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Arabana or Arabuna is an
Australian Aboriginal language The Indigenous languages of Australia number in the hundreds, the precise number being quite uncertain, although there is a range of estimates from a minimum of around 250 (using the technical definition of 'language' as non-mutually intellig ...
of the Pama–Nyungan family, spoken by the
Wongkanguru The Wangkangurru, also written Wongkanguru and Wangkanguru, are an Aboriginal Australian people of the Simpson Desert area in the state of South Australia. They also refer to themselves as Nharla. Country Norman Tindale estimated their tribal sw ...
and
Arabana people The Arabana, also known as the Ngarabana, are an Aboriginal Australian people of South Australia. Name The older tribal autonym was Ngarabana, which may have been misheard by white settlers as Arabana, the term now generally accepted by new ge ...
. The language is in steep decline, with an estimated 250 speakers according to 2004 NILS, to just 21 speakers found in the 2006 census.


Geographic distribution

Arabana is spoken at
Neales River The Neales River is a watercourse located in the Far North region of the Australian state of South Australia. The river is a tributary of Lake Eyre. The Central Australia Railway, on which The Ghan passenger train operated until 1980, crossed ...
on the west side of
Lake Eyre Lake Eyre ( ), officially known as Kati Thanda–Lake Eyre, is an endorheic lake in east-central Far North South Australia, some north of Adelaide. The shallow lake is the depocentre of the vast endorheic Lake Eyre basin, and contains th ...
west to the
Stuart Range The Stuart Range is a mountain range in central Washington, United States. The range lies within the eastern extent of the Cascade Range immediately southwest of Leavenworth and runs east–west. The western peaks make up a single sharp ridge ...
; Macumba Creek south to
Coward Springs Coward Springs is a former railway station of the Central Australia Railway and associated settlement in the Far North region of South Australia, west of Lake Eyre South. The name refers to a nearby mound spring, situated on the Oodnadatta T ...
; at
Oodnadatta Oodnadatta is a small, remote outback town and locality in the Australian state of South Australia, located north-north-west of the state capital of Adelaide by road or direct, at an altitude of . The unsealed Oodnadatta Track, an outback road ...
, Lora Creek, Lake Cadibarrawirracanna, and The Peake. Their boundary with the Kokatha People to their west is marked by the margin of the scarp of the western tableland near
Coober Pedy Coober Pedy () is a town in northern South Australia, north of Adelaide on the Stuart Highway. The town is sometimes referred to as the "opal capital of the world" because of the quantity of precious opals that are mined there. Coober Pedy ...
.


Dialects

Arabana has three dialects: Piltapalta, which Hercus refers to as "Arabana Proper", Wangkakupa, and Midhaliri. Wangganguru was also considered a dialect.


Phonology

Most of the nasals and laterals are allophonically prestopped.Jeff Mielke, 2008. ''The emergence of distinctive features'', p 135 Arabana uses the three vowel sounds, /a/, /i/, and /u/, as typically used in other Aboriginal Australian languages.


Bibliography

# Hercus, Luise. 1994. A grammar of the Arabana-Wangkangurru language Lake Eyre Basin, South Australia: Pacific Linguistics C128. Canberra: Pacific Linguistics.


References


External links


Arabana Aboriginal Corporation
representing Traditional Owners of Arabana Country * Bibliographies o
publishedrare
o
special
materials on Arabana language and people, at the
Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies The Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies (AIATSIS), established as the Australian Institute of Aboriginal Studies (AIAS) in 1964, is an independent Australian Government statutory authority. It is a collecting, ...
Karnic languages Critically endangered languages Endangered indigenous Australian languages in South Australia {{ia-lang-stub