Murrinh-Patha (Murinbata)

The Murrinh-Patha are an Aboriginal group located in northwest Australia. Also known as the Murinbata or Murrinpatha, they speak the Murrinh-Patha language, which is regarded as being among the healthiest Aboriginal languages in Australia. They number about 2,500 people and mostly live around the community of Wadeye (pronounced wad-ayer) in Australia’s Northern Territory. Their territory is primarily located between the Moyle and Fitzmaurice Rivers in the Thamarrurr Region of the Northern Territory.

Background

The Murrinh-Patha language has attracted interest from linguists due to its uncertain origins, unusual structure, and relative health. It is known by a variety of names and spellings and is most commonly written as Murrinh-Patha, Murinbata, Murinbada, and Garama. Murrinh-Patha itself means “the good language” and is defined in the twenty-first century as an independent non-Pama-Nyungan Australian language. Although it was once described as a language isolate, meaning that it had no known close relatives, it has been shown to share some characteristics with the Southern Daly class of languages of the Northern Territory. Murrinh-Patha has a shared vocabulary of less than 15 percent with its closest relative in the Daly language group; however, similarities in verbal inflections have led to its inclusion in this loose affiliation of tongues, as the striking unusual characteristics of these languages makes it likely they shared a common ancestor language. Murrinh-Patha is described as a polysynthetic language, meaning that each word may be composed of many different elements. Although it has thirty-eight different verb classes, Murrinh-Patha has only four vowels and only has words to count to five.

Despite its unusual nature, it has gained an increasing number of speakers in the twenty-first century, one of only twenty or so traditional Aboriginal languages to be regularly passed between generations as their primary or secondary language. Many Aboriginal people either speak English as their first language or a mixed form of English and one or more Aboriginal languages, typically referred to as Kriol in Australia. Wadeye is among the few locations in which a concerted effort has been made to pass the Indigenous language to new generations. As a result, Murrinh-Patha has seen a growth in the number of speakers. In 1996 the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) indicated there were 1,430 speakers of Murrinh-Patha. Although that figure dropped to 1,157 by 2001, it grew to 1,832 speakers by 2006. Giving even more optimism to linguists about its relative health, ABS research showed that 60 percent of its speakers were under twenty-four years of age, with 40 percent under fourteen. Murrinh-Patha is further used as a common language in the Wadeye region by a variety of different Aboriginal groups—including the Marri Ngarr, Magati Ke, Marri Tjevin, and Marri Amu—whose own languages are in danger of extinction. Murrinh-Patha is one of the few languages in the region to have its own dictionary and grammar book. Into the mid-2020s, between 2,500 and 3,000 people are estimated to speak Murrinh-Patha.

Although Wadeye was initially founded as the town of Port Keats by a Christian mission in 1935, the town is relatively isolated and the road to town is only open for roughly half the year. This comparative isolation has enabled Murrinh-Patha to remain relatively free of the influence of foreign languages. In the 1930s and 1940s, mission workers tried to force the Murrinh-Patha to speak English in school dormitories. Despite these attempts, Murrinh-Patha parents typically tried to reinforce their use of their Indigenous language at home. These rebellious attempts to speak Murrinh-Patha eventually spread to other regional groups who adopted Murrinh-Patha as a first or second language. After relief workers ended the mission, the Murrinh-Patha returned to teaching their Indigenous language to children. Local schools have sought to maintain the Murrinh-Patha facility with their own tongue, and many have bilingual programs in English and Murrinh-Patha. As a result, Murrinh-Patha is regarded as among a very select group of Aboriginal languages that is robust in health.

Overview

There are seven patrilinear clans associated with the Murrinh-Patha, patrilinear meaning that they trace their descent through the male line. Each clan has a totem associated with their group. These totems include the honeybee, the sugar glider, three types of birds, a tree blossom, and the morning star. Marriages are typically made between members from different clans. The Murrinh-Patha also have important musical traditions that help to define their cultural identity within the community. One of the most important of these traditions places each person within a “mob” named after three public ceremonial genres: djanba, wurltjirri, and malgarrin. The ceremonial groups are a comparatively recent creation of the Murrinh-Patha, with each repertory of songs only dating back to the 1930s.

The djanba songs are centered around the totemic symbols of the Kunyibinyi clan, such as the honeybee, and are regarded by researchers as being cryptic in their meaning. The wurltjirri songs are accompanied by a didgeridoo, with most refrains repeated by a chorus. Unusual for Australian Aboriginal songs using the didgeridoo, several wurltjirri songs are traditionally led by women. The malgarrin set of songs was mostly composed in the 1930s by a Murrinh-Patha woman named Mulindjin, who claimed to receive her inspiration from the Virgin Mary in a vision of the Aboriginal mythologic era known as the Dreamtime. Resultingly, many of the malgarrin songs have strongly Christian themes. They often involve the use of an Aboriginal instrument called the clapstick, which is played by the male song-leader.

Since their introduction to Christianity, many Murrinh-Patha have adopted Christian beliefs that may be intermixed with traditional practices. Traditionally, the Murrinh-Patha believed that they were descended from a single individual named Kunmanggur. Originally born as a rainbow-colored python, he lamented the absence of people from the land and decided to make the first boy and girl using a didgeridoo. Kunmanggur changed himself into the form of a man and raised the children as his own, teaching them how to use the land and live in peace with each other. Eventually, he sent them out to populate the land.

Many years later, he married one of their ancestors and had two daughters and a son. The son, Tjinimin, eventually came to despise Kunmanggur after he forbade him from trying to have relations with his sisters. Tjinimin destroyed the didgeridoo used to shape humanity and tried to slay his father. In terror at what he had done, he turned into a bat and flew away. The Murrinh-Patha claim the shrieks of the bat are the cries of Tjinimin expressing his shame and dismay at his actions. Kunmanggur did not die, but instead he traveled among the people as he sought to once again bring peace to humankind before ultimately dying and returning to his snake form.

Bibliography

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Furlan, Alberto. "Indigenous Songs as ‘Operational Structures of Transactional Life’: A Study of Song Genres at Wadeye." An Appreciation of Difference: WEH Stanner and Aboriginal Australia. Canberra: Aboriginal Studies Press, 2008, pp. 151–165.

Green, Ian. “The Genetic Status of Murrinh-Patha.” The Non-Pama-Nyungan Languages of Northern Australia: Comparative Studies of the Continent’s Most Linguistically Complex Region. Pacific Linguistics, 2003, pp. 159–184.

Johnson, Allen W., and Douglass Price-Williams. “The Death of the Father; Muribata (Australia).” Oedipus Ubiquitous: The Family Complex in World Folk Literature, Stanford University Press, 1996, pp. 229–35.

Kelly, Barbara, Rachel Nordlinger, and Gillian Wigglesworth. “Perspectives on the Vitality of Murrinh-Patha.” Proceedings of the Australian Linguistic Society, 2009, www.als.asn.au/proceedings/als2009/kellynordlingerwigglesworth.pdf. Accessed 3 Feb. 2025.

“Murrinh-Patha Language.” Global Recordings Network, globalrecordings.net/en/language/mwf. Accessed 3 Feb. 2025.

Street, Chester S. An Introduction to the Language and Culture of the Murrinh-Patha. Summer Institute of Linguistics, Australian Aborigines Branch, 1987.

Walsh, Michael J. The Murinyapata Language of North-West Australia. LINCOM, 2011.