Malgana language

Malgana
Malkana
Region	Shark Bay area of Western Australia
Ethnicity	Malgana people
Extinct	1990s
Revival	1-10 (2018-19) undergoing revival[1]
Language family	Pama–Nyungan Kartu Malgana
Dialects	Kakurtu (riverside Malgana) Ngulartu (bush Malgana)
Language codes
ISO 639-3	vml
Glottolog	malg1242
AIATSIS[2]	W18
ELP	Malkana

Malgana, also known as Malkana, is the Aboriginal Australian language of the Malgana people of Western Australia. It is one of the Kartu languages of the Pama–Nyungan family of languages.

Malgana country is the area around Shark Bay in Western Australia. In particular it includes the Peron and Edel Land Peninsulas as well as some of the adjoining land.^{[citation needed]} Buluguda, Damala, and Watjanti were likely Malgana-speaking locations or social groupings, rather than dialects.^{[citation needed]}

The Irra Wangga Language Centre (having taken over from the Yamaji Language Centre) has been carrying out work on the Malgana language since 1995, and has produced an illustrated wordlist from local speakers of the language. A Sketch Grammar of Malgana (Gargett, 2012) was published by Pacific Linguistics.^[3]

There is a sign in the Shire of Shark Bay that reads Yandani Gathaagudu, with under it being the English translation, "Welcome to Shark Bay".^[4]

Phonology

Consonants

	Peripheral		Laminal		Apical
	Labial	Velar	Dental	Palatal	Alveolar	Retroflex
Stop	b	ɡ	t̪	ɟ	d	ɖ
Nasal	m	ŋ	n̪	ɲ	n	ɳ
Lateral			l̪	ʎ	l	ɭ
Rhotic					ɹ	ɽ
Approximant	w			j

Vowels

	Front	Back
High	i iː	u uː
Low	a aː

References

1. "Aboriginal Languages".
2. W18 Malgana at the Australian Indigenous Languages Database, Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies
3. "Irra Wangga". Bundiyarra. Retrieved 22 October 2023.
4. "Bob wasn't allowed to speak his language growing up. Now he's helping to revive it". ABC News. 22 October 2023.

Gargett, Andrew. (2011). A salvage grammar of Malgana, the language of Shark Bay, Western Australia. (Pacific Linguistics, 624.) Canberra: Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies, Australian National University.