The 2014 AIATSIS National Indigenous Studies Conference was held from Wednesday 26th to Friday 28th March at the National Convention Centre in Canberra. It was a celebration of 50 years since the legislated establishment of the Australian Institute of Aboriginal Studies, now AIATSIS, along with the 50 year anniversary of leadership and excellence in Indigenous studies by AIATSIS.
Gary Williams, Dallas Walker and Br Steve have been looking at the special Gumbaynggirr language used to show politeness, avoidance and joking as found in the Collected Dreaming plays which they have been working on.
They were interested in the way you had to use different kinds of language especially with some kinds of relatives. They decided to present some of their findings at this years AIATSIS Indigenous Studies Conference. Dallas Walker was unable to make it so Michael Jarrett stood in for him.
They presented a paper entitled: ‘Different talk for different relatives: Relationships shown in restored stories from three Gumbaynggirr (N. Coast NSW) dialects.’ This was well-received and because linguists have since shown interest in it the paper may soon be published in a journal.
To view the Keynote Abstracts and Biographies, please click here to download the pdf file (size 665kb).
To view the Paper Abstracts and Biographies, please click here to download the pdf file (size 1.95mb).
To view the Poster Abstracts and Biographies, please click here to download the pdf file (size 779kb).
Muurrbay Aboriginal Language and Culture Co-operative