Kunjen is a Paman language

Paman languages

The Paman languages are an Australian language family spoken on the Cape York Peninsula of Queensland. First noted by Kenneth Hale, Paman is noteworthy for the profound phonological changes which have affected some of its descendants.- Classification :...

 spoken on the Cape York Peninsula

Cape York Peninsula

Cape York Peninsula is a large remote peninsula located in Far North Queensland at the tip of the state of Queensland, Australia, the largest unspoilt wilderness in northern Australia and one of the last remaining wilderness areas on Earth...

 of Queensland

Queensland

Queensland is a state of Australia, occupying the north-eastern section of the mainland continent. It is bordered by the Northern Territory, South Australia and New South Wales to the west, south-west and south respectively. To the east, Queensland is bordered by the Coral Sea and Pacific Ocean...

, Australia

Australia

Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

, by the Uw Olkola and Uw Oykangand people

Uw Oykangand people

The Uw Oykangand are an Australian people living on the southwestern part of the Cape York Peninsula, Queensland in Australia. Their traditional lands are around the Alice River, Queensland and the Crosbie River, and further west around the Mitchell River and into Gulf Country...

. The two dialects, Uw Olkola and Uw Oykangand, are very close, being mutually intelligible

Mutual intelligibility

In linguistics, mutual intelligibility is recognized as a relationship between languages or dialects in which speakers of different but related languages can readily understand each other without intentional study or extraordinary effort...

 and sharing 97% of their core vocabulary

Vocabulary

A person's vocabulary is the set of words within a language that are familiar to that person. A vocabulary usually develops with age, and serves as a useful and fundamental tool for communication and acquiring knowledge...

.

A small dictionary

Dictionary

A dictionary is a collection of words in one or more specific languages, often listed alphabetically, with usage information, definitions, etymologies, phonetics, pronunciations, and other information; or a book of words in one language with their equivalents in another, also known as a lexicon...

 of Kunjen has been compiled by Philip Hamilton.

Respect register

As in many other Australian languages, such as Dyirbal

Dyirbal language

Dyirbal is an Australian Aboriginal language spoken in northeast Queensland by about 5 speakers of the Dyirbal tribe. It is a member of the small Dyirbalic branch of the Pama–Nyungan family...

, Kunjen also has a respect register

Avoidance speech

Avoidance speech, or "mother-in-law languages", is a feature of many Australian Aboriginal languages and some North American languages and Bantu languages of Africa whereby in the presence of certain relatives it is taboo to use everyday speech style, and instead a special speech style must be...

, which is a polite way of speaking with a potential mother-in-law and is called Olkel-Ilmbanhthi. Most of the vocabulary is replaced, while affix

Affix

An affix is a morpheme that is attached to a word stem to form a new word. Affixes may be derivational, like English -ness and pre-, or inflectional, like English plural -s and past tense -ed. They are bound morphemes by definition; prefixes and suffixes may be separable affixes...

es and function words are kept.

The sentence below is in normal Uw Oykangand:

Alka-nhdh idu-rr ay

spear- spear- I

"I speared it with a spear"

The equivalent in Olkel-Ilmbanhthi is:

Udnga-nhdh yanganyunyja-rr ay

spear- spear- I

"I speared it with a spear"

Vowels

Kunjen has 5 vowel

Vowel

In phonetics, a vowel is a sound in spoken language, such as English ah! or oh! , pronounced with an open vocal tract so that there is no build-up of air pressure at any point above the glottis. This contrasts with consonants, such as English sh! , where there is a constriction or closure at some...

s:

	Front Front vowel A front vowel is a type of vowel sound used in some spoken languages. The defining characteristic of a front vowel is that the tongue is positioned as far in front as possible in the mouth without creating a constriction that would be classified as a consonant. Front vowels are sometimes also...	Back Back vowel A back vowel is a type of vowel sound used in spoken languages. The defining characteristic of a back vowel is that the tongue is positioned as far back as possible in the mouth without creating a constriction that would be classified as a consonant. Back vowels are sometimes also called dark...
	Unrounded	Rounded
Close Close vowel A close vowel is a type of vowel sound used in many spoken languages. The defining characteristic of a close vowel is that the tongue is positioned as close as possible to the roof of the mouth without creating a constriction that would be classified as a consonant.This term is prescribed by the...	i	u
Mid Close-mid vowel A close-mid vowel is a type of vowel sound used in some spoken languages. The defining characteristic of a close-mid vowel is that the tongue is positioned two-thirds of the way from a close vowel to a mid vowel...	e	o
Open Open vowel An open vowel is defined as a vowel sound in which the tongue is positioned as far as possible from the roof of the mouth. Open vowels are sometimes also called low vowels in reference to the low position of the tongue...	a

There is a lexical vowel harmony

Vowel harmony

Vowel harmony is a type of long-distance assimilatory phonological process involving vowels that occurs in some languages. In languages with vowel harmony, there are constraints on which vowels may be found near each other....

 constraint in Kunjen: Close and mid vowels do not co-occur in a word.

Consonants

Kunjen has 27 consonant

Consonant

In articulatory phonetics, a consonant is a speech sound that is articulated with complete or partial closure of the vocal tract. Examples are , pronounced with the lips; , pronounced with the front of the tongue; , pronounced with the back of the tongue; , pronounced in the throat; and ,...

s:

Peripheral Peripheral consonant In Australian linguistics, the peripheral consonants are a natural class encompassing consonants articulated at the extremes of the mouth: bilabials and velars. That is, they are the non-coronal consonants...		Laminal Laminal consonant A laminal consonant is a phone produced by obstructing the air passage with the blade of the tongue, which is the flat top front surface just behind the tip of the tongue on the top. This contrasts with apical consonants, which are produced by creating an obstruction with the tongue apex only...		Apical Apical consonant An apical consonant is a phone produced by obstructing the air passage with the apex of the tongue . This contrasts with laminal consonants, which are produced by creating an obstruction with the blade of the tongue .This is not a very common distinction, and typically applied only to fricatives...
Bilabial Bilabial consonant In phonetics, a bilabial consonant is a consonant articulated with both lips. The bilabial consonants identified by the International Phonetic Alphabet are:...	Velar Velar consonant Velars are consonants articulated with the back part of the tongue against the soft palate, the back part of the roof of the mouth, known also as the velum)....	Palatal Palatal consonant Palatal consonants are consonants articulated with the body of the tongue raised against the hard palate...	Dental	Alveolar Alveolar consonant Alveolar consonants are articulated with the tongue against or close to the superior alveolar ridge, which is called that because it contains the alveoli of the superior teeth...	Retroflex Retroflex consonant A retroflex consonant is a coronal consonant where the tongue has a flat, concave, or even curled shape, and is articulated between the alveolar ridge and the hard palate. They are sometimes referred to as cerebral consonants, especially in Indology...
Plosive	Voiceless Voiceless In linguistics, voicelessness is the property of sounds being pronounced without the larynx vibrating. Phonologically, this is a type of phonation, which contrasts with other states of the larynx, but some object that the word "phonation" implies voicing, and that voicelessness is the lack of...	p /p/	k /k/	ch /c/	th /t̪/	t /t/
	Voiced Voice (phonetics) Voice or voicing is a term used in phonetics and phonology to characterize speech sounds, with sounds described as either voiceless or voiced. The term, however, is used to refer to two separate concepts. Voicing can refer to the articulatory process in which the vocal cords vibrate...	b /b/	g /g/	j /ɟ/	dh /d̪/	d /d/
Nasal Nasal consonant A nasal consonant is a type of consonant produced with a lowered velum in the mouth, allowing air to escape freely through the nose. Examples of nasal consonants in English are and , in words such as nose and mouth.- Definition :...	Plain	m /m/	ng /ŋ/	ny /ɲ/	nh /n̪/	n /n/
	Prestopped	bm /ᵇm/	gng /ᶢŋ/	jny /ᶡɲ/	dnh /ᵈ̪n̪/	dn /ᵈn/
Trill Trill consonant In phonetics, a trill is a consonantal sound produced by vibrations between the articulator and the place of articulation. Standard Spanish <rr> as in perro is an alveolar trill, while in Parisian French it is almost always uvular....						rr /r/
Approximant Approximant consonant Approximants are speech sounds that involve the articulators approaching each other but not narrowly enough or with enough articulatory precision to create turbulent airflow. Therefore, approximants fall between fricatives, which do produce a turbulent airstream, and vowels, which produce no...	Central	w /w/		y /j/			r /ɻ/
	Lateral Lateral consonant A lateral is an el-like consonant, in which airstream proceeds along the sides of the tongue, but is blocked by the tongue from going through the middle of the mouth....			ly /ʎ/	lh /l̪/	l /l/