Galali language

Kullili (also Kullilla or Galali) is an Australian Aboriginal language.

The Kullili (Galali) people were an important group who occupied an area of Australia from about Thargomindah in south-west Queensland, southward to the Currawinya Lakes, and west to Bulloo Lakes and north to Norley Station.

The Kullili (Galali) language was collated by Gavin Breen from a remaining speaker named Charlie Phillips.

The descendents of the Kullili (Galali) speakers mostly live in Brisbane, Cherbourg (the old Aboriginal Mission), and small New South Wales and Queensland towns such as Bourke, Thargomindah, Cunnamulla, and Charleville.

Galali is one of the dialects of what linguist Gaven Breen has called the ‘Wilson River Language’. Galali has also been referred to as the ‘Bulloo River Language’, and strong similarities occur with ‘Wankumara’, ‘Thiraila’, ‘Mambangura’, and ‘Bunthamara’.

Breen pointed out that some groups in southwest Queensland had abandoned their original languages (but not their names) and adopted the ‘Wilson River Language’ in the early days of Australian settlement when people moved from Thargomindah to Nockatunga (near the modern town of Noccundra).

The informant Charlie Phillips aged 74 years, born at Backwood Station south of Hungerford in southwest Queensland, spoke the language fluently and confidently despite having not used the language conversationally for 40 years.

General characteristics

Wankamara (Galali) is entirely suffixing and morphologically fairly simple having the following word classes: nominal (noun and pronoun), verb, particle, and interjection. The word order is random and free. The phonemes consist of three vowels and 26 consonants.