Warlpiri Baby talk

The phonological forms and perceived functions of janyarrp, the Gurindji ‘baby talk’ register

“…These studies, carried out with transcription data, not instrumental analysis, reported baby talk patterns to include consonant cluster reduction, consonant harmony (place or nasality), consonant fronting, labialization, replacement of rhotics, stopping of fricatives, and initial or final deletion. Relevantly to the present paper, coronals were reported to be palatalized in baby talk in Warlpiri (Laughren, 1984), Japanese (Chew, 1969), South Estonian (Pajusalu, 2001), and Huichol, among Wixaritari people (Grimes, 1955). In East Cree and in Warlpiri, both languages without contrastive stop voicing, stops have been reported as voiced in baby talk (Jones, 1988;O'Shannessy, 2011).…”

“…Baby talk to Gurindji children has not previously been described, but there is a small literature describing baby talk in other Australian languages to which we can turn for predictions regarding baby talk to Gurindji children (Laughren, 1984;Machbirrbirr, 1990;Turpin et al, in press). The Australianist literature on baby talk is focused on describing the phonological modifications in speech to children.…”

“…There are social ties between Warlpiri and Gurindji people, and Warlpiri and is similar in phonological inventory and phonotactics. In speech to Warlpiri children (Laughren, 1984;O'Shannessy, 2011), adults reduce the threeway coronal place contrast (apical alveolar, apical post-alveolar, and laminal palatal) to laminal palatals in stops, nasals, and laterals. The Arandic languages, spoken further to the south-east in central Australia, have very different phonotactics, and an additional coronal place distinction (laminal dental).…”

“…Rhotic replacement in Southern Warlpiri results in all three rhotics being replaced by the palatal glide /j/, except in the common diminutive suffix --pardu, where the flap is replaced with /w/ (Laughren, 1984). For very young children up to three or four years of age, the apical laterals are replaced by /w/ in at least two common words (wawa for lawa 'no, nothing', and wawu for warlu 'fire, heat, hot').…”

“…Instead, when caregivers speak to children in a special way, they may be signalling and reinforcing social roles within a culture. In a study of baby talk in the central Australian language Warlpiri, Laughren (1984) argued that baby talk functioned to signal the socially important, distinct roles of adult and child.…”