Noongar: Difference between revisions

The '''Noongar''' ({{IPAc-en|ˈ|n|ʊ|ŋ|ɑr}}, also spelt '''Noongah''', '''Nyungar''' {{IPAc-en|ˈ|n|j|ʊ|ŋ|ɑr}}, '''Nyoongar''', '''Nyoongah''', '''Nyungah''', '''Nyugah''', and '''Yunga'''{{sfn|SWAL&SC}} {{IPAc-en|ˈ|j|ʊ|ŋ|ɑː}}) are [[Aboriginal Australian]] peoplespeople who live in the [[South West, Western Australia|south-west corner]] of [[Western Australia]], from [[Geraldton, Western Australia|Geraldton]] on the west coast to [[Esperance, Western Australia|Esperance]] on the south coast. There are 14 different groups in the Noongar cultural bloc: [[Amangu]], [[Ballardong]], [[Yued]], [[Kaneang]], [[Koreng]], [[Mineng]], [[Njakinjaki]], [[Njunga]], [[Pibelmen]], [[Pindjarup]], [[Wadandi]], [[Whadjuk]], [[Wiilman]] and [[Wudjari]].{{efn|Contemporary usage tends to aggregate these into three major sub-identities: (1) the Wardandi of the coastal zone from Augusta to Bunbury; (2) the Pindjarup (Binjarub) from north Bunbury to Mandurah and Pinjarra, both coastally and inland; and (3) the Perth metropolitan and surrounding area's Whadjuk.{{sfn |Allbrook |2014 |p=146 |loc=n. 4 }}}} The Noongar people refer to their land as {{lang|nys|Noongar boodja}}.{{efn|''Boodja'', sometimes spelt ''Boodjar'', is the [[Nyungar language|Noongar]] word for "country".}}<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.noongarculture.org.au/connection-to-country/|title=Connection to Country|publisher=South West Aboriginal Land & Sea Council|work=Kaartdijin Noongar – Noongar Knowledge|access-date=2 April 2022}}</ref>

The members of the collective Noongar [[cultural bloc]] descend from peoplespeople who spoke several languages and dialects that were often [[Mutual intelligibility|mutually intelligible]].{{cn|date=January 2023}} What is now classedclassified as the [[Noongar language]] is a member of the large [[Pama–Nyungan languages|Pama–Nyungan]] language family. Contemporary Noongar speak [[Australian Aboriginal English]] (a dialect of the English language) laced with Noongar words and occasionally inflected by its grammar. Most contemporary Noongar trace their ancestry to one or more of these groups. In the 2011 Australian census, 10,549 personspeople identified as indigenous in the south-west of Western Australia.<ref>{{Cite web |title=2011 South-Western WA, Census Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander people QuickStats {{!}} Australian Bureau of Statistics |url=https://www.abs.gov.au/census/find-census-data/quickstats/2011/IREG507 |access-date=2023-11-24 |website=www.abs.gov.au}}</ref> By 2021, this number had increased to 14,355.<ref>{{Cite web |title=2021 South-Western WA, Census Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander people QuickStats {{!}} Australian Bureau of Statistics |url=https://www.abs.gov.au/census/find-census-data/quickstats/2021/IREG507 |access-date=2023-11-24 |website=www.abs.gov.au}}</ref>

At the time of European settlement, it is believed that the peoples of what became the Noongar community spoke thirteen dialects, of which five still have speakers with some living knowledge of their respective versions of the language.{{sfn|LOTM|2000}} No speakers use it over the complete range of everyday speaking situations, and the full resources of the language are available only to a few individuals.{{sfn|Henderson|2013|p=58}}

The Noongar peoples have six [[season]]s whose time frame is defined by specific observable changes to the environment, with a dry period varying from as few as three to as many as eleven months.{{sfn|Nayton|2011|p=12}}{{efn|The contemporary Noongar calendar divides the year into six seasons: {{lang|nys|Binak}} (December–January): {{lang|nys|Bunuru}} (February–March); {{lang|nys|Djeran}} (April–May), {{lang|nys|Makuru}}; {{lang|nys|Djilba}} and {{lang|nys|Kambarang}}.{{sfn |Ryan |2013 |p=123}} }} Tribes are spread over three different geological systems: the coastal plains, the plateau, and the plateau margins; all areas are characterized by relatively infertile soil. The north is characterized by casuarina, acacia, and melaleuca thickets, and the south by mulga scrubland, but it also supportedsupports dense forest stands. Several rivers run to the coast, and with lakes and wetlands provided the Noongar people with their distinctive food and vegetation resources.{{sfn|Nayton|2011|pp=12–13}}

Generally, Noongar made a living by hunting and trapping a variety of game, including kangaroos, [[Phalangeriformes|possums]] and wallabies; for people close to the coastal zone or riverine systems, spear-fishing or culling fish in traps was customary. An extensive range of [[bush tucker|edible wild plants]] were also available, including yams and [[Acacia|wattle]] seeds. Nuts of the [[zamia palm]], eaten during the ''Djeran'' season (April–May){{sfn|Ryan|2013|p=123}} required extensive treatment to remove itstheir [[toxicity]], and for women, itthey may have had a contraceptive effect.{{citation needed|date=July 2019}} As early as 10,000 [[Before Present|BP]] local people utilised [[quartz]], replacing [[chert]] flint for spear and knife edges when the chert deposits were submerged by sea level rise during the [[Flandrian transgression]].{{citation needed|date=August 2017}}

Initially, relations were generally cordial. [[Matthew Flinders]] recognizedrecognised the success of his three-week sojourn as due in good part to Noongar diplomacy, and Noongar rituals celebrated their reception of the newcomers in a ceremonial form.{{efn|"The south-west corner of Western Australia provides a rare and celebrated instance of harmonious interaction that had lasting consequences. In King George Sound, explorers and early colonists owed the success of their missions to Nyungar traditions of diplomacy and hospitality. In 1803, Matthew Flinders had his marines perform a military salute to honour the Nyungar for their assistance over a three-week rest period (White 1980). For at least half a century or longer, the Nyungar would enact a variation of this ceremony, with Aboriginal men assembled in rows, military-style, with white pipe clay and red crosses painted on their chests, with sticks as guns — mimicking the 'redcoats'. By the early 1900s, however, this branch of the Nyungar clan had become extinct, victims of colonial expansion from the Swan River penal settlement and also of introduced diseases."{{sfn |McIntosh |2008 |p=175 }} }} When settlement became more firmly established, however, misunderstandings over the obligations of reciprocity – somereciprocity—some of the most productive land was being taken, especially on the Upper Swan – ledSwan—led to sporadic clashes. An example of such misunderstandings was the Noongar land-management practice of setting fires in early summer, mistakenly seen as an act of hostility by the settlers. Conversely, the Noongar saw the settlers' livestock as fair game to replace the dwindling stocks of native animals shot indiscriminately by settlers.{{citation needed|date=August 2017}} The only area that successfully resisted the usurpation of native land for any time was the area around the [[Murray River (Western Australia)|Murray River]], which effectively blocked expansion of the tiny settlement at [[Mandurah]] for almost half a decade.{{sfn|Nayton|2011|p=16}}

In June 1832, a Whadjuk leader,{{sfn|Allbrook|2014|p=49}} [[Yagan]], formerly of good standing among the settler authorities and known in the colony for his handsome bearing, "tall, slender, well-fashioned..of pleasing countenance", was, together with his father [[Midgegooroo]] and brother Monday, declared an outlaw after undertaking a series of food raids and a retaliatory murder. Caught and imprisoned, he escaped and was let alone, as though informally reprieved as a native version of [[William Wallace]].{{sfn|Seal|2011|p=70}}{{efn|Yagan's brother Monday later deposed that their resistance stemmed from the many deaths the Whadjuk had suffered, and their loss of access to elementary means of survival. "He stated that the number of men belonging to his tribe that were killed several times since we came to the settlement to be 16. Gave a most particular catalogue of the names, places & manner of death, & by whom killed, whether by soldier or otherwise. He complained greatly of our encroachments and interference; that they were straightened for subsistence, treated with rudeness, & prevented from walking with liberty in their own country."{{sfn |Wilson |2017 |p=115 }} }} His father was caught, and killed without trial by a military firing squad. Yagan himself, with a bounty on his head, was ambushed soon afterwards by an 18-year-old settler youth,{{sfn|Allbrook|2014|p=49}} after he had stopped two settlers and asked for flour.{{sfn|Seal|2011|p=70}} His corpse was decapitated, and the head was sent to England for display in fairgrounds.{{efn|Yagan's head was returned and given proper burial in 2010,{{sfn |Seal |2011 |p=70 }} 177 years after his death.{{sfn|AAP|AG|2010}} }} Yagan is now considered a Noongar hero,{{sfn|Seal|2011|p=70}} by many to have been one of the first indigenous [[resistance movement|resistance]] fighters.{{sfn|Cormick|1997}} Matters escalated with conflicts between the settlement of [[Thomas Peel]] and the Pindjarup people, resulting in the [[Pinjarra massacre]]. Similarly, struggles with [[Ballardong]] people in the Avon Valley continued until violently suppressed by Lieutenant [[Henry William St Pierre Bunbury]]. Notwithstanding this violence, extraordinary acts of goodwill existed. In the same year, 1834, the Swan River Noongar couple, Migo and Molly Dobbin, alerted to the fact a European child had gone missing, covered {{convert|22|mi|km|order=flip}} in 10&nbsp;hours tracking his [[Spoor (animal)|spoors]], and saved him, at the point of death.{{sfn|Bedells|2010|p=18}}

From August 1838, ten Aboriginal prisoners were sent to [[Rottnest Island]] ({{lang-nys|Wadjemup}}, possibly meaning "place across the water"{{sfn |www.creativespirits.info}}). After a short period when both settlers and prisoners occupied the island, the [[Secretary of State for the Colonies|Colonial Secretary]] announced in June 1839 that the island would become a penal establishment for Aboriginal people and was officially designated as such in 1841.{{sfn|Bedells|2010|p=22}} From that time down tountil 1903, when the indigenous section was closed,{{sfn|Bedells|2010|p=24}} Rottnest Island was used as a prison to transfer Aboriginal prisoners "overseas". To "pacify" the Aboriginal population, men were rounded up and chained for offences ranging from spearing livestock, burning the bush, or digging vegetables on what had been their own land. It quickly became a "place of torment, deprivation and death",{{sfn|Bedells|2010|p=23}} and it has been estimated that there may be as many as 369 Aboriginal graves on the island, of which five were for prisoners who had been hanged. Except for a short period between 1849 and 1855, during which the prison was closed, some 3,700 Aboriginal men and boys, many of them Noongars, but also many others from all parts of the state, were imprisoned.{{sfn|Green|Moon|1997}}

A notable incident for the Noongar people in the Western Australian Colony was the arrival of [[Rosendo Salvado]] in 1846. Salvado was an advocate for the humane treatment of the Australian Aboriginals at the mission he created at [[New Norcia]], in the territory of the [[Yued]]. He provided refuge for the [[Njunga]] and he defended many on charges of theft, arguing from Churchchurch doctrine that theft was not criminal if dictated by dire necessity. While intent on converting, he encouraged the NoongarNoongars to maintain their traditional culture.{{sfn|Russo|1980}}

By 1915, 15% of Perth's Noongar had been thrust north and interned at the [[Moore River Native Settlement]].{{sfn|Ord|Mazzarol|2007|p=514}} Carrolup (later known as [[Marribank]]) became the home of up to one-third of the population. It is estimated that 10 to 25% of Noongar children were forcibly "adopted" during these years, in part of what has become known as the [[Stolen Generations]].{{sfn|Haebich|Delroy|1999}}

Noongar people live in many country towns throughout the south-west as well as in the major population centres of [[Perth]], [[Mandurah, Western Australia|Mandurah]], [[Bunbury, Western Australia|Bunbury]], [[Geraldton, Western Australia|Geraldton]], [[Albany, Western Australia|Albany]] and [[Esperance, Western Australia|Esperance]]. Many country Noongar people have developed long-standing relationships with non-Noongar farmers, and continue to hunt [[kangaroo]] and gather [[bush tucker]] (food) as well as to teach their children stories about the land. In a few areas in the south-west, visitors can go on [[bush tucker]] walks, trying foods such as [[kangaroo]], [[emu]], [[Santalum acuminatum|quandong]] jam or relish, [[bush tomato]]es, [[witchetty grub]] pâté and bush honey.

{{anchor|kodj}}The kodj ([[Noongar language|"to be hit on the head"]]) or kodja<ref name="au-archaeo-assoc/2014/10/Akerman">{{cite journal |last1=Akerman |first1=Kim |title=Observations on edge-ground stone hatchets with hafting modifications in Western Australia |publisher=[[Australian Archaeological Association]] |journal=Australian Archaeology |date=2014 |volume=79 |pages=137–145 |doi=10.1080/03122417.2014.11682030 |url=<!-- https://www.jstor.org/stable/24471323 -->https://www.australianarchaeologicalassociation.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/AA-TS_Akerman-CORRECT.pdf |access-date=28 July 2023 |issn=0312-2417 |jstor=24471323 |quote=flexible wood bent around the head and with the arms tied together with sinew or fibre cord to ... known as the kodj or kodja and restricted in distribution }}</ref> is a Noongar [[hafting|hafted]] [[axe]].<ref name="museum.wa.gov.au/kodj-axe">{{cite web |title=Kodj (axe) |url=http://museum.wa.gov.au/research/collections/aboriginal-western-australians/aboriginal-cultures-collection/kodj-axe |website=[[Western Australian Museum]] |access-date=28 July 2023 |language=en}}</ref><ref name="abc.net.au/102397920">{{cite web |title=Kodj |url=https://www.abc.net.au/education/first-weapons-kodj/102397920 |website=First Weapons |publisher=ABC Education |access-date=28 July 2023 |language=en-AU |date=27 June 2023}}</ref><ref name="00664677.2019.1706038">{{cite journal |last1=Carty |first1=John |title=To Imagine an Australian Museum |journal=Anthropological Forum |date=2 October 2019 |volume=29 |issue=4 |pages=384–396 |doi=10.1080/00664677.2019.1706038 |url=<!-- https://digital.library.adelaide.edu.au/dspace/handle/2440/123375 --><!-- https://www.vgls.vic.gov.au/client/en_AU/vgls/search/detailnonmodal/eds:$002f$002f1657660369$002f0$002fa9h$007c$007c141412040/ada/5800a895-b070-4c11-b693-4332f0fd6ddf.nw9eF$002bI49ggGXaC9NGd4Eg$003d$003d?qu=Australian+Museum.+Trust.&if=ee%09edsExpanderFacet%09fulltext&d=eds%3A%2F%2F1657660369%2F0%2Fa9h%7C%7C141412040%7E1657660369%7E1&ic=true&te=1657660369 -->https://content.ebscohost.com/cds/retrieve?content=AQICAHjIloLM_J-oCztr2keYdV8f1ibHmDucods679W_YPnffAHjO4SNalC1Lx1lx0yFbsQTAAAA4jCB3wYJKoZIhvcNAQcGoIHRMIHOAgEAMIHIBgkqhkiG9w0BBwEwHgYJYIZIAWUDBAEuMBEEDIg3_PgLgtxHNO6A1QIBEICBmp7wD6ps-j9GeSFjUg5erktP_b5NSM4bGiG-CUCIwy8MUDzjbmmu6vRInHQkYiEw-TxcL2m475Po5tUy-IqFL-K3jJR1E9B8LnXtlsWe7oWtKmMAKhbJ5J6QLB2Keg2QWxHi2KvGmy2pVAP7YI8HVaoWnUMFNrrw1YwK1s3d8MzBrAimUCg8JX6_gIP2QMhQB4a4bWtJz6bcCaM= |access-date=28 July 2023 |issn=0066-4677}}</ref><ref name="calendar-australia/weapon-aborigines">{{cite web |title=What was the weapon of choice for the Aborigines of Australia? |url=https://www.calendar-australia.com/faq/what-was-the-weapon-of-choice-for-the-aborigines-of-australia |website=calendar-australia.com |access-date=28 July 2023}}</ref> [[Kojonup, Western Australia]] and ''The Kodja Place'' visitor centercentre,<ref name="wa/kodja-place">

describes itself as the response to the Aboriginal Communitycommunity's need for positive self-enhancement through artistic expression. It is a theatre company that strives for community development and which also has the drive to create "exciting, authentic and culturally appropriate indigenous theatre".

* [[HistoryAustralian history wars]]

| url = httpshttp://ebooks.adelaide.edu.au/b/bates/daisy/passing/chapter3.html