Worrorran languages (purple), among other non-Pama-Nyungan languages (grey)
Worrorra, also writtenWorora and other variants, and also known asWestern Worrorran, is amoribundAustralian Aboriginal language of northernWestern Australia. It encompasses a number of dialects, which are spoken by a group of people known as theWorrorra people.
Worrorra is adialect cluster; Bowern (2011) recognises five languages:Worrorra proper,Unggumi,Yawijibaya,Unggarranggu, andUmiida.[4] McGregor and Rumsey (2009) include the above dialects and also includeWinyjarrumi (Winjarumi), describing Worrorra as a non-Pama-Nyungan language of the Worrorran group of languages known properly as western Worrorran.[3]
An allegedMaialnga language was a reported clan name of Worrorra proper that could not be confirmed with speakers.[5]
A nasal occurring before a stop consonant, is then realised as a prenasalized voiced stop sound (ex. [ŋɡ]).
/r/ can be heard as a trill or a flap, and is typically only voiced when preceding a sonorant, voiced phoneme, or lateral consonant. Elsewhere, it is voiceless as[r̥], or can be heard in free variation.
/j/ can also be heard as a fricative sound[ç] in word-initial positions.
Long vowel sounds are noted as follows: /iː, ɛː, uː, ɔː, ɑː/.
In between consonant clusters, an epenthetic vowel sound[ʉ̆] ~[ɨ̆] occurs when breaking them up. Sometimes it can also be heard as a central vowel sound[ɨ].[8]
^Tindale, Norman B. (Norman Barnett); Jones, Rhys (1974),Aboriginal tribes of Australia : their terrain, environmental controls, distribution, limits, and proper names, University of California Press ; Canberra : Australian National University Press,ISBN978-0-520-02005-4
^Valda J. Blundell and Mary Anne Jebb."Umbagai, Elkin (1921–1980)". Australian Dictionary of Biography. Retrieved4 November 2013.
^abcClendon, Mark (2014).Worrorra: A language of the north-west Kimberley coast. Adelaide: University of Adelaide. pp. 24–39.
^Love, J.R.B. (1941).Worora kinship gestures, Reprinted inAboriginal sign languages of the Americas and Australia. New York: Plenum Press, 1978, vol. 2, pp. 403–405.
^Kendon, A. (1988)Sign Languages of Aboriginal Australia: Cultural, Semiotic and Communicative Perspectives. Cambridge:Cambridge University Press
