Kuuk Thaayorre language
Encyclopedia
Kuuk Thaayorre is a Paman language
spoken in the settlement Pormpuraaw
on the western part of the Cape York Peninsula
, Queensland
in Australia
by the Thaayorre people
. As of 2006, 250 of the 350 ethnic Thaayorre speak the language. It is in a robust position compared to many indigenous Australian languages, as it is still being acquired by children and used in daily interaction.
It is closely related to the Ogh-Undjan and Kuuk Yak
, and more distantly related to the Uw languages, Uw Olkola, and Uw Oykangand
.
Speakers of the Kuuk Thaayorre language are able to recall the names of a couple of dialect
s, such as Kuuk Thaayunth, Kuuk Thayem and Kuuk Thanon, but today there is only little dialectal difference and the language is becoming more and more uniform as the number of speakers goes down. The so called Kuuk Yak language
may be a dialect of Kuuk Thaayorre, but may be a closely related language as well. Barry Alpher is currently trying to document
the language in order to understand its genetic affiliation.
, there is a long list of alternative spellings of Kuuk Thaayorre. The name itself, Kuuk Thaayorre, means the Thaayorre language in the language itself, kuuk meaning language and Thaayorre being their ethnonym
.
Other names include Kuuk Thaayoore, Kuktayor, Kukudayore, Gugudayor, Koko Daiyuri, Koko Taiyor, Kokkotaijari, Kokotaiyari, Thayorre, Thaayore, Thayore, Tayore, Taior, Taiol, Da:jor and Behran.
s:
All of the vowels above have a long counterpart
. In addition, one of the rhotics may be syllabic.
s:
The maximal syllable structure is CVCCC, and four-consonant clusters are not uncommon. Unusually, sequences of consecutive /r/ and /ɻ/ are licit.
Unlike in many Australian languages, monosyllables of all word classes are frequent in Kuuk Thaayorre.
has intricate structure.
The irregular form of the ergative
morpheme makes it a clear suffix
, rather than an enclitic; however, it is borne on the last nomimal in the noun phrase. This makes Kuuk Thaayorre a rare example of a language displaying affixation to phrases.
Ergative marking has the pragmatic function of displaying the degree of expectedness of the subject.
There are multiple inclusory constructions, i.e. those referring to a superset while simultaneously focussing on a subset (these are found in many IE languages, e.g. German Wit Scilling 1.du Sc. "Sc. and I"). One of these is a set of single-word inclusory pronouns encoding both superset and subset.
s instead of words with relative senses (ahead, left, etc.) as is familiar in most languages. Speakers of Kuuk Thaayorre show a correspondingly greater skill in navigational ability than speakers of languages like English, and always know the exact direction of their facing. When asked to arrange a sequence of pictures in temporal order, speakers consistently arrange them so that time runs east to west, regardless of their own bodily orientation.
Paman languages
The Paman languages are an Australian language family spoken on the Cape York Peninsula of Queensland. First noted by Kenneth Hale, Paman is noteworthy for the profound phonological changes which have affected some of its descendants.- Classification :...
spoken in the settlement Pormpuraaw
Pormpuraaw, Queensland
Pormpuraaw is an Aboriginal community situated on the west coast of Cape York Peninsula approximately half way between Karumba and Weipa on the Edward River. It is by road from Cairns. Pormpuraaw currently has a 2-man police station...
on the western part of the Cape York Peninsula
Cape York Peninsula
Cape York Peninsula is a large remote peninsula located in Far North Queensland at the tip of the state of Queensland, Australia, the largest unspoilt wilderness in northern Australia and one of the last remaining wilderness areas on Earth...
, Queensland
Queensland
Queensland is a state of Australia, occupying the north-eastern section of the mainland continent. It is bordered by the Northern Territory, South Australia and New South Wales to the west, south-west and south respectively. To the east, Queensland is bordered by the Coral Sea and Pacific Ocean...
in Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
by the Thaayorre people
Thaayorre people
The Thaayorre are an Australian people living on the southwestern part of the Cape York Peninsula, Queensland in Australia, primarily in the settlement Pormpuraaw, having its foundation in the Edward River Mission....
. As of 2006, 250 of the 350 ethnic Thaayorre speak the language. It is in a robust position compared to many indigenous Australian languages, as it is still being acquired by children and used in daily interaction.
It is closely related to the Ogh-Undjan and Kuuk Yak
Kuuk Yak language
Kuuk Yak, or the snake language, if translated literally, is an extinct Paman language which was spoken on the Cape York Peninsula of Queensland, Australia....
, and more distantly related to the Uw languages, Uw Olkola, and Uw Oykangand
Uw Oykangand language
Kunjen is a Paman language spoken on the Cape York Peninsula of Queensland, Australia, by the Uw Olkola and Uw Oykangand people. The two dialects, Uw Olkola and Uw Oykangand, are very close, being mutually intelligible and sharing 97% of their core vocabulary.A small dictionary of Kunjen has been...
.
Speakers of the Kuuk Thaayorre language are able to recall the names of a couple of dialect
Dialect
The term dialect is used in two distinct ways, even by linguists. One usage refers to a variety of a language that is a characteristic of a particular group of the language's speakers. The term is applied most often to regional speech patterns, but a dialect may also be defined by other factors,...
s, such as Kuuk Thaayunth, Kuuk Thayem and Kuuk Thanon, but today there is only little dialectal difference and the language is becoming more and more uniform as the number of speakers goes down. The so called Kuuk Yak language
Kuuk Yak language
Kuuk Yak, or the snake language, if translated literally, is an extinct Paman language which was spoken on the Cape York Peninsula of Queensland, Australia....
may be a dialect of Kuuk Thaayorre, but may be a closely related language as well. Barry Alpher is currently trying to document
Language documentation
Language documentation is the process by which a language is documented from a documentary linguistics perspective. It aims to “to provide a comprehensive record of the linguistic practices characteristic of a given speech community”...
the language in order to understand its genetic affiliation.
Names
Like in the case with many other Australian languagesLanguages of Australia
Although Australia has no official language, it is largely monolingual with English being the de facto national language. Australian English has a distinctive accent and vocabulary. According to the 2001 census, English is the only language spoken in the home for around 80% of the population...
, there is a long list of alternative spellings of Kuuk Thaayorre. The name itself, Kuuk Thaayorre, means the Thaayorre language in the language itself, kuuk meaning language and Thaayorre being their ethnonym
Ethnonym
An ethnonym is the name applied to a given ethnic group. Ethnonyms can be divided into two categories: exonyms and autonyms or endonyms .As an example, the ethnonym for...
.
Other names include Kuuk Thaayoore, Kuktayor, Kukudayore, Gugudayor, Koko Daiyuri, Koko Taiyor, Kokkotaijari, Kokotaiyari, Thayorre, Thaayore, Thayore, Tayore, Taior, Taiol, Da:jor and Behran.
Vowels
Kuuk Thaayorre has 5 vowelVowel
In phonetics, a vowel is a sound in spoken language, such as English ah! or oh! , pronounced with an open vocal tract so that there is no build-up of air pressure at any point above the glottis. This contrasts with consonants, such as English sh! , where there is a constriction or closure at some...
s:
| Front Front vowel A front vowel is a type of vowel sound used in some spoken languages. The defining characteristic of a front vowel is that the tongue is positioned as far in front as possible in the mouth without creating a constriction that would be classified as a consonant. Front vowels are sometimes also... |
Back Back vowel A back vowel is a type of vowel sound used in spoken languages. The defining characteristic of a back vowel is that the tongue is positioned as far back as possible in the mouth without creating a constriction that would be classified as a consonant. Back vowels are sometimes also called dark... |
|
|---|---|---|
| Unrounded | Rounded | |
| Close Close vowel A close vowel is a type of vowel sound used in many spoken languages. The defining characteristic of a close vowel is that the tongue is positioned as close as possible to the roof of the mouth without creating a constriction that would be classified as a consonant.This term is prescribed by the... |
i | u |
| Close-mid Close-mid vowel A close-mid vowel is a type of vowel sound used in some spoken languages. The defining characteristic of a close-mid vowel is that the tongue is positioned two-thirds of the way from a close vowel to a mid vowel... |
e | o |
| Open Open vowel An open vowel is defined as a vowel sound in which the tongue is positioned as far as possible from the roof of the mouth. Open vowels are sometimes also called low vowels in reference to the low position of the tongue... |
a |
All of the vowels above have a long counterpart
Vowel length
In linguistics, vowel length is the perceived duration of a vowel sound. Often the chroneme, or the "longness", acts like a consonant, and may etymologically be one, such as in Australian English. While not distinctive in most dialects of English, vowel length is an important phonemic factor in...
. In addition, one of the rhotics may be syllabic.
Consonants
Kuuk Thaayorre has 16 consonantConsonant
In articulatory phonetics, a consonant is a speech sound that is articulated with complete or partial closure of the vocal tract. Examples are , pronounced with the lips; , pronounced with the front of the tongue; , pronounced with the back of the tongue; , pronounced in the throat; and ,...
s:
| Bilabial Bilabial consonant In phonetics, a bilabial consonant is a consonant articulated with both lips. The bilabial consonants identified by the International Phonetic Alphabet are:... |
Dental | Alveolar Alveolar consonant Alveolar consonants are articulated with the tongue against or close to the superior alveolar ridge, which is called that because it contains the alveoli of the superior teeth... |
Retroflex Retroflex consonant A retroflex consonant is a coronal consonant where the tongue has a flat, concave, or even curled shape, and is articulated between the alveolar ridge and the hard palate. They are sometimes referred to as cerebral consonants, especially in Indology... |
Palatal Palatal consonant Palatal consonants are consonants articulated with the body of the tongue raised against the hard palate... |
Velar Velar consonant Velars are consonants articulated with the back part of the tongue against the soft palate, the back part of the roof of the mouth, known also as the velum).... |
Glottal Glottal consonant Glottal consonants, also called laryngeal consonants, are consonants articulated with the glottis. Many phoneticians consider them, or at least the so-called fricative, to be transitional states of the glottis without a point of articulation as other consonants have; in fact, some do not consider... |
|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Plosive | p /p/ | th /t̪/ | t /t/ | c /c/ | k /k/ | ' /ʔ/ | |
| Nasal Nasal consonant A nasal consonant is a type of consonant produced with a lowered velum in the mouth, allowing air to escape freely through the nose. Examples of nasal consonants in English are and , in words such as nose and mouth.- Definition :... |
m /m/ | nh /n̪/ | n /n/ | ny /ɲ/ | ng /ŋ/ | ||
| Trill Trill consonant In phonetics, a trill is a consonantal sound produced by vibrations between the articulator and the place of articulation. Standard Spanish <rr> as in perro is an alveolar trill, while in Parisian French it is almost always uvular.... |
rr /r/ | ||||||
| Approximant Approximant consonant Approximants are speech sounds that involve the articulators approaching each other but not narrowly enough or with enough articulatory precision to create turbulent airflow. Therefore, approximants fall between fricatives, which do produce a turbulent airstream, and vowels, which produce no... |
l /l/ | r /ɻ/ | y /j/ | w /w/ |
The maximal syllable structure is CVCCC, and four-consonant clusters are not uncommon. Unusually, sequences of consecutive /r/ and /ɻ/ are licit.
Unlike in many Australian languages, monosyllables of all word classes are frequent in Kuuk Thaayorre.
Morphosyntax
Kuuk Thaayorre is on the whole a nonconfigurational language, although the noun phraseNoun phrase
In grammar, a noun phrase, nominal phrase, or nominal group is a phrase based on a noun, pronoun, or other noun-like word optionally accompanied by modifiers such as adjectives....
has intricate structure.
The irregular form of the ergative
Ergative
The term ergative is used in grammar in three different meanings:* Ergative case* Ergative-absolutive language* Ergative verb...
morpheme makes it a clear suffix
Suffix
In linguistics, a suffix is an affix which is placed after the stem of a word. Common examples are case endings, which indicate the grammatical case of nouns or adjectives, and verb endings, which form the conjugation of verbs...
, rather than an enclitic; however, it is borne on the last nomimal in the noun phrase. This makes Kuuk Thaayorre a rare example of a language displaying affixation to phrases.
Ergative marking has the pragmatic function of displaying the degree of expectedness of the subject.
There are multiple inclusory constructions, i.e. those referring to a superset while simultaneously focussing on a subset (these are found in many IE languages, e.g. German Wit Scilling 1.du Sc. "Sc. and I"). One of these is a set of single-word inclusory pronouns encoding both superset and subset.
Lexical semantics
Kuuk Thaayorre is noted for its throughgoing use of sixteen words for absolute cardinal directionCardinal direction
The four cardinal directions or cardinal points are the directions of north, east, south, and west, commonly denoted by their initials: N, E, S, W. East and west are at right angles to north and south, with east being in the direction of rotation and west being directly opposite. Intermediate...
s instead of words with relative senses (ahead, left, etc.) as is familiar in most languages. Speakers of Kuuk Thaayorre show a correspondingly greater skill in navigational ability than speakers of languages like English, and always know the exact direction of their facing. When asked to arrange a sequence of pictures in temporal order, speakers consistently arrange them so that time runs east to west, regardless of their own bodily orientation.