Umbugarla language

Umbugarla or Mbukarla is a possible Australian language isolate once spoken by three people in Arnhem Land, northern Australia, in 1981, and is now extinct.

Umbugarla
Mbukarla
RegionNorthern Territory
Extinctca. 2000; with the death of Butcher Knight
Darwin
  • Umbugarlic
    • Umbugarla
Language codes
ISO 639-3umr
Glottologumbu1235
AIATSIS[1]N43
ELPUmbugarla
  historic distribution of Umbugarla

Phonology

Consonants
Peripheral Laminal Apical
Labial Velar Palatal Alveolar Retroflex
Stop b ɡ ɟ d ɖ
Nasal m ŋ ɲ n ɳ
Lateral ʎ l ɭ
Rhotic ɽ
Approximant w j ɹ
  • /ɡ/ can be heard as either stops [k] or [ʔ] when in word-final or word-medial position, and as a fricative [ɣ] when in intervocalic position.
  • /ɽ/ can also be heard as an alveolar tap [ɾ] when in intervocalic position.

Vowels
Front Back
High i iː u uː
Mid ɛ ɔ
Low a aː
  • Vowels can be lengthened when in open syllables or in word-final position.[2]
Phoneme Allophones
/a/ [ä], [äː], [æ], [ɛ], [ə], [ɒ], [o]
/ɛ/ [ɛ], [ɛː]
/i/ [i], [iː], [ɨ], [ʉ], [ə], [eː]
/u/ [u], [uː], [o], [oː], [ʉ], [ə]
/uː/ [uː], [oː]

Classification

Umbugarla was once considered a language isolate (together with Ngurmbur as a dialect), but Mark Harvey has made a case for it being part of a family of Darwin Region languages.[3]

References
  1. N43 Umbugarla at the Australian Indigenous Languages Database, Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies
  2. Davies, Jennifer (1989). Umbugarla: A Sketch Grammar. University of Melbourne.
  3. Bowern, Claire. 2011. "How Many Languages Were Spoken in Australia?", Anggarrgoon: Australian languages on the web, December 23, 2011 (corrected February 6, 2012)
Wiktionary has a word list at Appendix:Umbugarla word list


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