Djingili Sign Language

Jingulu, also spelt Djingili, is an Australian language spoken by the Jingili people in the Northern Territory of Australia, historically around the township of Elliot. The language is one of several languages of the West Barkly family.

The Jingulu have (or had) a well-developed signed form of their language.

A 2022 study reports on an artificial intelligence (AI) system based on some unusual elements of the language, which only has three verbs and a flexible sentence structure.

Background and location

Other languages spoken in the West Barkly family include Wambaya, Gudanji, Binbinka, and Ngarnka. When the Mudburra people arrived to the region the Jingili live, a cultural fusion group arose named Kuwarrangu, while the Jingilu and Mudburra cultures still remained separate. Based on geographical proximity, the Jingili and other ethnic groups have related languages with common vocabulary.

Jingulu was historically spoken around the township of Elliot.

Speakers and status

Jingulu has an Ethnologue classification of moribund, meaning that it is an endangered language, with only between 10 and 15 speakers in 1997, /sup> the youngest being in the fifties. An additional 20 people had some command of it. However, it was not used in daily communication which instead was conducted in either English or Kriol. In 2019 approximately five people still spoke the language, including Stuart Joel Nuggett, who has recorded music in Jingulu. The remaining speakers are elderly.

AI application

A study published in ''Frontiers in Physics'' in July 2022 suggested that Jingulu has special characteristics that make it suitable for translation into commands for artificial intelligence (AI) swarm systems. One of these characteristics is the fact that the language only has three verbs: "go", "come", and "do", which fits the underlying mathematics and physics of such an AI system: attraction ("come"), repulsion ("go") and neither ("do"). Another characteristic is its flexible sentence structure. An experimental AI system has been developed using Jingulu principles, called JSwarm. The first application of the system helps farmers herd sheep by communicating with unmanned aerial vehicles performing the task. The system has not been implemented yet, with its creators seeking funding.

Sign language

The Jingulu have (or had) a well-developed signed form of their language. Kendon, A. (1988) ''Sign Languages of Aboriginal Australia: Cultural, Semiotic and Communicative Perspectives.'' Cambridge: Cambridge University Press

Phonology

Vowels

Jingulu has three basic vowel phoneme qualities, given in IPA in the following table. There are two high vowels, /i/ and /u/, and one low vowel /a/. /i/, /a/ and /u/ are front, central, and back, respectively. /u/ is rounded while /a/ and /i/ are unrounded.

While there are only three phonemically-distinct vowel phoneme qualities in Jingulu, the variations in vowel sounds are greater than in grammars with larger vowel phoneme inventories. These three phonemes have a variety of phonetic outputs depending on the word. The close vowel /i/ may be realized as �or the close vowel /u/ most commonly as but also and � and the open vowel /a/ as � �and �

Jingulu has contrastive vowel length. The orthographic convention of long high vowels is a two-syllable nuclei with a homorganic glide in between. In orthography, /aː/ appears as ⟨aa⟩, while the other two appear with a homorganic consonant, ⟨iyi⟩ and ⟨uwu⟩, respectively. diphthongs in Jingulu are realized as separate syllable nuclei, but not a single phoneme unit.

Vowel to long high vowel example:

Vowel to long low vowel example:

Diphthong example:

Vowel harmony

An important feature of Jingulu's phonology is vowel harmony. Jingulu exhibits a regressive vowel harmony, which means that the vowels of nominal or verbal roots may be subject to change triggered by suffixes that contain a close vowel and that are directly adjacent to the root. The vowel harmony affects open vowels in the roots, which become close. Due to Jingulu's small inventory of vowels, it will always be the open vowel /a/ that is subject to change, always becoming /i/. /sup> However, if vowel harmony is triggered and the root contains a close vowel, none of the open vowels to the left of the close vowel will be subject to change.

Consonants

Jingulu has eighteen consonant phonemes, distributed across five places of articulation and five manners of articulation.

Note: rr represents a flapped or trilled rhotic

Noticeably, all places of articulation have a stop phoneme. The consonant inventory is typical of Australian languages, with a lack of phonologically distinct fricatives and affricates as well as absence of phonemic consonant germinates. One noteworthy aspect of Jingulu that is unusual for Australian grammars is that it does not have series of interdentals.

There is no concrete evidence that voicing is contrastive. There is only little evidence showing that the retroflex consonants are contrastive. Most speakers of Jingulu do not make a distinction between the retroflex consonants and their alveolar equivalents. Often they merely serve as allophones. However, there are a number of minimal pairs where there indeed is a distinction, for instance dirnd- ''"shoot"'' and dind- ''"grind"''; mininmi''"Acacia victoriae"'' and mirnirnmi ''"fire drill"''; and walu ''"forehead"'' and warlu ''"burn scar."''

The glides, and may be dropped word-initially, which is also true for � The latter may also be replaced by a glide. ^0/sup>

: widij- ''"to tie"'' may be realized as /widij-/ or /idij-/
: yidaangka ''"in a few days"'' may be realized as /jidaːŋka/ or /idaːŋka/

: ngirrm- ''"to make"'' may be realized as /ŋirm-/, /irm-/ or /jirm-/
: nguny- ''"to give"'' may be realized as /ŋuɲ-/, /uɲ-/ or /wuɲ-/

Syllable structure

According to the grammar:

:'C' = Consonant
:'V' = Vowel
:'L' = Highly sonorous consonant (i.e. liquids and glides)

The basic syllable structure in Jingulu is CV. CVC and CVLC are also permissible structures. The basic phonological unit is the open (CV) syllable when V is a long vowel, while the basic phonological unit is the closed (CVC) syllable when V is a short vowel. A phonotactic restriction of Jingulu is that rr and ly cannot be word-initial. The word-final phoneme is nearly always a vowel.

Consonant clusters are evidenced in the Jingulu syllable structure. Clusters may be word-final only if they consist of a sonorant and a nasalplosive, in that order. The largest possible clusters are triconsonantal, consisting of a liquid, nasal, and stop, strictly in this order. Furthermore, they must be placed word-internally.

Stress

In Jingulu, only vowels can be stress bearing units (SBUs). For single morphemes, stress is predictable, landing on the penultimate SBU of a word. The final SBU is never stressed. This does not hold true for Jingulu words that come from the Pama-Nyungan languages of countries neighboring the Jingili. In general, however, Jingulu follows the following pattern:

* 2 SBUs → stress on initial SBU
* 3 SBUs → generally stress on second SBU
* 4 SBUs → generally primary stress on third SBU, secondary stress on initial SBU
* 5 SBUs → primary stress on penultimate or antepenultimate SBU, secondary stress on initial SBU
* 6 SBUs → primary stress on antepenultimate SBU, secondary stress on initial SBU.

Long vowels and diphthongs have two SBUs, signifying that they do not exist as their own phoneme.

Morphology

Jingulu has both prefixes and suffixes. Morphemes can sometimes stand alone as a word, such as with pronouns and certain cases of demonstratives and adverbials, but the majority of roots must have affixes. Both derivational and inflectional affixes can be found in the grammar.

Parts of speech

Jingulu vocabulary can be split into three broad categories of parts of speech: nominal, verbal, and adverbial.

Nominal

Nominals are modified/affixed with case marking and morphological discourse markings.

Verbal

The minimum words required to form an acceptable sentence in Jingulu is a light verb and either a subject or a coverbal root.

Adverbial

Aside from discourse markers, adverbs do not have affixation. In some cases, adverbs must exist immediately before coverbal roots.

Derivation

Jingulu has derivational affixes of the type nominalisation and adverbialisation.

Nominalisation

Jingulu has three nominalising affixes: ''-ajka,'' -''ajkal'', and -''jbunji'', the latter being very rare.

''-ajka'' derives nouns from verbs, specifically a verb to the person who is undergoing the action denoted by the verb.

the action of eating ''→'' that which is eaten

-''ajkal'' derives nouns from verbs, specifically verbs to represent someone or something that performs the verb.

the action of singing ''→'' that which is singing

-''jbunji'' changes a root meaning to something that has the property associated with that root. This is a less used nominalising affix compared to the other two.

the action of spearing ''→'' that which has been speared

Adverbialisation

Jingulu has two adverbialising affixes: -''kaji'' and -''nama''.

-''kaji'' is similar to 'really', 'right', or 'completely', indicating that the thing it is describing is done to its greatest extent.

forget ''→'' completely forget

''-nama'' can mean 'still', 'already', 'this time', 'in the time of...', and more. It is typically used to emphasize that the root it is affixing is happening over time.

went ''→'' already went

Nominals

The major uses of affixation in Jingulu are found in the expression of demonstratives, as well as the nominal features pronouns, case, number, and (in)definiteness discussed in the next section.

Demonstratives

Jingulu has three kinds of demonstratives: referential, anaphoric and cataphoric. In Jingulu, the referential demonstratives, of which there are about five sets, refer to objects that may be distal or proximal, and may be translated as "this" or "that." The anaphoric demonstratives, of which there is one set, refer to something that is already known by the speaker and listener at the time of speaking, and may be translated as "this (you know)" or "that (you know)." Finally, the cataphoric demonstrative, of which there is only one, refers to something that is not yet known by both the speaker and listener and is to be introduced, and may be translated as "this (which you are to know about)" or "that (which you are to know about)."

As the demonstratives are considered nominals, most of them belong to one of the four nominal classes. ^2/sup>

= Referential

=
There are five sets of referential demonstratives: jama and jimi; nyam-; ngin- and nyin-; ngunu; and ngunungku. The first three sets are all by default distal, but may be made proximal by the use of the suffix -(r)niki. None of the last two sets may take the proximal marker, as ngunu is always considered distal, and ngunungku is generally considered proximal, normally translated as "this way." 3/sup>

These demonstratives vary based on gender and animacy. The demonstrative jama belongs to the masculine class, and jimi to the neuter class. However, jama may refer to nominals of all classes, and jimi may also refer to nominals of the vegetable class. ⁴ The demonstrative nyam- takes either the suffix -a, -arni- or -bala depending on whether it refers to a nominal of the masculine, feminine, or neuter or vegetable class, respectively. Likewise, the demonstratives ngin- and nyin- take the suffix -da, -a or -i depending on whether it refers to a nominal of the masculine, feminine or neuter class, respectively, and become ngima and nyima when referring to a nominal of the vegetable class, respectively. While a nyam- demonstrative takes the proximal marker, it becomes nyamarniki no matter class. ^{Jingulu language#cite note-16">[16/sup> The demonstrative">6<_a>.html" ;"title="Jingulu language#cite note-16">[16">Jingulu language#cite note-16">[16/sup> The demonstrative ngunu belongs to the neuter class, but may also refer to nominals of the vegetable class. ngunungku may refer to nominals of all classes.}

(jimi is neuter)

(jimi is neuter + -niki modifier)

(jama is masculine)

(jamaniki is masculine + -niki modifier)

(nyama is masculine)

(nginda is masculine)

(ngini is neuter + -niki modifier)

(nyina is feminine)

(ngunu is neuter)

(ngunungku is "this way")

= Anaphoric

=
Anaphoric/discourse demonstratives refer to the aforementioned. There is one set of anaphoric demonstratives: kuna and kuya. These are only used rarely, and are often replaced by referential demonstratives. The former refers to nominals of the masculine class, and the latter to nominals of the neuter class. However, the former may also refer to nominals of other classes, and the latter to nominals of the vegetable class as well.

(kuyu is neuter)

(kuna is neuter)

= Cataphoric

=
The only cataphoric demonstrative is jiyi and refers to nominals of all classes.

Nominal features

Gender

All nominals in Jingulu belong to a certain gender or class of which there are four: masculine, Grammatical gender">feminine, Grammatical gender">neuter