that munanga linguist

The government survey mob is coming tomorrow. Woo-hoo. Or as they say in Marra, jawayiga! (Although I'm not sure how well my sarcasm translates into Marra.)

so slow with posting... sorry. so much happens and i have so much to share but so much of what happens is going by unblogged. also, the politics (intervention etc.) is getting me down and is so overwhelming that i just don't know where to start blogging about it. but i've had pretty good week at work. most of it has been out bush seeing places that i haven't seen before. Tuesday was a day trip to Walgundu with is a special site with rock art n lots of stories n history. The highlight was hanging out with some Alawa speakers that I used work with quite a bit and finally doing a bit of language work on Alawa again. Wednesday was in the office and the CDEP team worked so well - they're such a good team at the moment. But they're the ones pushing me to work! They made a gazillion flashcards for teaching and then we got through a fair bit of a Kriol translation job we're doing. Which is tiring but definitely not a bad thing! And Thursday/Friday was an overn...

I've found all the politics stuff that's been in the news lately really full on. I've been thinking about it lots and have had lots to say, but then at the same time, I don't quite know what to say and don't quite know what to think. Generally though, I find it pretty scary what the government is doing - and I think the fear comes about from the poor communication - when no one can tell you or knows what's happening, you can't really reassure yourself that everything's okay. One thing I can say though, is that the government's actions definitely have political motivations - no one can convince me otherwise of that. I was a bit depressed about it all a week or so ago, but I sorta came to the conclusion that I'll just get on with what we're trying to do here and then the proof (of our worth) will be in the pudding. And have we been doing some good work or what? The 4 ppl working with me on CDEP are doing really well at the moment and are a ...

I am really scared about what the government's doing with their 'National emergency response'. So much so, that I really just want to put my head in the sand because thinking about what might happen is terrifying, but putting my head in the sand is not going to be very helpful. I've started reading the 'Little children are sacred' report (from the inquiry into child protection from sexual abuse) and the government's response and I'll comment as I go along. One very important point stands out in the very first recommendation of the report - a point that Howard's government seems to have missed totally. "It is critical that both governments commit to genuine consultation with Aboriginal people in designing initiatives for Aboriginal communities." Let me repeat that: "It is critical that both governments commit to genuine consultation with Aboriginal people in designing initiatives for Aboriginal communities." That recommendation h...

Hey I'm in another article. Look here . And I don't even think I sound too silly!

Occasionally, I get asked if there's any meaning behind the names of the languages we work with here, like, if a similar thing happens here that you get on the east coast where language names are sometimes derived for the word for 'no, nothing' in that language (e.g. Gooreng gooreng (from Bundaberg area) is the word for 'no' reduplicated). That doesn't happen here but I like to think what the languages would be called if that *did* happen here: Marluy marluy Mandi mandi Gatjja gatjja Waba waba Waari waari hehe... sounds funny. But then the other day I realised that it *does* happen for one of the languages here, although only informally and in casual speech... I realised that I've regularly ppl talking about Yolŋu or Ritharrŋu / Wägilak mob and referring to them as 'yaka bayaŋu mob'. Neat!

Last week we had a big week in town (Katherine). We had two days with Batchelor and then three days with the Education Department for a Language Revitalisation Workshop. One of the highlights was working with Batchelor's linguistics students. They were in Katherine for a week-long workshop on Pidgins and Creoles. Their lecturer approached us to present something about the creole spoken at Ngukurr so we did a three hour session with them which was enjoyed by everyone. Usmob really enjoyed meeting the linguistics students and finding out where they’re from. They came from all over: Torres Strait, Desert, Western NSW, Victoria, Palm Island and came from different backgrounds (but all Indigenous). And they really enjoyed meeting the guys from Ngukurr and learning a bit about Kriol. It was just one of those lovely sharing experiences, but also included lots of discussion, opining and more. I was reflecting on why I enjoyed the session with them so much. One reason was that being ...