Pertame language
{{distinguish|text=Lower Southern Arrernte (Lower Arrernte)}}
{{short description|Threatened Australian Aboriginal language}}
{{use Australian English|date=June 2019}}
{{use dmy dates|date=June 2019}}
{{Infobox language
| name = Pertame
| altname = Southern Arrernte, Southern Aranda
| nativename = {{lang|mis|Pertame}}
| region = South-Eastern Northern Territory, along the Finke River
| speakers = <20
| familycolor = Australian
| fam1 = Pama–Nyungan
| fam2 = Arandic
| fam3 =
| iso3 = none
| glotto = pert1234
| glottorefname =
| aiatsis = C46
| states = Australia
| date = 2018
}}
Pertame, also known as Southern Arrernte or Southern Aranda, is an Arandic language (but not of the Arrernte language group) from the country south of Alice Springs, along the Finke River, north and north-west of the location inhabited by speakers of Lower Arrernte.{{Cite web | title = Lower Arrernte | website = Mobile Language Team | url = http://www.mobilelanguageteam.com.au/languages/lower_arrernte | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20180930012019/http://www.mobilelanguageteam.com.au/languages/lower_arrernte | archive-date = 30 September 2018 | access-date = 15 June 2019 | url-status = live }} Ethnologue classes Pertame as a variant name for Lower Southern, but other sources vary in their classifications and descriptions of this language.
Language revival
With only 20 fluent speakers left by 2018,{{cite news|title=To save a dying language|publisher=Alice Springs News Online|date=23 May 2019|url=http://www.alicespringsnews.com.au/2018/05/23/to-save-a-dying-language/|accessdate=9 June 2019}} the Pertame Project is seeking to retain and revive the language, headed by Pertame elder Christobel Swan.{{cite web|title=Pertame Project|website=Call for Australian languages and linguistics|url=https://call.batchelor.edu.au/project/pertame-southern-arrernte/|accessdate=9 June 2019}}
{{as of|2020}}, Pertame is one of 20 languages prioritised as part of the Priority Languages Support Project, being undertaken by First Languages Australia and funded by the Department of Communications and the Arts. The project aims to "identify and document critically-endangered languages — those languages for which little or no documentation exists, where no recordings have previously been made, but where there are living speakers".{{cite web|website=First Languages Australia|url=https://www.firstlanguages.org.au/projects/plsp|title=Priority Languages Support Project|access-date=13 January 2020}}
Speakers
Renowned artist Erlikilyika (Jim Kite) was a Pertame speaker.{{Cite journal |last=Gibson |first=Jason |date=July 2015 |title=Central Australian Songs: A History and Reinterpretation of their Distribution through the Earliest Recordings |url=https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/ocea.5084 |journal=Oceania |language=en |volume=85 |issue=2 |pages=165–182 |doi=10.1002/ocea.5084 |issn=0029-8077|url-access=subscription }}{{Citation |last=Mulvaney |first=D. J. |title=Erlikilyika (1865–1930) |work=Australian Dictionary of Biography |url=https://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/erlikilyika-12904 |access-date=2024-09-14 |place=Canberra |publisher=National Centre of Biography, Australian National University |language=en}}
References
{{reflist}}
{{Pama–Nyungan languages|Central}}
Category:Endangered indigenous Australian languages in the Northern Territory
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