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Language Data Assessment at the National Level: Learning from the State of the Environment Process in Australia

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Language Data Assessment at the National Level: Learning from the State of the Environment Process in Australia Language Data Assessment at the National Level: Learning from the State of the Environment Process in Australia. Patrick McConvell & Nicholas Thieberger Research, AIATSIS, GPO Box 553, ACT 2601, Australia & Department of Linguistics and Applied Linguistics, University of Melbourne [email protected], [email protected] Abstract been conducted these data have been included for Language maintenance is necessarily grounded in communities comparison and for evaluation of broader enumerations and has a local focus. Federal government policy has a like the national census. national and international focus, yet it is the source of funding for most Australian indigenous language (IL) work, through 1 The fact that indigenous languages even get on the ATSIC . The nearest approach to a national assessment of the agenda in a review process heavily dominated by number of languages and their needs has come through a biological sciences is rather remarkable, but this perhaps unexpected source, an initiative of the federal department responsible for the environment, Environment circumstance has other advantages in terms of the Australia. Every five years this department mounts an profile of the languages in the political landscape, and evaluation of aspects of the physical and cultural environment, potentially the capacity to link the languages with called the 'State of the Environment'. In 1997 it proposed a set Indigenous knowledge of the environment. One might of indicators for assessing the state of indigenous languages imagine that this appearance of endangered languages in and in 2001 these indicators were implemented in the State of this context was due to the analogy often drawn between Indigenous Languages (SOIL) report. them and endangered species, recently elevated into an even closer nexus by work suggesting that common Among the indicators are those which measure the level of environmental factors lie behind both processes. In fact endangerment of languages. This necessitated building an improved listing of languages and consideration of how census this tendency to tie these two phenomena together was data can be used to extract endangerment measures. Especially not responsible so much as an eminent archaeologist, given the minimal questions on language in the Australian Prof. Isabel McBryde, advocating the important place census and issues surrounding the meaning of the responses, languages, particularly the ancient languages of first these measures benefit from cross-checking against local peoples, have in our cultural heritage. Prof. McBryde studies where they exist. This paper presents some of the most had a pioneering interest in how a conceptualisation of recently available census data from 2001 and compares it, landscape and artefacts can be gained by attention to the where possible, with local and regional studies. expression of these fields in indigenous languages. Unfortunately the structure of the chapters in the State of The State of Indigenous Languages (SOIL) the Environment report has made it difficult to go one Report step further and elaborate on the immensely rich forms of expression about the natural world which are to be The Australian Government’s State of the Environment found in Indigenous languages. These aspects of five-yearly reporting process has so far twice included a Indigenous knowledge are seriously endangered and this report on the State of Indigenous Languages (SOIL), the endangerment of ethnobiological knowledge is strongly only national review that systematically addresses linked to language endangerment. available data on the number of speakers of indigenous languages in Australia. The 2001 report (McConvell, We will further discuss this important links between the and Thieberger 2001) included the establishment of a state of indigenous languages and the state of indigenous baseline of data (the Indigenous Languages Database or knowledge of the environment briefly at the end of the ILDB) for each language for which information was paper. We will focus first on what language known. Schmidt's (1990) report and handbooks of endangerment means, and how it can be measured. languages of a particular region (e.g. McGregor 1988) provide figures at a national or regional level for particular languages, but there had been no systematic Endangerment in the Australian context attempt to collate population figures at the national level Some approaches to language endangerment attempt to for all languages. give minimum absolute figures for populations speaking a language if it is to have a chance of survival, ranging Sources of data included in the ILDB vary from local from 10,000 to 100,000 (Krauss 1992). Under this surveys to the national census. Where local surveys have approach, all Australian ILs are severely endangered, since the largest languages have only a few thousand speakers. Even with a lower cut-off point like 500, as 1 The Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission's used for Mexican Indigenous languages by Garza- funding program currently known as Preservation of Indigenous Language and Recording. Cuaron and Lastra (1991:97), all but a few Australian languages are marked for extinction. However we, along languages with quite divergent figures (as discussed in with Henderson and Nash and a number of other authors McConvell and Thieberger 2001:43-44). (Crystal 2000:12-13, Nettle and Romaine 2000:9-10), are not convinced of the validity of this indicator. For Another study worth commenting on is the ABS survey one thing in traditional times before white settlement, of 1994 (ABS 1996) which sampled some 17,500 Australian languages only had a hundred or so to a few Indigenous people nationally (and projected the results thousand speakers and did not die out, at least not on a onto national figures). It provides the results of this regular basis. Of course we are talking now about a very work by ATSIC region and is clearly not a reliable different situation in Australia and the world but it has source for numbers of language speakers at this level, not been convincingly proved that these absolute mainly because of the sampling and projection numbers indicators are of any great value. Consequently methodology. It is however interesting, in that it we have looked at other ways of measuring language provides data on two language-related questions, the endangerment more suited to the Australian situation. first is ‘Speaks an Indigenous language’ for which it finds 21% of the total sample of Aboriginal and Torres Australian Bureau of Statistics Indigenous Strait Islanders (aged over 5 years); the second is ‘Speaks mainly an Indigenous language at home’ for language data which it finds 13%. This 8% difference indicates the Every five years since 1986 the Australian census asks margin that could be considered in assessing responses what language each respondent speaks at home. This to the usual Census question which asks only about wording was arrived at after some discussion in the early home use. 1980s when the attempt to get at 'ethnicity' included several 'ethnic surrogate topics' of which language was Because of the availability of Census data, the dual one (see Ozolins 1993:197). As there is nowhere on the measurement of ‘speaking’ versus ‘speaking at home’ census to indicate ethnic affiliation, the answer to the in this 1994 survey, despite its shortcomings, does language question is the only place where a person can provide a cross-check of some of the more interesting indicate they belong to a particular group, even more so results from the 1996 Census or at least raises in the indigenous Australian context where group interesting questions about them. For instance, in the identity is often tied closely to a language. That is, there SOIL report we noted an unusual pattern in relation to is nowhere to say that you are not only Indigenous, but the Adelaide region in the 1996 figures that showed that you are Nyungar, or Yamatji, or Muri or Koori (all higher proportions of younger people reported speaking names of indigenous people in different parts of the an Indigenous language than did older people, although country). What constitutes a 'speaker' of a language for all the percentages are less than 10%. This we ascribed the census will vary considerably too, as we know that to positive attitudes about Indigenous languages and the qualifications for being the best speaker will attempted language revival in recent years. progressively lower as the number of speakers reduces (Evans 2001). Adelaide, Speakers of Australian Indigenous Languages, nfd; Eastern The 2001 ABS data was made available to us at the Aboriginal, nec (ABS 2001) Indigenous Area (IA) level, which is fairly finegrained as there are 564 IAs nationally. There is also some scope 300 for a slight bloat in the figures due to randomising of 250 any figure below 3 in any given Indigenous Area to r e 200 protect confidentiality. The figures presented in this b m 150 paper should be read with the understanding that such u randomising has been applied. N 100 50 Figures for some 48 ILs are enumerated by the ABS, 0 9 9 9 9 9 0 6 2 3 4 5 1 - - - - and all other languages are lumped together under - r 0 0 0 0 0 e 2 3 4 categories 'not elsewhere classified' (nec) and 'not 5 v further defined' (nfd). O A g e - g r o u p s Comparisons of surveys and the ABS figures At the time of writing the SOIL report we were able to Chart 1 Age range of speakers in the Adelaide region of incorporate the results of a survey of Barkly languages languages other than those known to be from outside of conducted by Robert Hoogenraad, and a survey of the Adelaide region. Maningrida languages conducted by the Bawinangga Aboriginal Corporation. For both of these studies there However if we look at the 1994 survey for Adelaide were some languages with very close correlations there is virtually no Indigenous language reported as between the surveys and ABS figures, and some being spoken at home but 12% report being able to speak an Indigenous language.
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