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A Warlpiri language is spoken by astir 3000 of the Warlpiri people in Australia's Northern Territory. These are one of a Ngarga languages of the large Southwest branch of the Pama-Nyngan family, as is maybe a 2nd virtually all widely spoken primal language within Australia.

Phonology

Vowels

Warlpiri has the standard 3-vowel technique similar thereto of Classical Arabic, with the length distinction creating the sum of sise imaginable vowels.

Consonants

Every bit shown in the chart, Warlpiri distinguishes 5 positions of articulation, & has unwritten & rhinal blocks at both position. A unwritten ends own there is no phonemic voice distinction, but display sonant & unspoken allophones; stops come unremarkably unstated at the beginning of a word, & voiced elsewhere.

Warlpiri is remarkable for its complete want of fricative consonants.

A consonant enrolled in the table as a retroflex flap is actually an unusual consonant, even unique to Warlpiri. A tongue-tip begins within retroflex position, then again moves send on speedily, flapping against a alveolar ridge.

Syllables and stress

Warlpiri syllables are quite constrained within structure. Completely syllables start using one consonant; there is no syllable-initial consonant clump, & no syllable begins using the vowel. When a consonant comes one yearn or even short vowel, which is periodically followed by one closing consonant. Open syllables come very much supplementary park than closed ones. There are no syllable terminates using a prevent or even by having the retroflex flap /ɽ/.

a usual sort of consonant bunch occurs once a syllable finishes by having a nasal consonant & the next syllable begins by owning the corresponding prevent, however more clump such as /rk/ & /lp/ as well occur.

Stress is non typically distinctive, however assigned by rule. Polysyllabic words receive primary stress in the number one syllable, by owning secondary stresses tending to occur on replacement syllables thenceforth; this rhythm can be broken per structure of the word, and so that there are every now and again 3-syllable stress groups.

Vowel harmony

Whenever ii adjacent syllables inside the Warlpiri morpheme have high vowels, then people high vowels come about universally similar; that is, two u or even two we. A total of Warlpiri roots using adjacent syllables getting u & i personally is very little.

This tendency to like adjacent high vowels to exist as monovular as well spreads through morpheme boundaries inside the word. Adding the postfix to the word may place the u & an we inside call for. Whilst this happens, one of a vowels tends to assimilate: that is, it changes to match a more vowel. This kinda assimilation is called vowel harmony. (Vowel harmony is non uncommon in the globe's languages: these are uncovered, for instance, inside Turkish, Hungarian, and Finnish. English plural form rather geese & German dieresis represent traces of vowel harmony within early Germanic languages.)

Inside Warlpiri, each progressive & regressive vowel harmony occur. Inside progressive vowel harmony, a 2nd vowel changes to match a 1st; within regressive harmony, a foremost changes to match a 2nd.

Regressive harmony just occurs once attaching the tense postfix to the verb (watch in the image below). For instance, while a verb panti- (class Two) is positioned it used to be that tense using a suffix -rnu, a symptom is non *pantirnu however panturnu.

Progressive harmony occurs by owning virtually all more sort of postfix. E.g., whilst a ergative out break suffix -ngku is bound to the noun karli "boomerang", a effect is karlingki, non *karlingku.

Occasionally, long-chain molecule of high vowels could assimilate, for each one forcing a next. E.g., once a class Two verb kiji- is connected to the past tense suffix -rnu, a ensuant word is kujurnu.

Words

There is no Warlpiri word begins by using alveolar consonant; the number one consonant of a word must become bilabial, palatine, retroflex, or even velar.

Wholly Warlpiri words prevent around vowels; the word that may otherwise prevent around the consonant is ordinarily "corrected" by adding the nonmeaningful postfix, normally -pa.

Orthography

Since a 1950's, Warlpiri has been written in the Roman alphabet utilizing the technique originally devised by Lothar Jagst and subsequently modified slightly. Warlpiri writing system utilizes exclusively average letters, using there are no accent marks. These are or so IPA, deviating in the charted ways:

  • Long vowels come written by doubling a vowel letter: 2, aa, uu.
  • Retroflex consonants come written by having digram formed by prefixing r to the common alveolar symbol: rt, rn, rl.
  • The palatine prevent is written j.
  • Other palatals come written using digram formed by suffixing y to the common alveolar symbol: ny, ly. A palatine approximant is written y.
  • The velar nasal is written ng.
  • The alveolar trill is written rr.
  • The retroflex flap is written rd.
  • The retroflex approximant is written r.

    To these basic system come added ii adjustments to produce a writing system more comfortable to apply.

  • The indicators y (for palatal) & r (for retroflex) come typically dropped inside case redundant in consonant clustering that part articulation position. Examples: nyj is written new jersey, rnrt is written rnt.
  • At a beginning of a word, the retroflex indicator r is omitted. This doesn't create ambiguity, because there are no Warlpiri word begins by using the obviously alveolar consonant. Case: rtari "foot" is written tari.

    Morphology

    Verbs

    Warlpiri verbs come built from either two or three century verb roots, distributed among 5 conjugation classes. Virtually all verb roots belong to one of merely ii one classes; a more threesome classes keep close at hand single two or three roots every.

    The big class of modifying prefixes, or even preverbs, come wont to produce verbs using specific meanings. For instance, a verb root parnka- means "run" whilst utilized by itself, when wurulyparnka- means "scurry into hiding". A preverb wuruly- is utilized sustaining two or even three more verb roots to form more verbs of concealing or seclusion. Preverbs come every now and again reduplicated for even emphasis or to produce the significant distinction.

    Virtually all preverb-verb combinations come the fixed a share of the lexicon; freshly combinations just can't become created freely. However there are two or three preverbs that may be productive & may be combined using several different roots, & a few roots may assume well-nigh any preverb.

    the verb root is followed by a tense postfix. There are 5 one for every conjugation class, every bit shown in the as punishment table. (A select few optional variations use at times been omitted.)

    Nouns

    Warlpiri nouns come assembled from either hundreds to thousands of roots, using the rich array of derivational techniques like combining & derivational postfix. [Expand, give examples.]

    Auxiliary word and agreement suffixes

    To each one fully Warlpiri clause can contain an auxiliary word, which together using a verb suffix service to identify tense & to clarify a relationship between main & subordinate clause. Most common aide include ka (present tense), kapi (new tense), kaji (mislead). the auxiliary word is well-nigh universally a 2nd word of a clause.

    A auxiliary word likewise functions when a personal for an elaborate personal of postfix that specify a individual & total of the subject & object of the clause. Which are actually similar to a familiar conjugational postfix that agree using a subject inside Indoeuropean languages, however around Warlpiri it is laid on a aide instead of on the verb, & it agree by owning the object too when the subject.

    An case of the suffixed auxiliary word may be seen in the farewell, kapirnangku nyanyi, "I will see you." On this button, kapi indicates new tense, -rna is the postfix for number one human singular form subject "I", -ngku indicates 2nd individual singular form object "you", & nyanyi is the nonpast form of the class Three verb "see".

    It used to be that tense, a auxiliary word typically drops out totally. within that outbreak, a agreement postfix bind instead to the foremost or even 2nd word of the clause, when in nyangurnangku, "I saw you".

    A junction in which a agreement postfix come tied could trigger progressive vowel harmony. So, nyanyi kapingki, "(S)he will see you", shows a vowel suffix -ngku (2nd human singular object) ingesting to the final vowel of kapi.

    Avoidance Register

    Within Warlpiri culture, these are considered impolite or even shameful sure as shooting personal relations to converse. (For instance, the woman should non converse by owning her boy-inside-law.) Whenever such conversation is necessary, a speakers apply a favorite register of the Warlpiri language known as the turning away register. the shunning register hwhen the equivalent grammar as average Warlpiri, however the drastically decreased lexicon; virtually all open-class word come replaced either by a generic equivalent word or even by a word unique to the shunning register.

    Warlpiri Sign Language

    the Warlpiri language has a signed also as a spoken mode. Watch independent article Walpiri Sign Language.

    • Warlpiri
    Bibliography, vocabulary and links to other related sites for the Warlpiri language.




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