Noongar language

Noongar, also spelled Nyungar, is a Pama-Nyungan language or, by most linguists' accounts, a dialect continuum of closely related varieties historically spoken across the southwest corner of Western Australia by the Noongar people. Named varieties recorded within the continuum include Wudjari, Minang, Bibelman, Kaneang, Wardandi, Balardung, Yuat, Wiilman, Whadjuk and Pinjarup, among others, and most linguists agree there was no single standardized Noongar language before European settlement, rather a group of related varieties that have since been treated increasingly as one language. Noongar was first documented in word lists taken by the navigator Matthew Flinders in 1801. Fewer than 250 people reported speaking it as a home language in recent censuses, but active revival programs have grown substantially, with tens of thousands of students learning some Noongar in Western Australian schools by the early 2020s.