Maung (Mawung, Mawng, Gun-marung) is an Australian aboriginal language spoken by the Maung people on the Goulburn Islands, off the north coast of Arnhem Land, in the Northern Territory of Australia. Maung is closely related to Iwaidja language which occupies the northwestern corner of the opposite mainland. This is a language that belongs to the Iwaidjan language family of Non-Pama–Nyungan languages.Capell, A. & Hinch, H. E. 1970 Maung grammar; texts and vocabulary / A. Capell and H.E. Hinch Mouton, The Hague : As of 2021, there were around 360 speakers of the language.
Study of Maung has developed to the point where a dictionary, grammar and portions of the Bible are available. Maung is taught in local schools alongside English and other languages such as Iwaidja or Kunwinjku. Children are still acquiring it as a first language, making it somewhat healthier than most other aboriginal languages.
Phonology + Consonant inventory Peripheral Laminal Apical Bilabial Velar Postalveolar Alveolar Retroflex Plosives Nasals Laterals Flaps Approximants
+ Vowel inventory Front Central BackHigh Mid Low
The phonemic inventories provided here are from Capell's well-known 1970 work on Maung. More recent papers (Singer 2006;Singer, R. 2006 Agreement in Mawng: Productive and lexicalised uses of agreement in an Australian language: The University of Melbourne Melbourne : Teo 2007Teo, A. 2007 Breaking up is hard to do: teasing apart morphological complexity in Iwaidja and Maung:) have only two rhotics to Capell's three. Teo lacks the alveolar flap, and Singer the retroflex flap. (In a minor difference, both describe the approximant as retroflex, whereas Capell describes it as alveolar.)
Grammar Maung has five grammatical genders: masculine, feminine, vegetation, land, and edible.
Alternative names Kunmarung (Kunwinjku exonym)
References