Warumungu (Australian-Pama-Nyungan)

Abstract

Warumungu is a language spoken by a few hundred people in the central part of the Northern Territory of Australia around Tennant Creek. The speakers have suffered greatly from the invasion of their country and their dispossession. Through some successful land claims, they have regained some of this country, and many continue to work to overcome the tragic effects of the invasion on their families, health, culture and language. The language is undergoing rapid change (as are many surviving Australian languages), and the morphology used by younger speakers differs greatly from that used by older speakers. The analysis here is based largely on analysis of older speakers' speech as in Hale and Heath. Show more