<h1 class="cN-headingPage" style="margin:0px 0px 0.2em;padding:0px;border:0px;font-weight:normal;font-size:2.3em;font-family:Georgia,'Times New Roman',Times,serif;vertical-align:baseline;text-align:left">Children invent new language in remote NT community</h1>
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July 16, 2013 - 1:58PM</dd></dl></div><span style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-size:12px;font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;vertical-align:baseline;line-height:17px;text-align:left"><br><br></span><div><h3 class="authorName" style="margin:0px 1.5em 0px 0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-size:0.92em;font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;vertical-align:baseline;line-height:1.4;width:auto;background-color:rgb(255,255,255)">
Nicholas Bakalar</h3></div><div><br></div><div><p style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-size:12px;font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;vertical-align:baseline;line-height:17px;text-align:left">There are many dying languages in the world. But at least one has recently been born, created by children living in a remote village in the Northern Terrritory.</p>
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Carmel O'Shannessy, a linguist at the University of Michigan, has been studying the young people's speech for more than a decade and has concluded that they speak neither a dialect nor the mixture of languages called a creole, but a new language with unique grammatical rules.</p>
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The language, called Warlpiri rampaku, or Light Warlpiri, is spoken only by people under 35 in Lajamanu, an isolated community of about 700 people in the Northern Territory. In all, about 350 people speak the language as their native tongue. O'Shannessy has published several studies of Light Warlpiri, the most recent in the June issue of<em style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-style:inherit;font-family:inherit;vertical-align:baseline">Language</em>.</p>
<span style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-size:12px;font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;vertical-align:baseline;line-height:17px;text-align:left"><br><div>Access full article below: </div><div><a href="http://www.smh.com.au/national/children-invent-new-language-in-remote-nt-community-20130716-2q1k6.html#ixzz2ZFPGuRmx" style="font-family:inherit;margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-style:inherit;vertical-align:baseline;color:rgb(0,51,153);text-decoration:none">http://www.smh.com.au/national/children-invent-new-language-in-remote-nt-community-20130716-2q1k6.html#ixzz2ZFPGuRmx</a></div>
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