Are urban kids learning Indigenous languages?

Abstract

Footprints in Time has interviewed over 1850 parents of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children in over a dozen sites around Australia. This presentation will use Wave 1 survey and qualitative data from the Longitudinal Study of Indigenous Children to explore the issue of Indigenous language loss and maintenance in urban and remote communities. There is a strong perception that Indigenous languages are only spoken in remote Indigenous communities. Looking at this data, we will be able to show whether this is true for the families who responded to our survey. Collectively, 101 different languages were spoken by respondents (primary carers of Indigenous children). The most commonly spoken languages were English, Kriol, Torres Strait Creole, Djambarrpuyngu and Kalaw Kawaw Ya. Of these 19% spoke two languages; 6% spoke three languages; 2% spoke four languages; and 1% spoke five or more languages. The presentation will relate to how Footprints in Time can contribute to the broader dialogue on a number of questions relating to language attitudes and language use: Which languages are being spoken by parents and learnt by children?; Are urban Indigenous children more likely to learn foreign languages than an Indigenous language?; Do certain activities or family relationships play a role in language maintenance?; How many families speak an Indigenous language as their main language?; How are Indigenous languages connected to identity?