Tasmanian languages
| Tasmanian | |
|---|---|
| Palawa | |
| Geographic distribution: |
Tasmania |
| Linguistic classification: | unclassified |
| Subdivisions: | |
| ISO 639-2 and 639-5: | xtz |
 Approximate ethnic divisions in pre-European Tasmania
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The Tasmanian languages, or Palawa languages, were the languages indigenous to the island of Tasmania. Based on short wordlists, it appears that there were anywhere from five to sixteen languages on Tasmania.[1]
Though the last full-blooded Tasmanian died on Flinders Island in 1888, a language or languages continued to be used, perhaps as a creole, on Flinders and Cape Barren Islands.[2] These are believed to have gone extinct in 1905, with the death of the last known speaker, Fanny Cochrane Smith. Tasmanian Aborigines today speak English.
Little is known of the languages and no relationship to other languages is demonstrable; it is not even known if they were related to each other.[2] They appear to have been typologically and phonetically similar to southern Australian Aboriginal languages. Joseph Greenberg proposed an Indo-Pacific superfamily which includes Tasmanian along with Andamanese and Papuan (but not Australian). This has not met with acceptance by historical linguists.[3]
There are about twenty word lists, the most extensive being that of George Augustus Robinson. All these show a poor grasp of the sounds of Tasmanian, which appear to have been fairly typical of Australian languages in this parameter. Plomley (1976) presents all the lexical data available to him in 1976. Crowley and Dixon (1981) summarise what little is known of Tasmanian phonology and grammar.
Fanny Cochrane Smith recorded a series of wax cylinder recordings of Aboriginal songs, the only existing audio recording of the Tasmanian indigenous languages, though they are of extremely poor quality, and Smith's language was likely not pure Tasmanian. In 1972, a woman in Hobart shared with Terry Crowley one sentence and a few words that had been handed down for generations, of a language last spoken for daily communication in the 1830s.[4] From these sources, Tasmanian people are seeking to recover their lost languages and traditions.[4] The largest language revival project to date is the Palawa kani project.
[edit] References
- ^ Crowley, Field Linguistics, 2007:3
- ^ a b Linguist List
- ^ Blench: Classifications of the Tasmanian languages in relation to the peopling of Australia: sensible and wild theories [1]
- ^ a b Bernard Comrie, Stephen Matthews, and Maria Polinsky. The Atlas of Languages. New York: Facts on File. Page 116.
[edit] Bibliography
- Crowley, T; Dixon, R. M. W. (1981). "Tasmanian". In Dixon, R. M. W. and Blake, B. J.. Handbook of Australian languages. Vol 2. Canberra: Australian National University Press. pp. 394–421.
- Plomley, N. J. B. (1976). A Word-list of the Tasmanian Aboriginal Languages. Launceston.
[edit] External links
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