Djapu a Yolngu dialect is a thorough treatment of Djapu by Frances Morphy, a trained linguist attached to the Australian National University (ANU) in Canberra. This is a chapter in a book called Handbook of Australia Languages, Volume 3, edited by R. M. W. Dixon and Barry J. Blake. The book was published in 1983 by the ANU Press, Canberra, ISBN 0 7081 1215 3.
This is a chapter for linguists really, as there are a lot of technical details and the terminology used is also strictly from the linguistics discipline. However, readers not trained or versed in linguistics will still benefit from this extensive coverage of Djapu... the few hurdles will be understanding the terminology used. You'll read about phonotactics, word-final consonant clusters, laminal assimilation, derivation of verbs from nominals, inflectional affixes, equational sentences, finite subordinate clauses, apposition, polar interrogatives etc. You get the picture...?
One nice touch to this chapter is the inclusion of text in Djapu, of simple sentences and also short stories. This is important as far as understanding how Yolngu construct their sentences and how they flow...
I read this book about 13 years ago when the internet was still new. These days you'll be able to google many of the linguistic terms that appear in the book which should enable you to grasp the workings of Djapu in no time
If you understand everything that is written in this chapter, 188 pages in all, you'll be well on your way to conversing with M*lk*y and other Djapu people!
Frances Morphy- any relation to Howard Morphy, the visual anthropologist from ANU?
