Ngaatjatjarra dialect

Ngaatjatjarra (also Ngaatjatjara, Ngaadadjarra) is an Australian Aboriginal dialect of the Western Desert language. It is spoken in the Western Desert cultural bloc which covers about 600,000 square kilometres of the central and central-western desert.

Ngaatjatjarra
Nga:da
Region	Western Australia
Ethnicity	Ngaatjatjarra
Native speakers	(989 cited 1996)[1]
Language family	Pama–Nyungan Wati Western Desert Ngaatjatjarra
Signed forms	Ngada Sign Language
Language codes
ISO 639-3	–
Glottolog	None
AIATSIS[1]	A43
ELP	Ngaatjatjara

It is very similar to its close neighbours Ngaanyatjarra, Pitjantjatjara and Pintupi, with which it is highly mutually intelligible.

Most Ngaatjatjarra live in the communities of Warburton, Warakurna, Tjukurla or Kaltukatjara.

Name

The name Ngaatjatjarra derives from the word ngaatja 'this' which, combined with the comitative suffix -tjarra means something like 'ngaatja-having'. This distinguishes it from its near neighbour Ngaanyatjarra which has ngaanya for 'this'.

Phonology

Vowels

Orthography is in brackets.

	Front	Back
High	i ⟨i⟩ iː ⟨ii⟩	ʊ ⟨u⟩ uː ⟨uu⟩
Low	a ⟨a⟩ aː ⟨aa⟩

Sign language

The Ngaatjatjarra have (or had) a signed form of their language,^[2] though it is not clear from records that it was particularly well-developed compared to other Australian Aboriginal sign languages.^[3]