Yugambeh (or Mibanah, from , 'language of men' or 'sound of eagles'), also known as Tweed-Albert Bandjalang, is an Australian Aboriginal language spoken by the Yugambeh living in South-East Queensland between and within the Logan River basin and the Tweed River basin, bounded to the east by the Pacific Ocean (including South Stradbroke Island) and in the west by the Teviot Ranges and Teviot Brook basin.Yugambeh Museum web site introduction (web site by the Kombumerri Aboriginal Corporation for Culture)
Yugambeh is a dialect cluster of two mutually intelligible dialects, one of four such clusters of the Bandjalangic branch of the Pama–Nyungan language family.
Name In the Yugambeh language, the word means an emphatic 'no', 'never' i.e. 'very much no' and is a common exonym for the people and their language. Speakers of the language use the word which means 'man', 'human', 'wedge-tailed eagle' and is the preferred endonym for the people; they call their language meaning 'of man', 'of human', 'of eagle' (the suffix forming the genitive of the word )."Edward Curr, The Australian Race" 1886. Macquarie Aboriginal Words, Macquarie University, 1994, paperback , chapter 1
Yugambeh may also be referred to as: Yugambir, Yugambeh (not to be confused with Yugambal/Yugumbal, a distinct language located further west) Yubumbee Jugumbir, Jukamba Tweed-Albert language Nganduwal Ngarangwal Manaldjali (a variant of Mununjali, the name of a Yugambeh-speaking clan) Minjanbal (probably from Minjungbal, an alternate language term)
Geographic distribution Yugambeh is spoken within the Logan, Albert, Coomera, Nerang, and Tweed River basins.
Dialects Linguists such as Margaret Sharpe, relying on the previous work of others like Terry Crowley, described the Yugambeh language as having potentially upwards of 7 dialects. Recent analysis has found errors in these original studies and when corrected for these errors, two mutually intelligible dialects can be found; a western (freshwater) variety and an eastern (saltwater) variety with minor vocabulary differences.
Some differences between the dialects as noted by linguist Shaun Davies: EnglishEasternWesternshegirl
App The Yugambeh Museum in Beenleigh currently maintains a free dictionary app for the Yugambeh language, available on Android, iOS and a desktop version.
Phonology Vowels Yugambeh has a vowel system of four vowels that also contrast in length, resulting in eight phonemic vowels in total. The letter "h" is used after the vowel to indicate a long vowel. FrontBackHigh Mid Low
Allophones The low central vowel is fronted and raised between palatal consonants and a lateral/rhotic consonant.
Consonants Compared to other Pama-Nyungan languages, Yugambeh has a smaller inventory of consonants. There are four places of articulation, with the consonants consisting of four obstruents, four nasals, two liquids, and two semivowels. PeripheralLaminalApicalBilabialVelarPalatalAlveolarObstruent Nasal Lateral Rhotic Semivowel
Obstruents Obstruents do not have a voicing contrast, and can appear as fricative allophones. Obstruents are phonetically voiceless, except when following a homorganic consonant.
Grammar The grammar of the Yugambeh language is highly agglutinative, making use of over 50 suffixes on nouns, verbs, adjectives, and demonstratives.
Noun morphology Nouns take a number of suffixes to decline for grammatical case.
Suffixes Noun suffixes are placed into ten orders. A noun may not take more than one suffix from any order, and if more than one suffix is attached they must always be in the set order of the suffix orders, e.g., an order 7 suffix must always come after an order 5 suffix.
Orders1234567#8910 Typified byFeminineDiminutive Possessive Abessive Allative Ergative, Instrumental, Comitative Intensive Query 'also' Past Possessive Objective Respective Benefactive Purposive Desiderative Ablative Locative Past Locative Aversive 'X' stands for a homorganic obstruent.
'N' stands for a homorganic nasal.
#The comitative, purposive, desiderative, ablative, and aversive suffixes are preceded by on animate nouns.
1st order suffixes - (typified by) – used to indicate an association or link Examples: 'shoe' lit. 'typified by foot' 'womaniser' lit. 'typified by women' 2nd order suffixes (feminine) – used to form feminine nouns and some astrological terms Examples: 'female singer' 3rd order suffixes (diminutive) – used to form the diminutive of a noun, referring to a smaller version Examples: 'toy boomerang' 4th order suffixes (possessive) – indicates current possession Examples: 'our' 'of the moon/moon's' (past possessive) – indicates past possession Examples: 'was of the parrot' (Billinudgel)
Verb morphology Verbs are conjugated with suffixes. Yugambeh is an aspect-dominant language, as opposed to being tense-dominant like most Western languages. Suffixes mostly indicate aspect and mood.
Suffixes Verb suffixes are placed in six orders. A verb may not take more than one suffix from a given order, and similar to nouns, suffixes are attached in a set order. Combinations of these suffixes express all possible conjugations of Yugambeh verbs, with only a small number of combinations possible. Yugambeh verb stems are commonly two syllables in length and always end in a vowel. +Orders123456 -ba 'Causative' -ndi 'Carry whilst...' -li 'reflexive/passive' -ja 'Past tense' -hn 'imperfective aspect' -du 'habitual aspect' -wa 'Repetitive' -hny 'potential mood' -i 'preconditional' -ma 'Causative' -h 'imperative' -de 'preconditional' -hla 'continuous aspect' -nah 'antechronous aspect' -nyun 'synchronous aspect' -luru 'historical past' -yan -yah 'purposive' -jin 'synchronous aspect' -n 'permissive' -ni 'perfective'
Adjective morphology Adjectives can be marked with a suffix to indicate the gender of the noun they qualify.
Suffixes +Adjective suffixesGenderSuffixAnimate (male) -binAnimate (female) -ganArboreal -Nahn*Neuter -gay *N stands for a homorganic nasal.
Demonstratives Yugambeh possesses a complicated set of demonstratives which make a three-way distinction among proximal, medial, and distal sets. There is a further distinguishing of demonstrative adjectives and location demonstratives. The adjective set can be additionally suffixed to create demonstrative pronouns. The adjective set has three forms for "things in sight", "things hidden or not in sight", and "things not there anymore", while the location set has forms to indicate the general area and definite area, whether in sight or not in sight, and past and present forms.
Adjective set +Demonstrative adjectivesDemonstrativesProximal (this)Medial (that)Distal (that over there)In sight (sg)In sight (plrl)Not in sight (sg)Not in sight (plrl) The above set can be suffixed with order 7 noun suffixes to form demonstrative pronouns that function like ordinary independent nouns. e.g. 'Take this with you!'
The 'not in sight' and 'not here anymore' forms can take the order 2 noun suffix -gan to form time words. e.g. 'recently'.
Location set DemonstrativesProximal (here)Medial (there)Distal (over there)In sight (definite area)In sight (general area)Not in sight (present)Not in sight (past)
Syntax Syntax in the Yugambeh language is fairly free, with a tendency towards SOV (subject–object–verb). Within noun phrases, adjectives and demonstratives (e.g., that man, a red car) stay adjacent to the noun they qualify.
Place names Modern place names with roots in the Yugambeh language include: Billinudgel – from , 'was of the parrot' Canungra – from , 'a long flat or clearing' Coomera/Upper Coomera – from , a species of wattle Jumpinpi – Pandanus root Mundoolun – from , the local name for the Common death adder Nindooinbah – from , 'the remains of a fire' Pimpama – from , 'a place of soldier birds' Tabragalba – from , 'a place of clubs' Tallebudgera – rotten or decayed logs Wongawallan – from the words ('pigeon') and ('water')
References
Further reading Dictionary of Yugambeh Including Neighbouring Dialects, compiled by Margaret Sharpe, Pacific Linguistics: Australian National University, 1998.
External links Borobi and His Friends , virtual book, read in Yugambeh language by Axel Best. From the State Library of Queensland virtual book collection. (requires Adobe Flash) Linguist List (2005) Synopsis of Grammar and Texts of the Yugambeh-Bundjalung Dialect Chain in Eastern Australia Accessed 20 May 2008 Yugambeh (South East Queensland - Logan, Gold Coast, Scenic Rim) Community Language Journey Digital Story, State Library of Queensland