Grammar and Texts of the Yugambeh-Bundjalung dialect chain in Eastern Australia

Abstract

The Yugambeh-Bandjalang chain of dialects (most now either extinct or having only limited use) stretches from some 16 km south of Brisbane to north of Yamba on the mouth of the Clarence River in New South Wales, and inland almost to Tenterfield (NSW) and past Warwick (Qld). It is a member of the Pama-Nyungan family of Australian languages. Dialect names (which include Yugambeh, Bandjalang and Gidhabal) were mostly named for the way some words were pronounced, the named being assigned sometimes by the group in question and sometimes by their neighbours. Reasonably uncommon among Australian languages there are fricative allophonic variations in the four obstruents (written b, d, j/dh/dj, g/k in practical orthographies); word medially /d/ and /j/ collapse together to an interdental fricative, an alveopalatal stop or a sibilant fricative according to dialect. The language is ergative; however pronouns and nouns for large animate creatures also have accusative inflection. There are or were four genders, masculine and feminine applying to humans, arboreal to trees, and neuter to everything else. There are no bound pronouns, and the language is aspect prominent, with a number of orders of verbal suffixes including one for antipassivity/reflexivity. Up to about 14 common verbs are irregular to a lesser or greater degree, but all other inflections of verbs and nouns followed predictable patterns.