Some early north west indigenous wordlists

Petkovic, J. (2007) Some early north west indigenous wordlists. IM: Interactive Media (3).

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Abstract

The indigenous words in the Stefano manuscript give us an important albeit small window into the languages of the North West Cape Aborigines.2 From the available information, we can now be reasonably certain that this wordlist belongs primarily to the Yinikurtira language group.3 We also know that the Yinikurtira community came to be dispersed about one hundred years ago and its members ceased using the Yinikuritra language, which is now formally designated as extinct.4 If in these circumstances we want to find something authentic about the Yinikurtira language we cannot do so by simply asking one of its living speakers. Rather, we need to look at the documents on the Yinikurtira language and culture from about a century ago and from the time when the Yinikurtira people were still living on Yinikurtira country.