against the lower teeth, normally only found in pathological speech. Generally precluded are linguolabials, in which the tip of the tongue contacts the posterior side of the upper lip, making them coronals, though sometimes, they behave as labial consonants.

Uvulars are consonants articulated with the back of the tongue against or near the uvula, that is, further back in the mouth than velar consonants. Uvulars may be stops, fricatives, nasals, trills, or approximants, though the IPA does not provide a separate symbol for the approximant, and the symbol for the voiced fricative is used instead. Uvular affricates can certainly be made but are rare: they occur in some southern High-German dialects, as well as in a few African and Native American languages. Uvular consonants are typically incompatible with advanced tongue root, and they often cause retraction of neighboring vowels.

Rotokas is a North Bougainville language spoken by about 4,320 people on the island of Bougainville, an island located to the east of New Guinea, which is part of Papua New Guinea. According to Allen and Hurd (1963), there are three identified dialects: Central Rotokas, Aita Rotokas, and Pipipaia; with a further dialect spoken in Atsilima (Atsinima) village with an unclear status. Central Rotokas is most notable for its extremely small phonemic inventory and for having perhaps the smallest modern alphabet.

Ubykh, an extinct Northwest Caucasian language, has the largest consonant inventory of all documented languages that do not use clicks, and also has the most disproportional ratio of phonemic consonants to vowels. It has consonants in at least eight, perhaps nine, basic places of articulation and 29 distinct fricatives, 27 sibilants, and 20 uvulars, more than any other documented language. Some Khoisan languages, such as Taa, may have larger consonant inventories due to their extensive use of click consonants, although some analyses view a large proportion of the clicks in these languages as clusters, which would bring them closer into line with the Caucasian languages.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Australian Aboriginal languages</span> Indigenous languages of Australia

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 up to possibly 363. The Indigenous languages of Australia comprise numerous language families and isolates, perhaps as many as 13, spoken by the 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".

In phonetics and phonology, a sonorant or resonant is a speech sound that is produced with continuous, non-turbulent airflow in the vocal tract; these are the manners of articulation that are most often voiced in the world's languages. Vowels are sonorants, as are semivowels like and, nasal consonants like and, and liquid consonants like and. This set of sounds contrasts with the obstruents.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Warlpiri language</span> Aboriginal Australian language

The Warlpiri language is spoken by close to 3,000 of the Warlpiri people from the Tanami Desert, northwest of Alice Springs, Central Australia. It is one of the Ngarrkic languages of the large Pama–Nyungan family and is one of the largest Aboriginal languages in Australia in terms of number of speakers. One of the most well-known terms for The Dreaming, Jukurrpa, derives from Warlpiri.

Nyangumarta, also written Njaŋumada, Njangamada, Njanjamarta and other variants, is a language spoken by the Nyangumarta people and other Aboriginal Australians in the region of Western Australia to the south and east of Lake Waukarlykarly, including Eighty Mile Beach, and part of the Great Sandy Desert inland to near Telfer. As of 2021 there were an estimated 240 speakers of Nyangumarta, down from a 1975 estimate of 1000.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Yugambeh–Bundjalung languages</span> Language branch spoken in Australia

Yugambeh–Bundjalung, also known as Bandjalangic, is a branch of the Pama–Nyungan language family, that is spoken in north-eastern New South Wales and South-East Queensland.

Murrinh-patha, called Garama by the Jaminjung, is an Australian Aboriginal language spoken by over 2,000 people, most of whom live in Wadeye in the Northern Territory, where it is the dominant language of the community. It is spoken by the Murrinh-Patha people, as well as several other peoples whose languages are extinct or nearly so, including the Mati Ke and Marri-Djabin. It is believed to be the most widely spoken Australian Aboriginal language not belonging to the Pama-Nyungan language family.

This article discusses the phonology of the Inuit languages. Unless otherwise noted, statements refer to Inuktitut dialects of Canada.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Worrorra language</span> Aboriginal Australian language of northern Western Australia

Worrorra, also written Worora and other variants, and also known as Western Worrorran, is a moribund Australian Aboriginal language of northern Western Australia. It encompasses a number of dialects, which are spoken by a group of people known as the Worrorra people.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Christina Smith (missionary)</span> Christian lay missionary and educator

Christina Smith (1809–1893), generally referred to as Mrs James Smith, was a teacher and Christian missionary who documented the lives, customs, legends, and language of the Buandig Indigenous Australians who live in south-eastern South Australia and western Victoria.

Alawa (Galawa) is a moribund Indigenous Australian language spoken by the Alawa people of the Northern Territory. In 1991, there were reportedly 18 remaining speakers and 4 semi-speakers.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Wadawurrung language</span> Australian language of Victoria, Australia

Wadawurrung, also rendered as Wathawurrung, Wathaurong or Wada wurrung, and formerly sometimes Barrabool, is the Aboriginal Australian language spoken by the Wathaurong people of the Kulin Nation of Central Victoria. It was spoken by 15 clans south of the Werribee River and the Bellarine Peninsula to Streatham. Glottolog classifies Wathawurrung as extinct, however various regional programs and initiatives promote the usage and revitalisation of Wathaurong language

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Darumbal language</span> Extinct Australian Aboriginal language

Darumbal, also spelt Dharambal, is an Australian Aboriginal language of Queensland in Australia declared extinct. It was spoken in the Rockhampton area of Queensland, as well as on the Capricorn Coast, Southern Great Keppel Island and Yeppoon islands. Dialects were Guwinmal, Karunbara, Rakiwara, and Wapabura. It is classified with Bayali as a Kingkel language, but the two are not close, with a low 21% shared vocabulary. Indeed, Angela Terrill states that "there is no evidence on which to base a claim of a low-level genetic group including Dharumbal with any other language".

References

  1. Dixon, R. M. W. (2002). Australian Languages: Their Nature and Development. Cambridge University Press. p. xxxv.
  2. S13 Bungandidj at the Australian Indigenous Languages Database, Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies
  3. 1 2 Christina Smith, The Booandik Tribe of South Australian Aborigines: A Sketch of Their Habits, Customs, Legends, and Language , Spiller, 1880
  4. Monaghan, Paul (2017). "1. Structures of Aboriginal life at the time of colonisation in South Australia" (PDF). In Brock, Peggy; Gara, Tom (eds.). Colonialism and its aftermath: A history of Aboriginal South Australia. Extract, pp.i-xxiii. Wakefield. p. 17. ISBN   9781743054994.
  5. 1 2 3 4 5 Blake, Barry J. (2003). The Bunganditj (Buwandik) language of the Mount Gambier region. Australian National University. Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies. Canberra: Pacific Linguistics, Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies, Australian National University. ISBN   9780858834958. OCLC   56054287.