Indigenous languages at risk: expert

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Indigenous languages at risk: expert

September 24, 2007 - 6:29PM
http://www.theage.com.au/news/National/Indigenous-languages-at-risk-expert/2007/09/24/1190486215437.html

The federal government's takeover of Aboriginal communities in the Northern
Territory will spell the end for many indigenous languages, linguistics
expert Rob Amery says.

Dr Amery, a lecturer at the University of Adelaide, says indigenous
languages are at the crossroads, under threat of extinction unless action
is taken to reverses the trend.

Speaking before a three-day Indigenous Languages Conference in Adelaide, Dr
Amery said as the government moved to crackdown on indigenous health and
child abuse in the NT, resources were being redirected at the expense of
programs on culture and language.

He said about 250 indigenous languages were spoken in Australia, with only
17 frequently used in communities - half of which might not survive the
next decade.

"Australia's indigenous languages are at a crossroads," Dr Amery said.

"Current federal government interventionist policies are being introduced
without any thought of the harmful effects of those policies on indigenous
languages.

"There is naturally a focus on basic survival issues - child safety, health,
and so on - but it is all too easy to forget the fundamental role that
language plays, and has played for millennia, in establishing indigenous
Australians' sense of social identity."

Dr Amery said one of the biggest threats to indigenous languages was the
government's encouragement of people to move away from areas of high
unemployment to low, areas normally closer to major towns.

"They are actively being encouraged to move," he said.

"Has anyone given a thought to the effects on their language, on their
culture? I suppose they are not thinking about these things."

The conference will consider formal recommendations for government and
community action aimed at valuing, protecting and promoting Aboriginal and
Torres Strait Island languages.

Dr Amery said one idea was to make indigenous languages official in at least
regional areas, but also to give recognition to widely spoken languages at
state or national levels.

© 2007 AAP