Yir-Yoront 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 in two settlements, Kowanyama

Kowanyama, Queensland

Kowanyama is a town on the Gulf of Carpentaria side of Cape York Peninsula in Far North Queensland, Australia.At the 2006 census, Kowanyama had a population of 1,017....

 and Pormpuraaw

Pormpuraaw, Queensland

Pormpuraaw is an Aboriginal community situated on the west coast of Cape York Peninsula approximately half way between Karumba and Weipa on the Edward River. It is by road from Cairns. Pormpuraaw currently has a 2-man police station...

 on the southwestern part of 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...

, 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...

 in 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 Yir-Yoront people

Yir-Yoront people

The Yir-Yoront are an Australian people living on the southwestern part of the Cape York Peninsula, Queensland in Australia, primarily in the two settlements Kowanyama and Pormpuraaw, having their foundations in the Mitchell River Mission and Edward River Missian, respectively...

. As of 1991 only 15 speakers remain, with the rest of the Yir-Yoront people speaking English

English language

English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...

 or even Kuuk Thaayorre

Kuuk Thaayorre language

Kuuk Thaayorre is a Paman language spoken in the settlement Pormpuraaw on the western part of the Cape York Peninsula, Queensland in Australia by the Thaayorre people. As of 2006, 250 of the 350 ethnic Thaayorre speak the language...

 as many speakers of Yir-Yoront apparently are using Kuuk Thaayorre in daily conversation. Together with Yirrk-Thangalkl

Yirrk-Thangalkl language

Yirrk-Thangalkl is a Paman language spoken on the southwestern part of the Cape York Peninsula, Queensland in Australia, by the Yirrk-Thangalkl people...

 it forms the group of Yir languages

Yir languages

The Yir languages are two languages spoken on the Cape York peninsula of Queensland, Australia. They are very closely related, and are therefore often mentioned as being sister dialects. The first part of both of the names, yir is from the word yirrq meaning speech or language, and the following is...

.

Names

Yir-Yoront is written hyphen

Hyphen

The hyphen is a punctuation mark used to join words and to separate syllables of a single word. The use of hyphens is called hyphenation. The hyphen should not be confused with dashes , which are longer and have different uses, or with the minus sign which is also longer...

ated as a way of indicating that the syllable following the hyphen is stressed. In the standard orthography

Orthography

The orthography of a language specifies a standardized way of using a specific writing system to write the language. Where more than one writing system is used for a language, for example Kurdish, Uyghur, Serbian or Inuktitut, there can be more than one orthography...

, it is correctly spelled Yirr-Yorront, with "rr" representing the consonant /r/. There is a valid alternative pronunciation with stress on the first syllable; this can be written YirrqYorront. Other spellings encountered include Yir Yoront and Jir Joront.

Other names for the language include:

• Yirr-Thuchm: Meaning "from the sandridges"
• Kok-Minychen: The name of the Yir-Yoront in the Koko-Bera language
  • Koko-Minychena: Alternative spelling
  • Kokomindjen: Alternative spelling
  • Mandjoen: Alternative spelling
  • Mind'jana: Alternative spelling
  • Mundjun: Alternative spelling
  • Myunduno: Alternative spelling
• Kuuk-Thaanhon: The name of the Yir-Yoront in the Kuuk Thaayorre language
  Kuuk Thaayorre language
  Kuuk Thaayorre is a Paman language spoken in the settlement Pormpuraaw on the western part of the Cape York Peninsula, Queensland in Australia by the Thaayorre people. As of 2006, 250 of the 350 ethnic Thaayorre speak the language...
  
  
• Gwandera: A name incorrectly applied to the Yir-Yoront people
  Yir-Yoront people
  The Yir-Yoront are an Australian people living on the southwestern part of the Cape York Peninsula, Queensland in Australia, primarily in the two settlements Kowanyama and Pormpuraaw, having their foundations in the Mitchell River Mission and Edward River Missian, respectively...
  
   and their language
• Millera: No source available

Vowels

Yir-Yoront has 6 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...	Central Central vowel A central vowel is a type of vowel sound used in some spoken languages. The defining characteristic of a central vowel is that the tongue is positioned halfway between a front vowel and a back vowel...	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	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
Close-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
Mid Mid vowel A mid vowel is a vowel sound used in some spoken languages. The defining characteristic of a mid vowel is that the tongue is positioned mid-way between an open vowel and a close vowel...		ə
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

Consonants

Yir-Yoront has 20 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:

	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:...	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...	Postalveolar Postalveolar consonant Postalveolar consonants are consonants articulated with the tongue near or touching the back of the alveolar ridge, further back in the mouth than the alveolar consonants, which are at the ridge itself, but not as far back as the hard palate...	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...	Palatal Palatal consonant Palatal consonants are consonants articulated with the body of the tongue raised against the hard palate...	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)....	Glottal Glottal consonant Glottal consonants, also called laryngeal consonants, are consonants articulated with the glottis. Many phoneticians consider them, or at least the so-called fricative, to be transitional states of the glottis without a point of articulation as other consonants have; in fact, some do not consider...
Plosive	p /p/	th /t̪/	t /t/		rt /ʈ/		k /k/	q /ʔ/
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 :...	m /m/	nh /n̪/	n /n/		rn /ɳ/	ny /ɲ/	ng /ŋ/
Affricate Affricate consonant Affricates are consonants that begin as stops but release as a fricative rather than directly into the following vowel.- Samples :...				ch /t͡ʃ/
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/
Tap			r /ɾ/
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...		lh /l̪/	l /l/		rl /ɭ/	y /j/	w /w/

Sign

The Yir Yoront had a developed sign

Australian Aboriginal sign languages

Many Australian Aboriginal cultures have or traditionally had a manually coded language, a sign-language counterpart of their spoken language. This appears to be connected with various speech taboos between certain kin or at particular times, such as during a mourning period for women or during...

 form of their language.

General

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.