Endangered Languages Projects

The following projects include the documentation of the Diyari language:

Diyari

Peter Austin, SOAS

Diyari (also misspelled Dieri) is an Australian Aboriginal language traditionally spoken in the far north of South Australia along Cooper Creek to the east of Lake Eyre. Peter Austin studied Diyari from 1974 to 1978, recording the last generation of fluent speakers, and publishing a book and several articles about the language, including a biography of one of the last speakers co-authored with Luise Hercus and Philip Jones. There is now no-one alive who speaks Diyari fluently. ... more

Ngamini

Peter Austin, SOAS

Ngamini is an Australian Aboriginal language traditionally spoken in the far north of South Australia around Goyder’s Lagoon to the east of Lake Eyre. It is related to Diyari, and belongs to the Karnic group of languages. It is listed in Ethnologue with code NMV (http://www.ethnologue.com/14/show_language.asp?code=NMV). Ngamini has been extinct since the 1980’s – Peter Austin and Gavan Breen (School of Australian Linguistics) studied the language with Mrs Maudie Akawiljika Naylon who was the ... more