Introduction to the Marranunggu Language

Throughout the First Languages Australia Project, Angolmi Director, Dr Payi Linda Ford, has led a small group of Mak Mak Marranunggu speakers to document Marranunggu. She has taught her family the language, and she has worked with the Marranunggu community on language education issues. She has interacted with people in Humpty Doo, Girraween, Canberra, Melbourne, and Darwin regions. But she and her family live in Darwin and have not always had the opportunity to engage face-to-face with other Marranunggu speakers. Some speakers live up to 10 hours’ drive from Darwin in the dry season and their small remote communities are not accessible during the wet season. Marranunggu language work and cultural knowledge succession is an ongoing project and a cultural responsibility.

The Mak Mak Marranunggu Calendar

In collaboration with her family, Dr Ford has developed the Mak Mak Marranunggu Calendar, a Marranunggu language poster, which depicts the local seasons through a traditional lens.

For more information on the four Mak Mak Marranunggu seasons, please see additional information below.

  • January, February and March

    This is part of the wet season, and it starts when the long yam leaf goes yellow.

  • April, May and June

    This is the ‘Winter’ harvest time. On our Country, it is the best time to harvest long yam.

  • July, August and September

    This is our ‘Spring’. It is signalled by all of the beautiful bush flowers.

  • October, November and December

    This season is hot, so hot that locals often describe their feet ‘baking’ on the ground.