Pidgin Ngarluma: An Indigenous Contact Language in North Western Australia

This paper discusses evidence of an early pidgin in use amongst Aboriginal people of the north west coast of Western Australia. The crucial evidence comes from an Italian manuscript describing the rescue, by local Aborigines, of two castaways wrecked on North West Cape in 1875. The data reveals that the local Aborigines attempted to communicate with the Italian-speaking survivors using what appears to be an Australian language spoken some 300 kilometers further along the coast, around the emerging center of the new Pilbara pearling industry. I present an analysis of the material, showing that it differs from Australian languages of the area in significant ways and can be considered a reduced variety. I conclude that this variety is an indigenous pidgin — the first to be described for Australia.