The Mantharta languages are a group of four Aboriginal languages traditionally spoken in the north-west of Western Australia. They are Jiwarli W28, Thiin W25, Warriyangka W22 and Tharrkari W21. The languages are closely related genetically, although they show some interesting structural and lexical differences (2015:5).
Jiwarli is a Pama Nyungan language of the Mantharta group, along with Thiin W25 and Warriyangka W22 and Tharrkari W21 (Austin, 1991:20). Jiwarli and Thiin may be dialects of one language (Austin, p.c., in Thieberger, 1993:106). The Jiwarli materials collected by Austin from the late Jack Butler consists of seventy texts, fieldnotes and about fifteen hours of recordings (1991:21).
Not to be confused with Juwaliny A88.
Austin, Peter. 2015. A Reference Grammar of the Mantharta Languages, Western Australia. Draft version 3.7. Unpublished MS.
Ashburton River region, south-east from Exmouth and Onslow (Sally Dixon, Wangka Maya, 2007 p.c.).
The places which mark the limits of Jiwarli territory are: north: mirni Minnie Springs. Here the Jiwarli met the Thalanyji north east: kajriwari Mount Florrie on the border with the Pinikura south east: yaalha pool on Henry River East Branch is the south east limit south west: karlapaya High Range borders on Tharrkari country south: japarntipirri Edmund River borders on Warriyangka country and the Barlee Range borders on the Thiin. (http://www.linguistics.unimelb.edu.au/research/jiwarli/region.geog.html).
... the eastern neighbours of the Purduna were the Jiwarli, who owned territory along the Henry River south to Edmund Station (Austin in Sutton 1995:97)
... traditionally spoken along the upper reachers of the Henry River, a tributary of the Ashburton River (Austin 2006, vol 6:125). ... the area at the top end of the Yannarie River down to the Lyons River where it divides and up to the Henry River (Burgman & Austin 2007:iii).
Search MURA people®
Search MURA language®
Search OZBIB
Search Trove
Search Worldcat
Speaker numbers were measured differently across the censuses and various other sources listed in AUSTLANG. You are encouraged to refer to the sources.
Speaker numbers for ‘NILS 2004’ and ‘2005 estimate’ come from 'Table F.3: Numbers of speakers of Australian Indigenous languages (various surveys)' in 'Appendix F NILS endangerment and absolute number results' in McConvell, Marmion and McNicol 2005, pages 198-230 (PDF, 2.5MB).
Austin, Peter. c2001. Jiwarli: a language of Western Australia, http://www.linguistics.unimelb.edu.au/research/projects/jiwarli/index.html.
Austin, Peter. 1992. A dictionary of Jiwarli, Western Australia. Bundoora: La Trobe University. Wangka Maya Pilbara Aboriginal Language Centre. 2006. Jiwarli: Jiwarli-English dictionary English-Jiwarli wordlist & topical wordlist 2006. South Hedland, WA: Wangka Maya Pilbara Aboriginal Language Centre. Burgman, Albert. 2007. Jiwarli dictionary 2007. South Hedland, WA: Wangka Maya PALC. (CD ROM) Burgman, Albert & Peter Austin. 2007. Jiwarli: Jiwarli-English dictionary, English-Jiwarli wordlist & topical wordlist 2007. South Hedland, WA: Wangka Maya Pilbara Aboriginal Language Centre.
