Sun 8 Jul 2007
Arrandic or Yolngic?
Posted by jangari under Indigenous, Languages
[3] Comments
This is from the inside cover of the Ampe Akelyernemane Meke Mekarle report of a few weeks ago:
Title
The title “Ampe Akelyernemane Meke Mekarle” is derived from the Arrandic languages of the Central Desert Region of the Northern Territory. It is pronounced Ump-ah Ah-kil-yurn-a-man Mu-kar-Mu-karl.
Quote
The title quote In our Law children are very sacred because they carry the two spring wells of water from our country within them reflects the traditional Aboriginal law of the Yolngu people of Arnhem Land in the Northern Territory, and was provided by a senior Yolngu lawman.
I’m quoting this here because Rob Knight during the week visited the community to talk about the report, the government’s plan and why it fellates. While mentioning the report he pointed out the ‘indigenousness’ of it, alluding to the design and the title. I offered my relative expert opinion on the matter and let him, and all else there, know that the title was from an Arrandic language.
Rob Knight appeared to disagree, and continued to read out the blurb that pertained to the ‘quote’, suggesting that Ampe Akelyernemane Meke Mekarle was from a Yolngic language.
The title is certainly from an Arrandic language – anyone who knows anything about Australian languages can see that just by scanning the cover. Arrandic has a unique and unmistakable phonology.
In my opinion, the juxtaposition of the ‘title’ and the ‘title quote’ of the report cover, suggest to me that “Little children are sacred” is an English translation of the Arrente Ampe Akelyernemane Meke Mekarle. But the fact that they derive from different sources means this may not be the case.
Does anyone have even a rudimentary knowledge of Arrandic languages who can give a little bit of insight? Can you see a nominal root for ‘child’, or for ‘sacred’? I’d be interested to know.
July 8th, 2007 at 8:01 pm
Hi
Yes, I speak Arrernte. The glosses of the main words in the title are as follows:
ampe ‘child’; akelye ‘small’; rneme ‘plural; meke-meke ‘restricted or out of bounds’ (this is often used to describe places in country); arle ‘focus marker’. The Arrernte dictionary would have more considered definitions.
In fact the use of the suffix ‘rneme’ and the word ‘akelye’ makes this more northern Arandic or even Alyawarr – a closely related language. (Central and Eastern Arrernte people would be more inclined to say ‘akweke mape’ rather than ‘akelyerneme’.
Nothing to do with Yolngu.
Cheers
jenny
July 9th, 2007 at 11:43 am
Thanks very much, Jenny.
So it does mean “little children are sacred” and there’s certainly no question that Arrandic languages have nothing to do with Yolngic langauges. Which forces me to ask, why did they choose an excerpt from Yolngu law as the English title, and a further translation of it in Arrente as the ‘language‘ title? Why not have a Yolngu law presented in Yolngu-matha?
July 9th, 2007 at 6:33 pm
I suspect that the report’s publisher was aiming for a title with connections to a large language group in the NT’s north (Yolngu) and south (Arrernte).
If you want a bit more of a taste of Arrernte, there is a short vocabulary excerpted from Eastern and Central Arrernte to English Dictionary and A Learner’s Wordlist of Eastern and Central Arrernte (IAD Press) online in UsMob‘s Fact Sheet 3 — and the first entry is ampe akweke. And UsMob’s Episode 5 Pmere Amekemeke (Sacred Sites) title contains a variant form of mekemeke.
By the way, in the course of locating the UsMob vocab, I stumbled across this unusual re-purposing of an Arrernte vocabulary — does anyone recognise where it is adapted from?