| Kuuk Thaayorre | |
|---|---|
| Native to | Australia |
| Region | Cape York Peninsula,Queensland |
| Ethnicity | Thaayorre |
Native speakers | 174 (2021 census)[1] |
Pama–Nyungan
| |
| Dialects |
|
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 | thd |
| Glottolog | thay1249 |
| AIATSIS[2] | Y69 |
| ELP | Kuuk Thaayorre |
 Kuuk Thaayorre is classified as Definitely Endangered by theUNESCOAtlas of the World's Languages in Danger. | |
| This article containsIPA phonetic symbols. Without properrendering support, you may seequestion marks, boxes, or other symbols instead ofUnicode characters. For an introductory guide on IPA symbols, seeHelp:IPA. | |
Kuuk Thaayorre (Thayore) is aPaman language spoken in the settlementPormpuraaw on the western part of theCape York Peninsula,Queensland inAustralia by theThaayorre people. As of 2006, 250 of the 350 ethnic Thaayorre spoke the language. It is in arobust position compared to manyindigenous Australian languages, as it is still being acquired by children and used in daily interaction.[3]
It is closely related to theOgh-Undjan and more distantly related to theUw languages,Uw Olkola.Kuuk Yak is either a dialect or closely related.
Speakers of the Kuuk Thaayorre language are able to recall the names of a couple ofdialects, such asKuuk Thaayunth,Kuuk Thayem andKuuk Thanon, but today there is only little dialectal difference and the language has become more uniform as the number of speakers has gone down. The so-calledKuuk Yak language may be a dialect of Kuuk Thaayorre, but may be a closely related language as well.Barry Alpher is currently trying todocument the language in order to understand its genetic affiliation.[3]
As with many otherAustralian languages, there is a long list of alternative spellings ofKuuk Thaayorre. The name itself,Kuuk Thaayorre, means 'the Thaayorre language' in the language itself,kuuk meaning 'language' andThaayorre being theirethnonym.
Other names includeKuuk Thaayoore,Kuktayor,Kukudayore,Gugudayor,Koko Daiyuri,Koko Taiyor,Kokkotaijari,Kokotaiyari,Thayorre,Thaayore,Thayore,Tayore,Taior,Taiol,Da:jor andBehran.
Kuuk Thaayorre has fivevowels:
| Front | Back | |
|---|---|---|
| Unrounded | Rounded | |
| Close | i | u |
| Close-mid | e | o |
| Open | a | |
All of the vowels above have along counterpart. In addition, one of the rhotics may be syllabic.[4]
Kuuk Thaayorre has 16consonants:
| Peripheral | Laminal | Apical | Glottal | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Bilabial | Velar | Palatal | Dental | Alveolar | Retroflex | ||
| Plosive | p⟨p⟩ | k⟨k⟩ | c⟨c⟩ | t̪⟨th⟩ | t⟨t⟩ | ʔ⟨'⟩ | |
| Nasal | m⟨m⟩ | ŋ⟨ng⟩ | ɲ⟨ny⟩ | n̪⟨nh⟩ | n⟨n⟩ | ||
| Trill | r⟨rr⟩ | ||||||
| Approximant | w⟨w⟩ | j⟨y⟩ | l⟨l⟩ | ɻ⟨r⟩ | |||
The maximal syllable structure is CVCCC, and four-consonant clusters are not uncommon. Unusually, sequences of consecutive /r/ and /ɻ/ are valid.
Unlike in many Australian languages, monosyllables of all word classes are frequent in Kuuk Thaayorre.
A clause in Kuuk Thaayorre can be as small as a singlepredicateconstituent. Anyarguments that a predicate subcategorises for can be omitted. Predicating constituents includeverbs,adjectives,nouns,demonstrative pronouns, andlocative adverbs.[3]
Kuuk Thaayorre is on the whole anonconfigurational language at the level of theclause, although forcomplex clauses there are constraints on the ordering of the main clause and thedependent clause. Within a clausenoun phrases have intricate structure.[3]
The irregular form of theergative morpheme makes it a clearsuffix, rather than anenclitic; however, it is borne on the last nominal in the noun phrase. This makes Kuuk Thaayorre an example of a language displaying affixation to phrases. Ergative marking has the pragmatic function of displaying the degree of expectedness of the subject.
There are multipleinclusory constructions, i.e. those referring to a superset while simultaneously focussing on a subset (these are found in many IE languages, e.g. GermanWit Scilling 1.du Sc. "Sc. and I"). One of these is a set of single-word inclusory pronouns encoding both superset and subset.
Kuuk Thaayorre is similar to most Australian languages for its thoroughgoing use of absolutecardinal directions instead of words with relative senses (ahead,left, etc.) as is familiar in European languages. There are sixteen words for directions in Kuuk Thaayorre. Speakers of Kuuk Thaayorre show a correspondingly greater skill in navigational ability than speakers of languages like English, and always know the exact direction of their facing.[5] When asked to arrange a sequence of pictures in temporal order, speakers consistently arrange them so that time runs east to west, regardless of their own bodily orientation. They are also able to point to cardinal directions with very high accuracy.[6] This has been used to support theSapir–Whorf hypothesis.[7]
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