The Chair of an Aboriginal language group in north Queensland has warned urgent funding is needed before 80 per cent of Indigenous languages spoken in the far north Queensland region are lost. The North Queensland Regional Aboriginal Language Corporation (NQRALC) Chair, Troy Wyles-Whelan issued the warning to the standing committee for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Affairs…
Read the full National Indigenous Times article.
By Kiri Ten Dolle for The Satellite
INDIGENOUS members of the community have welcomed the Federal Government’s recommendations to introduce bilingual education in schools to boost Aboriginal student attendance.
The House of Representatives Standing Committee on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Affairs, chaired by Federal Member for Blair Shayne Neumann, last week hand down its report Our Land Our Languages: Language Learning in Indigenous Communities.
The report found only 18 of an estimated 250 Aboriginal languages were still spoken and were in danger of being wiped out in the next decade.
It recommended the need to urgently ensure their survival by teaching students whose first language was indigenous in their mother tongue, and an alternative NAPLAN method of testing.
But Mr Neumann took it a step further, calling for an Indigenous Language Learning Centre at Ipswich.
He said he would also like to see an indigenous language degree on offer at universities or TAFE in addition to other foreign language degrees.
“There are 136,000 people in the Blair electorate and 5300 are indigenous, according to the latest census,” Mr Neumann said.
“At Riverview State School 25% of students are indigenous. Most Ipswich high schools have indigenous populations of 10 to 15%.
“This is a very significant report for at least one in 10 people in our district. If adopted by the government it will make a huge difference.
By Lachlan Mackintosh for ABC Brisbane
There’s a lot to a language, it’s more than just a tool for communication, it’s a social identity.
So when a language disappears, how does it affect the culture attached to it?
The ‘Our Land, Our Languages’ report was released this week, it looked at the role of Indigenous languages in Australia and how they could help strengthen the Aboriginal identify and culture.
Dr Felicity Meakins, a Research Fellow in Linguistics at the University of Queensland, joined the program to talk about the topic.
By Ross Kay for ABC Wide Bay.
The study of a language can lead to a new understanding of the world as you immerse yourself in a different culture. But what if you could do that in your own backyard?
That’s the invitation extended to the traditional owners in the Port Curtis and Coral coast region at the 2012 Immersion weekend.
The event will be held over three days at the Wyper Park Scout Camp in Bundaberg, and Phillip Brown, Central Queensland Language Centre co-ordinator says the weekend is designed to provoke discussion about local language groups, and to continue to build a framework for future education.
Read the full article.
Read the full article.
By Frances Adcock and Marlina Whop for ABC News
The principal of Cherbourg State School, south-west of Bundaberg in southern Queensland, says it will be difficult to teach Indigenous languages in some schools.
A new report is calling on the Federal Government to introduce Indigenous language education into schools with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students.
Principal Peter Sansby says it is a good initiative but it may not be practical in some schools with a diverse range of students.
(more…)
By Liam Parsons for the Cairns Post.
SCHOOL students in the Far North have improved in 11 out of 20 NAPLAN test areas, while there region’s 11,000 indigenous students enrolled in state schools have continued to lift their performance.
In the nationwide tests, Far Northern Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students are improving at a faster rate than non-indigenous students, with NAPLAN results showing promising signs throughout the region.
Meanwhile, teaching indigenous children in their mother tongue would help lift literacy rates and school attendance, a federal parliamentary committee said yesterday.
Read the full article in the Cairns Post.
Greg Dickson, of Crikey language blog Fully (sic), writes:
Today federal Parliament releases the Our Land, Our Languages report, stemming from the recent inquiry into Learning Languages in Indigenous Communities. Our Land, Our Languages draws on 154 submissions and 23 public hearings held throughout Australia over the course of a year. The report comprehensively argues for greater recognition and resourcing of indigenous languages and calls for action to halt the embarrassing rate of loss and endangerment of native languages. It is a thorough, measured, yet still ambitious document arguing for indigenous languages to be elevated into a position of greater prominence and prosperity.
(more…)
Children’s learning is booming in Cherbourg because of a new teaching method.
Many of its youngsters speak home language with a different grammar structure to the standard Australian English they’re hit with when they start school.
Don’t believe me?
Well, if I said “dem ova der em looka dat diddy orse” you’d know what it meant…
Read the full National Indigenous Times article
Jeanie Adams of Black Ink Press in Townsville, Northern Queensland, talks about some of the reasons for low literacy among many indigenous Australians.
‘As an indigenous teenager here in Townsville said “what have books got to do with us sir, books are for whitefellas”. And if you are black and you live in the bush and you speak your own language or Aboriginal English, but every time you open a book it is about white kids living in the city using sophisticated English, where do you fit in?’
Ockham’s Razor, on Radio National. Listen to the interview.
AAP , © The Cairns Post
Sister act: Deline and Naurita Briscoe from The Briscoe Sisters, performing at the CIAF Opening Party.
Art lovers from around Australia – and even some from across the world – will soon converge on Cairns for the fourth annual program of indigenous visual art, dance and music.
The Cairns Indigenous Art Fair (CIAF), Australia’s premier indigenous art fair, is a celebration of the beauty and diversity of Queensland indigenous art and culture.
This year’s opening night program includes the 30-member Lockhart River Kawandji-Wimpa Dancers from the Cape York community and a unique musical performance sung in traditional language from The Briscoe Sisters and Torres Strait Island Choir.