One of our star storytellers of 2019, Glen, has spent the last decade reviving his Australian Aboriginal ancestral language of Ngunawal. Language Party Canberra producer Jennifer Pinkerton sat down with Glen before and after the December show. Here, he shares more of his personal story – and reveals how telling a spoken story in Ngunawal proved transformative.

*Glen Freeman, photography by Jennifer Pinkerton*

BEFORE THE SHOW

Jen: Glen, your Aboriginal language, Ngunawal, has not been spoken live – as a fluent language, in a public setting – for 140 years. Tell us more about that.

Glen: The state of the language at the moment is that no one is out there speaking it. I coached [former Australian Prime Minister] Malcolm Turnbull in Ngunawal in 2016. Apart from this translation of an Acknowledgment of Country* I am the only person who has spoken the language in public.

Jen: And how is it that you came to have knowledge of the language? How did you work to bring the language back?

Glen: The push to bring the language back started with a number of Ngunawal blood family groups. We wanted to get it as authentic as possible, so we engaged some linguists to get us together. It’s 2019! This should be out there! This should be taught in schools!

We first got started, working to revive language, in 2011. Everyone started up enthusiastically. First thing we realised – and this came from working with the linguists – is that you need a writing system. So then we made one. We worked out consonants, and a set of vowels. From there, we could develop new words… if we wanted to.

We went through this process under the name of the Ngaiyuriidja Ngunawal Language Group so as we could protect the language from being stolen and mismanaged by people not from country, and of course, by those selfish people who would use it for their own reasons, as has happened with so much of our cultural lore over a period of decades now.

We had a heap of materials that came from a historian who lived with our people some time ago. He had made notes about our language. We had to sort through that material.

Some Ngunawal people started to drop off the project, which I guess was inevitable. They said it was too hard. They were older people.

Jen: What kept you going?

Glen: You just have to put up with being repetitive with it – and then you’ll get it.

There is no ending yet. My ending is that it will be there. The language will be there. You’ve got to keep the tenacity up! You’ve got to stay committed to the cause. To create the foundations of our language revival cost us, as a group, over $125,000 during the first year, for example. That funding did not come from AIATSIS (Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies).

Yes, we have it going now. We have a writing system. Do we want other people using the acknowledgment that Malcolm Turnbull used? We do.

It does need to be shared with community and with everyone, but only in the traditional way. My personal view is that it shouldn't be used at every opportunity, which just waters it down and then it loses its significance. And of course, in our lore, only women do the Acknowledgement and only men who do the Welcome.

*Ngunawal traditional custodian, Wally Bell, shares a Welcome to Country at Language Party Canberra, photography by Aishah Kenton*

Jen: Was hearing spoken Ngunawal part of your childhood?

Glen: Not in a fluent sense. I heard phrases and words from a mix of Aboriginal languages: Ngunawal, Wiradjuri, Yuin. We were lumped together in those reserves, and we were forbidden from speaking language and from practising cultural ways. We were part of a mixed group who camped over the back of Oak Hill in Yass, NSW. The group was defiant of authorities. This was in the 1950s and 60s.

We had to walk on our side of the street. I had an uncle who got pulled up every time he came back to Yass. He was arrested and told to go away. Mum was outspoken, and maybe even an activist, I am told.

We still practiced the old culture. 1962, when I was eight years old, that was the last time there was a ceremonial corroboree in Banjo Patterson Park. I remember a covert ceremonial happening, too. There were Ngunawal, Wiradjuri, Yuin – mixed people, from as far away as the Northern Territory and North Queensland.

We remembered words, but as it turns out, these were words from other languages. We started piecing together things from historical documents. We started from scratch. The main gist I took after working with all the linguists is that this language is basic. We had verbs, but hardly any English-style phrasing – it was pretty abrupt. Our language isn’t formal. We didn’t communicate in that way. It was fragmented at times, and beautifully flowing at other times.

“Nuna djayanuh nhanghi imbedji dharwra nuna dja gundaroodja yerrabidji gunya boola dja ngagarra

See everyone, this is your country. See the rivers run home to the sacred waters”

Jen: What were your personal efforts to help rebuild Ngunawal?

Glen: I started writing my own stuff. I thought, ‘I’ll have a crack at this’. I had a limited understanding, so I followed the linguist’s lead. I took myself back to that time… You meet someone, you say, “Yadhungdhunga.”

I delved back into the different phrases, to think about what kind of phrasing would be used for ‘up high’, etc. That’s the way the language was. It can be abrupt at times, and softly turned at other times.

I’ve now done ‘Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star’ in language, and a songline from my mother’s time in language, as well as other interpretations. We can do all those things because we have a writing system.

‘Gun-burra’** that’s an old phrase for ‘meeting place’. And that was the name given to Capital Hill, precisely where Old Parliament House stands.

*Glen prepares to go on stage at Language Party Canberra, photography by Aishah Kenton*

Jen: Given that you’re still in the early stages of reviving Ngunawal, what it’s been like putting an oral story together for the first time, for Language Party Canberra?

Glen: This story is the greatest challenge I’ve had. Putting together a whole story! I hadn’t even thought it at the time, when I agreed to be part of the Language Party.

But when I started putting the story together, I realised it has so much relevance. It’s like a bible story, in a way, because it connects to the moral sides of life. It carries a message about the way we live. It’s about protecting the environment; I realised the story gives reverence for nature. My story is relevant today to the climate splintering, and the chaos, and to things not being in order.

Jen: What does your language mean to you?

Glen: English is a part of us. But people forget about the resonance with the soul when you speak your own language. When I first started getting things right with Ngunawal, it gave me the shivers. It was like it gave me an inner vision of who I actually was. All these visions were connected to the language – a phrase, a word, putting it all together and getting it right.

I am still working on it, but there is lots more work to do.

Language can save a child from going down the wrong path, by connecting him or her with her language and culture – with who they are. That’s saving a life. That’s giving someone the opportunity to see the bigger picture, and to cast off the things that have been making them ill for a long time. Language has a place in that. This is what connects you to your culture. This is what connects you to the bigger picture and to intangible places. It’s how I see it, and how I feel it.

I am trying to hook up with some younger people, with a view to getting them to take the language further. I believe it needs to be shared. The more people that speak it, or part of it… that’s progress, and it gives everyone belonging. Because you live here on Ngunawal country, does it not make sense to have you speak the language… of what, ultimately, in a way, is your country, too?

Of course, there are some out there who disagree.

*Glen at Language Party Canberra, photography by Aishah Kenton*

Jen: And how does language fit into the bigger picture of your life?

Glen: My mum moved from the Aboriginal mission when she married my dad. She died when I was 18 months. I lived then with a lot of other families, but my cultural learnings were started by Wally’s [Wally Bell, a Canberra Ngunawal traditional custodian] dad, my uncle. My beginnings started there.

And I spent a lot of time in the wilderness. I was a pretty rebellious young fella. Strong role models that I’ve had over the years, women role models, helped me immensely.

I went to Yass Public School, and later, I lived in Queensland. I lost my Aboriginality for a long time. I felt confusion about my skin colour, etcetera. I am white and I hadn’t thought to equate Aboriginality with skin colour… Having kids let me relate to my Aboriginality. I realised I lost so many years, and I could have done way better with my life.

Language touched me. This gives me recognition. Of being the Aboriginal person I am. And in some small way it helps to heal the lifelong hurt inflicted one terrible day at Yass Public School in 1962 when I first learned about how difference in a person’s skin colour can define who they are. Apparently I was white, my cousins were black, and I couldn't be Aboriginal?!

… AND AFTER THE SHOW

Jen: Yadhungdhunga, Glen!

Glen: Yadhungdhunga, Jen.

Jen: How would you describe being part of Language Party Canberra?

Glen: Enlightening. Awkward at first, but then the story took over. I will still be basking for a little while yet, I feel. The ancestors are so pleased.

*Audience at Language Party Canberra, photography by Aishah Kenton*

Jen: What did sharing a story like this mean for you?
Glen: It means that I can now move forward from a difficult last few years, and that my hard work and continued belief in doing the language, in my way, is justified.

*Glen performs ‘Wanagan’ at Language Party Canberra, photography by Aishah Kenton*

Jen: Did any new realisations or ideas emerge for you?

Glen: It made me realise how important storytelling can be. I guess we’ve already established the fact the language is still here.

I have ideas to do a storybook, perhaps in the old way. I can possibly do something electronically… I want to get this dictionary-style resource done. And it doesn’t have to be a dictionary type thing, but something like that. A spoken language of the landscape. The language was my ancestors picture bible. A bible of pictures. A landscape of pictures in language.