Nhawurdatha nganhi!

Here is the comic we presented in the last blog post:

Here is what the two characters (Thidnamara ‘Frog’ on the left, and Mawakantyi ‘Greedy’ on the right) are saying:

Thidnamara:	wardaru yini mawakantyi? ‘How are you?’
Mawakantyi:	matya nganhi manyu ‘I’m fine’
Thidnamara:	waranha nhaniya? ‘Who is she?’
Mawakantyi:	nhaniya ngakarni papa ‘She is my aunt’
Thidnamara:	waranha nhawurda? ‘Who is he?’
Mawakantyi:	nhawurda ngakarni kaka ‘He’s my uncle’
Mawakantyi:	nhawurdatha nganhi! ‘This is me!’

The English translation misses some important parts of the meaning in the Dieri original because English does not have a way to express certain concepts, like the distance someone is from the speaker. Notice that Frog uses nhaniya to refer to the aunt who is a little distance away, using the ending -ya. But when he points to the uncle who is understood to be right close by he uses nhawurda with the ending -rda that means ‘close by’. Similarly, when Greedy sees himself on the computer screen he uses nhawurda because it is close by (he could reach out and touch it) — he also adds the ending -tha which indicates old information, something that everyone can see and know about. Notice if the character was female she would say nhanirdatha nganhi! ‘This is me!’ using the female term for ‘this, she’.

You can use these expressions by yourself or in a group to practise Dieri in several ways. One possibility is to draw pictures of your relatives (and yourself!) and write the term for their relation to you in Dieri under the picture. Then place them on a table at various distances away and practice saying things like nhawurda ngakarni kaka ‘This (right here) is my uncle’ or nhaniwa ngakarni ngandri ‘That (far away) is my mother’. You can also do this with a friend as question and answer pairs, like:

Question: waranha yingkarni kaka ‘Who is your uncle?’
Answer: nhawurda ngakarni kaka ‘This (nearby) is my uncle’

or:

Question: nhaniya yingkarni kaku kara yingkarni ngathata ‘Is this your older sister or your younger sister?’
Answer: nhaniya ngakarni kaku ‘This is my older sister’

If you can use Powerpoint you can also scan the pictures with their Dieri relation terms, and create a Powerpoint show with them, one on each slide, and then narrate the slides in Dieri as you present them. You can end your presentation with nhawurdatha nganhi! or nhanirdatha nganhi!, depending on whether you are male or female.

Note: Thanks to Greg Wilson and the Dieri Language Committee for sharing some of the materials and ideas in this blog post.

Waranha nhawurda?

Today’s comic talks about different relations:

Here is what the two characters (Thidnamara ‘Frog’ on the left, and Mawakantyi ‘Greedy’ on the right) are saying — to help understand them you might have a look back at this blog post and this blog post. For some of the dialogue listen to the recordings of Aunty Rene and Aunty Winnie below:

Thidnamara:	wardaru yini mawakantyi?
Mawakantyi:	matya nganhi manyu
Thidnamara:	waranha nhaniya?
Mawakantyi:	nhaniya ngakarni papa
Thidnamara:	waranha nhawurda?
Mawakantyi:	nhawurda ngakarni kaka
Mawakantyi:	nhawurdatha nganhi!

Listen to Aunty Rene and Aunty Winnie saying part of the dialogue:

nhaniya ngakarni papa

nhawurda ngakarni kaka

nhawurdatha nganhi!

In the next blog post we will look at the translation of this dialogue and also some ways it can be used in language learning activities, either by yourself or in a group, such as in a classroom.

Note: Thanks to Greg Wilson and the Dieri Language Committee for sharing their sound recordings.