In the Yugambeh language, the word yugambeh means an emphatic 'no', 'never' i.e. 'very much no' and is a common exonym for the people and their language. Language speakers use the word miban which means 'man', 'human', 'wedge-tailed eagle' and is the preferred endonym for the people; they call their language Mibanah meaning 'of man', 'of human', 'of eagle' (the -Nah suffix forming the genitive of the word miban).^{[7][8][3][4][9][10]}

Yugambeh may also be referred to as:

• Yugambir, Yugambeh (Yugambal/Yugumbal was evidently a separate language located further west^[11])
• Yubumbee
• Jugumbir, Jukamba^[12]
• Tweed-Albert language
• Nganduwal^[13]
• Ngarangwal^[7]
• Manaldjali (a variant of Mununjali, the name of a Yugambeh-speaking clan)
• Minjanbal (probably from Minjungbal, an alternate language term)^[14]

Yugambeh is spoken within the Logan, Albert, Coomera, Nerang, and Tweed River basins.^[7]

Linguists such as Margaret Sharpe, relying on the previous work of others like Terry Crowley, described the Yugambeh language as having potentially upwards of 7 dialects. Recent analysis has found errors in these original studies and when corrected for these errors, two mutually intelligible dialects can be found; a western (freshwater) variety and an eastern (saltwater) variety with minor vocabularic differences.^[6]

Some differences noted by linguist Shaun Davies:

Vowels edit

Yugambeh has a vowel system of four vowels that also contrast in length, resulting in eight phonemic vowels in total. The letter "h" is used after the vowel to indicate a long vowel.

Allophones edit

The low central vowel /a/ is fronted and raised between palatal consonants and a lateral/rhotic consonant.

Consonants edit

Compared to other Pama-Nyungan languages, Yugambeh has a smaller inventory of consonants. There are four places of articulation, with the consonants consisting of four obstruents, four nasals, two liquids, and two semivowels.

Obstruents

Obstruents do not have a voicing contrast, and can appear as fricative allophones. Obstruents are phonetically voiceless, except when following a homorganic consonant.^[15]

The grammar of the Yugambeh language is highly agglutinative, making use of over 50 suffixes on nouns, verbs, adjectives and demonstratives.

Syntax edit

Syntax in the Yugambeh language is fairly free ordered, with a tendency towards SOV (subject–object–verb) structures. Adjectives and demonstratives part of noun phrases e.g. that man, a red car, stay adjacent to the noun they qualify.^[16]

Noun morphology edit

Nouns take a number of suffixes to decline for grammatical case.

Suffixes edit

Noun suffixes are placed into ten orders. A noun may not take more than one suffix from any order, and if more than one suffix is attached they must always be in the set order of the suffix orders, e.g. an order 7 suffix must always come after an order 5 suffix.

'X' stands for a homorganic obstruent.

'N' stands for a homorganic nasals.

#The comitative, purposive, desiderative, ablative and aversive suffixes are preceded by -bah on animate nouns.^[17]

1. 1st order suffixes
   • -gali (typified by) – used to indicate an association or link
     • Examples:
       • Jinanggali 'shoe' lit. 'typified by foot'
       • Dubaygali 'womaniser' lit. 'typified by women'
2. 2nd order suffixes
   • -gan (feminine) – used to form feminine nouns and some astrological terms
     • Examples:
       • Yarabilngingan 'female singer'
3. 3rd order suffixes
   • -bur (diminutive) – used to form the diminutive of a noun, referring to a smaller version
     • Examples:
       • Baraganbur 'toy boomerang'
4. 4th order suffixes
   • -Nah (possessive) – indicates current possession
     • Examples:
       • Ngalingah 'our'
       • Gibamah 'of the moon/moon's'
   • -Nahjil (past possessive) – indicates past possession
     • Examples:
       • Bilinahjil 'was of the parrot' (Billinudgel)

Verb morphology edit

Verbs are conjugated with the use of suffixes. It is an aspect-dominant language, as opposed to tense-dominant like most Western languages. Yugambeh suffixes mostly conjugate for aspect and mood.

Suffixes edit

Verb suffixes are placed in six orders. A verb may not take more than one suffix from an order, and similar to nouns, suffixes are attached in a set order. Combinations of these suffixes express all possible conjugations of Yugambeh verbs, with only a small number of combinations possible. Yugambeh verb stems are commonly two syllables in length and always in a vowel.^[18]

Adjective morphology edit

Adjectives can be marked with a suffix to indicate the gender of the noun they qualify.^[17]

Suffixes edit

*N stands for a homorganic nasal.

Demonstratives edit

Yugambeh possesses a complicated set of demonstratives that make a three-way distinction, with proximal, medial, and distal sets. There is a further distinguishing of demonstrative adjectives and location demonstratives. The adjective set can be additionally suffixed to create demonstrative pronouns'. The adjective set has three forms for "things in sight", "things hidden or not in sight" and "things not there anymore", while the location set has forms to indicate the general area and definite area, whether in sight or not in sight, and past and present forms.^[19]

Adjective set edit

The above set can be suffixed with order 7 noun suffixes to form demonstrative pronouns that function like ordinary independent nouns. e.g. Yanindeh galini wungahbaia! 'Take this with you!'

The 'not in sight' and 'not here anymore' forms can take the order 2 noun suffix -gan to form time words. e.g. gunahgan 'recently'.

Location set edit

The Yugambeh Museum in Beenleigh currently maintains a free dictionary app for the Yugambeh language, available on Android,^[20] iOS^[21] and a desktop version.^[22]

Modern place names with roots in the Yugambeh language include:^[23]

• Billinudgel – from bilinahjil, 'was of the parrot'
• Canungra – from gungunga, 'a long flat or clearing'
• Coomera/Upper Coomera – from kumera, a species of wattle
• Jumpinpi – Pandanus root
• Mundoolun – from Mundheralgun, the local name for the Common death adder
• Nindooinbah – from ninduinba, 'the remains of a fire'
• Pimpama – from pimpimba, 'a place of soldier birds'
• Tabragalba – from dhaberigaba, 'a place of clubs'
• Tallebudgera – rotten or decayed logs
• Wongawallan – from the words wonga ('pigeon') and wallan ('water')

• Dictionary of Yugambeh Including Neighbouring Dialects, compiled by Margaret Sharpe, Pacific Linguistics: Australian National University, 1998. hdl:1885/145959 doi:10.15144/PL-C139

• Borobi and His Friends, virtual book, read in Yugambeh language by Axel Best. From the State Library of Queensland virtual book collection. (requires Adobe Flash)
• Linguist List (2005) Synopsis of Grammar and Texts of the Yugambeh-Bundjalung Dialect Chain in Eastern Australia Accessed 20 May 2008
• Yugambeh (South East Queensland - Logan, Gold Coast, Scenic Rim) Community Language Journey Digital Story, State Library of Queensland