Barrow Point language

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Barrow Point
Mutumui
Eibole
RegionQueensland, Australia
EthnicityMutumui
Extinctby 2005, with the death of Urwunjin Roger Hart[1]
Language codes
ISO 639-3bpt
Glottologbarr1247
AIATSIS[1]Y63.1
ELPBarrow Point
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The Barrow Point or Mutumui language, called Eibole, is a recently extinct Australian Aboriginal language. According to Wurm and Hattori (1981), there was one speaker left at the time.[3]

Phonology

Unusually among Australian languages, Barrow Point had at least two fricative phonemes, /ð/ and /ɣ/. They usually developed from *t̪ and *k, respectively, when preceded by a stressed long vowel, which then shortened.[4]

References

  1. ^ a b Y63.1 Barrow Point at the Australian Indigenous Languages Database, Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies
  2. ^ Bowern, Claire. 2011. "How Many Languages Were Spoken in Australia?", Anggarrgoon: Australian languages on the web, December 23, 2011 (corrected February 6, 2012)
  3. ^ Barrow Point language at Ethnologue (15th ed., 2005) Closed access icon
  4. ^ Dixon, R. M. W.; Dixon, Robert M. W.; Dixon, Adjunct Professor and Deputy Director of the Language and Culture Centre R. M. W. (14 November 2002). Australian Languages: Their Nature and Development. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9780521473781.

See also John Haviland and Roger Hart's Old Man Fog and the Last Aborigines of Barrow Point, ISBN 1-56098-928-9, a novel about the efforts of Hart, a native of the Cape York peninsula, to record and preserve Barrow Point language and culture.