Malak-Malak language
| MalakMalak | |
|---|---|
| Nguluk Wangarr | |
| Region | Northern Territory |
|
Native speakers
|
8 MalakMalak (2015 fieldwork) |
|
Northern Daly (language isolate)
|
|
| Latin | |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 |
|
| Glottolog | nort1547 |
| AIATSIS |
N22 MalakMalak |
MalakMalak (also spelt Mullukmulluk, Malagmalag, Malak-Malak) or referred to as Ngolak-Wonga, Nguluwongga is an Australian Aboriginal language spoken by the Mulluk-Mulluk people. MalakMalak is nearly extinct, with children growing up speaking Kriol or English instead. The language is spoken in the Daly River area around Woolianna and Nauiyu.
MalakMalak has sometimes been classified in a Northern Daly family along with an "Anson Bay" group of Wagaydy (Patjtjamalh, Wadjiginy, Kandjerramalh) and the unattested Giyug. Green concluded that Wagaydy and MalakMalak were two separate families. Later researchers have linked them, and this is reflected in Bowern (2011). However, the Wagaydy people are recent arrivals in the area, and their language may only similar due to borrowing.AIATSIS and Glottolog treats Wagaydy as an isolate and Giyug as unclassifiable.
MalakMalak, is an ergative-absolutive language with constituent order mainly determined by information structure and prosody, but syntactically free. Marking of core-cases is optional. The language is mostly dependent-marking (1), but also has no marking (2) and head-marking features (2).
(1) dependent-marking: possession
"Doro's dog"
(2) no marking: noun-adjective
"I tripped on the little stick"
(3) head-marking: noun-adposition
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