The language reconciliation

By Leonie-Ruth Acland, senior advisor student equity    

8 May 2007: The Wiradjuri language is on move, primarily because of the work of a Wiradjuri Elder Stan Grant. In my first conversation with Stan I learnt that language does not belong to people, it belongs to country.  For the Wiradjuri people it is therefore disrespectful to speak other languages in Wiradjuri country. It goes without saying then that there has been a lot of disrespect (sometimes unknowingly) perpetuated over generations of white colonial hegemony in Wiradjuri country.

Stan Grant has spent the last 20 years (in conjunction with Dr John Rudder) working on a dictionary and a grammar of the Wiradjuri language. A corollary of this initiative has been the development of a staged series of language learning materials for the Wiradjuri language. In his retirement Stan now teaches Wiradjuri to an incredibly diverse collection of people throughout the western region of NSW including groups in several jails, many primary schools, high schools and TAFE colleges.

I have spent much of my adult life as both a language learner and a language teacher and so was delighted to be invited by the Ngunnawal Centre to sit in on the tutorial group of Indigenous History and Self Expression which Stan addressed here at UC on Friday 20 April. Terry Williams introduced Stan to the class and he did so in his own Gamilaraay (Kamilaroi) language, giving us the direct translation "the clever man who has come to teach us".

Indeed Stan Grant is a clever man and well did he teach.

Phonetically Wiradjuri is quite a tongue twister for English speakers because it uses many sounds which we don't use in English. The two hours of tutorial time was a mixture of tough language learning interwoven with stories. We worked as a class and in pairs on simple questions and responses, practised greetings and were drilled in an initial vocabulary list which we were then tested on at the end of the session.

In true oral history tradition Stan kept us enthralled as he passed on stories which gave us a small window of understanding into Wiradjuri culture, stories about Baiame, the Creator, and stories about initiation. He also generously shared experiences from his youth growing up under the tutelage of his grandfather and Wiradjuri Elders.

With Reconciliation Week coming up at the end of May (27 May-3 June) and Sorry Day on 26 May it is a timely reminder of the critical importance of the life giving relationship between language, culture, and identity. The relationship which for far too many Indigenous Australians has been ripped apart and in may cases irretrievably lost because those who know the language and culture have long since died.

What I encountered in the Indigenous Studies minor unit tutorial class last Friday was an extraordinary story teller and language teacher who is making a positive contribution reconciling the language and culture of the Wiradjuri for us all to access. His message was full of hope:

Language is coming back: culture is not lost.

If Reconciliation is to be more that just a word bandied about once a year in a feel good fashion there needs to be immediate and measurable increases in public and private respect for Indigenous culture. One way to do that is to make and take the opportunity to learn an Indigenous language. The University Library has Wiradjuri language dictionary as one of its resources.

Perhaps as part of the University of Canberra Reconciliation Action Plan and in alignment with the leadership role the University aspires to in the Australian Capital Region we could teach Wiradjuri language here at the University of Canberra?

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• Read last week's column by student Wayne Applebee
  Is reconciliation a lost cause?