| Adnyamathanha-Kuyani | |
|---|---|
| yura ngarwala | |
| Native to | Australia |
| Region | South Australia |
| Ethnicity | Adnyamathanha,Kuyani,Wailpi |
Native speakers | 262 (2021 census, Adnyamathanha)[1] |
Pama–Nyungan
| |
| Latin script | |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 | Either:adt – Adnyamathanhagvy – Guyani |
| Glottolog | adny1235 Adnyamathanhaguya1249 Guyani |
| AIATSIS[2] | L10 Adnyamathanha,L9 Kuyani |
| ELP | Adnyamathanha |
| Kuyani | |
 Traditional lands ofAboriginal peoples nearAdelaide | |
 Adnyamathanha is classified as Severely Endangered by the UNESCOAtlas of the World's Languages in Danger. | |
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TheAdnyamathanha language (pronounced/ˈɑːdnjəmʌdənə/), also known asyura ngarwala natively andKuyani, also known asGuyani and other variants, are two closely relatedAustralian Aboriginal languages. They are traditional languages of theAdnyamathanha of and theKuyani peoples, of theFlinders Ranges and to the west of the Flinders respectively, inSouth Australia.
As of the2016 Australian census, there were around 140 speakers of Adnyamathanha, making it anendangered language; there have been no speakers of Kuyani recorded since 1975. The firstbilingual dictionary of the language was published in November 2020.
The name of thewitchetty grub comes from Adnyamathanha.
This language has been known by many names and variant spellings of names, including:
Yura ngarwala is a widely used term for the Adnyamathanha language. It translates literally to 'people speak'. However, in modern timesyura has come to mean 'Adnyamathanha person', rather than 'person' generally, and thus the term translates to 'Adnyamathanha person speak'.
Guyani is also spelledKijani, Kuyani, Kwiani.
WhileR. M. W. Dixon classifies Adnyamathanha and Guyani as a single language,Ethnologue,Glottolog andAIATSIS treats them as separate languages, L10: Adnyamathanha[2] and L9: Kuyani.[3]
Estimates of the number of people who speak Adnyamathanha are variable, though it is a severelyendangered language. According to Oates (1973) there were only 30 speakers, around 20 according to Schmidt in 1990, 127 in the 1996Australian census, and about 140 counted in the 2016 census.[2]
Adjnjamathanha and Guyani have the same phonemic inventory.
| Front | Back | |
|---|---|---|
| High | iiː | uuː |
| Low | aaː | |
Most of the nasals and laterals are allophonicallyprestopped.[4]
| Peripheral | Laminal | Apical | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Labial | Velar | Palatal | Dental | Alveolar | Retroflex | Glottal | ||
| Plosive | voiceless | p | k | c | t̪ | t | ʈ | (ʔ) |
| voiced | (ɖ) | |||||||
| Fricative | voiced | (v) | ||||||
| Nasal | m ~bm | ŋ | ɲ ~ɟɲ | n̪ ~d̪n̪ | n ~dn | ɳ ~ɖɳ | ||
| Lateral | ʎ ~ɟʎ | l̪ ~d̪l̪ | l ~dl | ɭ ~ɖɭ | ||||
| Flap | ɾ | ɽ | ||||||
| Trill | r | |||||||
| Approximant | w | j | ɻ | |||||
[v] may be an allophone of/p/.
While the closely related Guyani retains word-initial stops, Adnyamathanha has undergone systematiclenition of stops in this position. Former*p has become[v], former*t̪ and probably also*c have become/j/, and former*k has disappeared entirely.
Adnyamathanha has a complex system ofpersonal pronouns. There are 10 different ways of saying we "you and I" (first persondual), depending on the relationship between the speaker and the addressee.
The linguistBernhard Schebeck travelled to theNepabunna region in the 1970s, and wroteAn Adnyamathanha-English Research Dictionary in 2000, which was "For private, or internal, use only – not for publication".[5]Dorothy Tunbridge, alinguist fromCanberra and author of[6]Flinders Ranges Dreaming[7] visited the area in the 1980s. Both contributed much to knowledge of the language, but neither recorded all of the words that were known to local speakers.[8]
In November 2020 the first-ever bilingual Adnyamathanha/English dictionary andgrammar was published, with translations from and to each language. Compiled byTerrence Coulthard and his wife Josephine, the 400-pageAdnyamathanha Culture Guide and Language Book[9] includes descriptions of cultural practices,songlines (muda), theAdnyamathanha kinship system andsocial history.[10] Terrence, an Adnyamathanha speaker, had been collecting information on the culture and language for 40 years, building on the earlier work by Schebeck and Tunbridge.[8] Linguists and others from theUniversity of Adelaide's Mobile Language Team helped the couple to finalise work on the book in the 18 months to two years before publication.[10][8]
The Coulthards runIga Warta, acultural tourism enterprise, located nearNepabunna in theGammon Ranges, the site of amission where Terrence grew up.[8] Iga Warta means "native orange",[11] named by 19th-century English botanistJohn Lindley asCapparis mitchelii.[12][13]
