Discovery of a New Language Spoken by Only 350 People in Australia's Remote Village of Lajamanu

Berfin Ceren Meray
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Linguists have unveiled the documentation of a newfound language in the secluded village of Lajamanu, situated in Australia's Northern Territory and predominantly inhabited by the Warlpiri community. With just around 350 speakers, this linguistic revelation offers a glimpse into the rich tapestry of diverse languages thriving in the world's remote corners. Explore the intriguing story behind the silent emergence of a language that has quietly flourished in the heart of Australia.

Light Warlpiri, also known as Warlpiri rampaku, is spoken by several thousand Indigenous people in northern Australia, incorporating elements from both the Warlpiri Aboriginal language and Kriol, a creole developed in the late 19th to early 20th century based on English.

This cultural enigma was extensively studied by Carmel O'Shannessy, a linguistics professor at the Australian National University, who first reported this "new language" in 2005.

It is believed to have emerged in the 1970s and 80s when some Warlpiri adults began intermittently using English or Kriol words within Warlpiri sentences, a phenomenon known as code-switching, where a speaker transitions between two or more languages while speaking.

O'Shannessy, in a 2018 statement to Atlas Obscura, said, "For a mixed language to develop, you need to have bilingual or multilingual individuals who are systematically code-switching and have some social reason for creating their speech forms."

Over the years, the language system has naturally evolved and has even become the mother tongue for some in Lajamanu. While traditional Warlpiri is considered an endangered language, spoken by only around 4,000 people, Light Warlpiri is even more uncertain, spoken and understood by only around 350 individuals, mostly under the age of 40.

Lajamanu is incredibly remote.

The closest community is Daguragu, approximately 110 kilometers (68 miles) away, and the nearest substantial town is Katherine, over 560 kilometers (350 miles) away, taking about a 6-hour drive by car. Not just odd words and phrases are borrowed or modified. As explained by O'Shannessy, the fundamental structure of the language is influenced by different elements from Warlpiri, English, and Kriol.

In most languages, hearing structures from vastly different, distant languages in the verb system and noun system is rare.

However, in Light Warlpiri, while verbs mostly come from English or Kriol, most other grammatical components in the sentence come from Warlpiri. O'Shannessy added, 'The restructured auxiliary system selectively draws on Warlpiri and various varieties and styles of English and/or Kriol to put together in a creative way new structures.''