What is our Indigenous language? There are more than 250 Indigenous Australian languages and 800 dialectal varieties.
Australia is not the same.
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Yes it is hard. But just like other countries they have made a universal one - i.e. China.
I never said Australia was. But Wales and to a less extend Ireland did bring back their first language after it was taken away.
China is a different story too.
Fair enough. I am quite aware there is differences. But just because it is different doesnāt mean it couldnāt be achieved. Nothing is ever going to be exactly the same. But you can use these as examples of it being possible. And just because something is hard doesnāt mean it shouldnāt be attempted. Yes, 250 variations of the language is a lot. But surely they could get the tribes together and discuss this. It would create jobs, a more inclusive Australia and would show respect to the indigenous culture. The one thing I loved most about New Zealand was the fact they had the Maori dialect on signs etc.
Again. Itās a completely different situation with New Zealand. There is one Maori language. Every country which has a second or third official language has a long tradition with that language.
I donāt see what getting 250 indigenous groups together achieves. You canāt just pick one as an official second language of Australia and forget the rest. It just doesnāt work that way.
The idea of having the traditional indigenous name of places on signs is a good idea and they do that already in some places. I agree Australia should show more respect to indigenous culture. It is something that makes Australia unique and interesting. Itās also something that would be interesting to tourists.
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You are just so negative Jbar.
There are ways around it. If a country wanted to teach an indigenous language that can make it work. Have 250 languages - if your school lands in that area that is the one schools can teach.
This country has one of the oldest cultures it should be respected more. Teaching more indigenous issues is just a start. With an attitude like yours āthings are too hard so donāt do itā the world will always be stuck in one place.
I know Indigenous educators who have gone to state ministers with ideas to create educational programs and they are the ones that have dismissed this. The issue is the government donāt care about the traditional Australians and they donāt care about education.
If the United Nations can bring together countries from around the world to resolve disputes I donāt see why you canāt bring together tribes from around Australia to workshop ideas. Putting something in the too hard basket never helps.
Iām not saying indigenous languages canāt or should not be taught in schools. Iām just saying you canāt just pick one as an official second language of Australia.
Thatās what we were discussing in the first place. A country like Canada can have French as a second language because they had French colonies there which became part of the country. Those people and their descendants were a large percentage of the population that spoke that language.
My point is that there is no large population of indigenous people on Australia who speak one particular language. There are actually more speakers of foreign languages here.
According to the 2016 Census, the Top 10 Languages Spoken in Australia after English are:
- Mandarin
- Arabic
- Cantonese
- Vietnamese
- Italian
- Greek
- Tagalog/Filipino
- Hindi
- Spanish
- Punjabi
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Iām almost tempted to make a Media Spy poll out of this.
The official language of Media Spy.
Contenders:
- Technobabble
- Goobleydook
- Rubbish
- Truth
- Other
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Relaunchish
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As I said I know some educators who went to parliament members in SA with an idea about this. But money talks. They had no interest whatsoever. I donāt know all the details of what they suggested but I donāt think it would be about picking one language to teach. And to be fair I donāt have a lot of education about the indigenous languages. I was only aware there were a lot. And I guess this is part of the issue in Australia, we donāt have a lot of education on our indigenous. I donāt even know if any of the languages have similarities, or if some of the tribes have unfortunately lost all their members and therefore that language is impossible to teach. This is why they should be educating Australians on it. And I know you donāt think they should be getting one from each tribe together but I think they should, to help workshop ideas on how to educate Australians on our indigenous to help with the respect.
Interestingly, theyāre the top 2 countries that Australians like to move to, apart from Australia.
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Bingo. The area between Sydney and Melbourne alone has dozens of different indigenous languages:
https://mgnsw.org.au/sector/aboriginal/aboriginal-language-map/
As for the self-determination of Indigenous Australians, this is beyond the scope of the discussion here, but I will note that Canada has a long way to go here too. Research the residential schools for First Nations in Canada; the similarities to our Stolen Generation are eerie.
Iām a bit surprised USA didnāt rate higher.
Iām not that surprised.
Many people wouldnāt want to live there because of the poor labour standards, lack of universal health care, high rate of crime/corruption and an inadequate social safety net. A very good number of Aussies wouldnāt like the politics, either. Theyāve got a conservative party and a crazy conservative party.
Itās just too unpredictable.
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Hit the nail on the head there @mubd. Though the crime rates have definitely improved overall since the 80s and 90s.
The power outages due to the incompetence of Pacific Gas & Electric in California are something Iād expect to occur in a third world country, not the US. For those that are unaware of the story, PG&E has neglected to maintain its transmission lines in bushfire prone areas, resulting in mass power cuts in the hope of preventing fires in extreme weather:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2019_California_power_shutoffs
(Yeah, itās a Wikipedia article, but a nice summary of the issue).
At least here in Australia, we cope with bushfire emergencies reasonably well given the extreme circumstances. Our RFS vollies are pretty amazing.
One of the 2013 bushfires in the Blue Mountains was started by a tree falling on power lines, but this was a pretty extreme fire day.
Also, China eastern airlines will launch non stop flights from Perth to shanghai in january 15 2020.
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ā¦for 5 weeks (3 times a week), as a trial.
Personally I donāt think thereās a strong chance of the service becoming permanent unless the state government throws them a really big bag of cash.
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SHanghai Is a target destination for Perth.
Recently, ANA has started Perth to Tokyo Narita Flights using a 787-8 Dreamliner year-round. Many Perth travellers want direct flights to tokyo (not having to stop over at Singapore or Hong Kong). Japan Airlines will Be on the cards for new flights to perth in 2020 and beyond.
Totally aware of this, but what youāre clearly not aware of is the fact that these flights are very much state government āsupportedā (Read: The WA state government compensated ANA and China Eastern to get these flights off the ground). Itās very much worth the investment, but it didnāt just happen because the airlines decided it was Perthās turn to get a direct flight.