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National survey of languages to strengthen Indigenous culture

Media Release
Senator Amanda Vanstone
Minister for Immigration and Multicultural and Indigenous Affairs
Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for Reconciliation

22 June 2004 - Minister for Indigenous Affairs, Senator Amanda Vanstone, today announced a major investment in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander culture, through an online and community survey of Indigenous languages.

'Knowledge of the languages of parents and grandparents helps create a powerful sense of heritage and identity,' Senator Vanstone said.

'In Indigenous society, strong community languages are important elements in shaping social and individual well-being.

'Today there is only a handful of Indigenous languages that might be described as strong - that is, understood by all age groups. Prior to European settlement there may have been as many as 250 Indigenous languages spoken throughout Australia.'

The Government has allocated $250 000 for a National Indigenous Languages Survey which will:

• determine the health of Indigenous languages - identifying where they are gaining in strength or being eroded
• identify community needs
• identify best practice among existing language support programs.

'I am pleased that the Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies successfully tendered for the contract and will work closely with the Federation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Languages (FATSIL.) Survey teams will visit a range of communities for consultations and data collection.

'The survey document is now available on the AIATSIS, FATSIL and ATSIC websites. I urge all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians to participate in this survey so as to provide the most accurate report possible on the state of our country's Indigenous languages.'

Source: Minister for Indigenous affairs

National Indigenous Language Survey

Background

This survey is being run by the Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies (AIATSIS) and the Federation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Languages (FATSIL) under contract to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Services (ATSIS).

The survey is being done to collect information on the current state of Aboriginal and Tores Strait Islander languages. This information will be used to write a report to ATSIS which will identify languages and numbers of speakers, review existing research, primary source materials and other language resource materials, and provide recommendations where languages may be considered to be endangered. The survey and report will be finalised by September 2004.

It is important that this survey collects accurate information from as many different sources as possible. For this reason we ask people to take the time to fill in the forms and tell us about their languages.

Doing the Survey

The personal information collected in part A of this survey will only be seen by FATSIL, ATSIS and AIATSIS, and will not be given out to any other person or organisation. If you want to fill out the form but don't want to put your name on it, that is okay, although we would like to have the other personal information filled in. The information collected in sections B--E will be entered into the Indigenous Languages Database, and may be seen by other people. All parts of the survey are optional and may be skipped over if desired.

It is assumed that if you begin the survey and enter information, then you are giving ATSIS and AIATSIS permission to use the information you enter (apart from the personal information) for the purposes of the survey, which might include putting the information onto a website.

You may stop the survey at any time, and the information will be saved and you will be able to return to it at a later time.

At the end of the language section there is a option to allow you to enter information on a second (or third, fourth or fifth) language.

There are two forms that can be downloaded and filled out if you want to give more detailed information about a collection of language resources. They may be downloaded from the resource section of the survey and the End page.

Thank you,
ATSIS, AIATSIS and FATSIL

The survey team can be contacted at:
FATSIL:
Phone: (07) 3846 3738
Email: carolyn@e-soup.net

Or

AIATSIS:
Phone: (02) 6246-1166
Email: nils@aiatsis.gov.au
Postal: NILS
AIATSIS
GPO Box 553
Canberra ACT 2601

Source: Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies (AIATSIS)

related links :

• National Indigenous Language Survey
• Federation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Languages (FATSIL.)

Further information: culture issues page - includes news index and external links