Isabel O'Keeffe

As Indigenous musicians, language activists, scholars, educators, and others from around Australia undertake a variety of approaches in their efforts to revitalise song and language, in this chapter we provide a snapshot of the situation in Warruwi community, western Arnhem Land. Here, sustaining the local performance tradition of manyardi ceremonies and songs relies on maintaining diversity, and the task of documenting both linguistic and musical diversity has relied on intercultural collaboration and an interdisciplinary approach. Warruwi is a highly multilingual community where multiple small languages are still being spoken, and individually-owned song-sets (distinct repertories of songs) continue to be performed in public ceremony and passed on to children. In this chapter, we suggest that it is the maintenance of this diversity of languages and songs – rather than just maintaining individual languages or song-sets – which is highly valued by the community. For over a decade, a...

© 2016 Dr. Isabel Anne O'KeeffeWestern Arnhem Land (Northern Australia) is well known for its linguistic diversity and multilingualism. Less well known is the diversity of songs in this region and the way the multiple linguistic resources are deployed within them. This thesis focuses on the manyardi/kun-borrk public dance-song genre, found across western Arnhem Land. I particularly concentrate on five repertoires of manyardi/kun-borrk songs, drawing on my fieldwork recordings of performances and discussions of songs as well as previous research. Employing both linguistic and musicological perspectives, this thesis examines the ways in which the manyardi/kun-borrk song traditions manifest linguistic diversity, multilingualism and the underpinning language ideologies of the region. I consider how and why different linguistic varieties are used within the repertoires and the role of sociolinguistic practices and cultural beliefs related to multilingualism across various aspects of the song traditions. Through detailed linguistic and musical analysis I show how multilingualism and the underlying language ideologies permeate the manyardi/kun-borrk genre from the macro-levels of the organisation of the song traditions and performance practices to the micro-levels of song-texts and musical elements. In seeking to account for the manifestations of multilingualism within the manyardi/kun-borrk song traditions I draw on previous studies of sociolinguistic practices and cultural beliefs or ideologies related to multilingualism in the western Arnhem Land region and more broadly in Aboriginal Australia. I show the way that many of the language ideologies related to multilingualism in Aboriginal Australian are enshrined or embodied in the manyardi/kun-borrk song traditions. These song traditions therefore reinforce these ideologies and contribute to the resultant sociolinguistic practices as well as reflecting or being influenced by them. While the findings of this thesis relate specifically to the sociocultural and linguistic context of western Arnhem Land, I argue that they have wider implications for our study of multilingualism and of linguistic and musical diversity. I contend that considering both linguistic and musicological perspectives provides greater insight into our understanding of multilingualism and the factors that contribute to the fostering and maintenance of linguistic and cultural (including musical) diversity

Warruwi Community.Warruwi School. Funding from the Hans Rausing Endangered Languages Programme, the Australian Research Council, the University of Sydney, the University of Melbourne, Batchelor Institute, and the Australian Government Indigenous Languages and Arts Program.

Abstract: In examining a sung version and a spoken version of a Kun-barlang love song text recorded by Alice Moyle in 1962, I outline the context and overall structure of the song, then provide a detailed comparative analysis of the two versions. I draw some preliminary conclusions ...

This paper explores how emotions are expressed in the endangered Gunwinyguan language Kunbarlang and compares these expressions to those in the neighbouring Gunwinyguan language Bininj Kunwok, and neighbouring languages from other language families, Mawng (Iwaidjan) and Ndjébbana (Maningridan). As well as considering body-based emotion expressions and the tropes (metaphors and metonymies) they instantiate, we consider the range of other (non-body-based) expressions and tropes available in each language. These provide an important point of comparison with the body-part expressions, which are limited to expressions based on noun incorporation in the Gunwinyguan languages and, correspondingly, a more limited range of tropes. By outlining and comparing the linguistic tropes used to express emotions in these four languages in the highly multilingual yet socioculturally unified context of western Arnhem Land, we aim to shed further light on the relationships between linguistic figurative ...

This article explores the role of legacy recordings of song for a family of Arrarrkpi (Mawng-speaking people), who are contemporary singers and dancers of manyardi, a public ceremonial performance of western Arnhem Land, in their collaborative work with a team of Balanda (Euro-diasporic) researchers. Drawing inspiration from the dialogical approach of the Yolŋu ceremonial leader and scholar Joe Gumbula, the article reflects on various dialogues that inform the research, practice and archival recording of manyardi. We demonstrate how legacy recordings reinvigorate contemporary performance practice in collective settings, rather than serving as canonical or ideal versions of song sets to be replicated by an individual singer. We suggest that maintaining the linking and organisation of enriched song metadata from this community to the archival collection will enable future song inheritors to maintain dialogues with archives that hold recordings of manyardi.