Wp/nys/Using and Editing the Noongarpedia

This is the first Wikipedia site created in Australian Aboriginal English. The first thing to realise is that there are many alternative spellings in Noongar, both because there is more than one dialect of Noongar and because in settlement times Wadjela wrote down what they heard as best they could using the English alphabet. That is not a problem for an oral language, but it is a problem for an encyclopedia which organizes and searches for things based on their spelling! Hence if you are looking for a Noongar term and you don't find it in the Noongarpedia straight away, then use the 'search' function (top right in all Noongarpedia pages) to search for alternative spellings, and even use the English spelling of the Noongar term if known as a search term. Or ask Google and add the search term Noongarpedia.

If you have edited the Noongarpedia, thank you. As a favour to the Noongarpedia project, could we ask you to carry on and make one edit a month - not necessarily a new page, just an edit. Thank you again.

Modern Noongar dialect groups

There may have been up to 15 dialects of the Noongar language at the time of European settlement. Today it is highly endangered as the 2006 census recorded only 240 speakers, but nidja is an increase from the 1996 census wer karro people are learning the language. Noongar words are used as part of the vocabulary of an English dialect with Nyungar admixture, known as Neo-Nyungar, which is spoken by perhaps 8,000 ethnic Noongar. This Noongarpedia is written in English, Neo-Nyungar wer Noongar. It is written to be a reference source for yennar the people of WA, especially the Noongar, wer as a learning resource for the Noongar language. It is critical importance that Noongar and Neo-Noongar are used in schools in Noongar boodjar. The Noongarpedia acknowledges and respects all variants of dialect used across the south west and aims to support schoolchildren by using their language.

The Noongarpedia accomodates different spellings in a page title by using redirects, so there should be just one page on one topic. If a second page is started because the author did not discover the first page, the content of the second page should be merged into the first page and the second page should then be made a redirect to the first page. If the page spelling is correct and in common use by some group (i.e. it is not a typo) then the Noongarpedia accepts that spelling and does not change the page name to any standard spelling. Hence the general rule is that a page keeps the spelling of the first page created on that topic. Alternative spellings should however be given in the first paragraph on the page.

The main page on the Noongar language is at Gnullar Karla Mia - Our Campfires (Language groups).

Functions of the Noongarpedia

Jack Davis

English-English and English-Persian dictionaries

The acclaimed Noongar playwright Jack Davis was a member of the stolen generations. At the Moore River Native Settlement he used an English dictionary to educate himself with astonishing success. It is difficult to use a dictionary for this purpose, but that was all Mr Davis had. An encyclopedia is designed not to give you the meanings of words but to educate you. In a paper based encyclopedia you can look up other pages to add context or detail to increase your understanding, as Mr Davis did with his dictionary. But it is much easier to see other pages in an on-line encylcopedia as you just have to click on a link. When you click on a link now, think of how difficult it was for Mr Davis to educate himself using just a paper dictionary.

Some pages of the Noongarpedia are designed specifically to provide a teaching resource for teachers or for self-study (see Category:Wp/nys/Teaching Aids). In explaining real issues the Noongarpedia does not seek to just give a potted version of the mainstream view, but in explaining scientific and political controversies it aims to educate the reader and help the reader develop an understanding of how political and judicial processes work, or how the scientific method works, etc.

A secondary function of the Noongarpedia is to record language resources and historical records, or at least their location on the Internet. Sometimes things on the Internet can be embarrassingly persistent, but sometimes qwop material can be lost. However, the Internet Archive Wayback Machine can be used to make a permanent record of a web page's content on a particular day - see "Wayback Machine".

The rest of this page starts with a sample new page to get you started when creating your own new page, followed by help on specific topics. Thank you for reading this.

Sample new page

This is a raw page in wiki code to just copy and paste when creating a new page to get you started. Hope it helps :)

[[File:Black-winged stilt (Himantopus himantopus).jpg|thumb|Djandjarak. This is an example image]]

'''Page title repeated here in bold''' ... All pages in the Noongarpedia should be in the Category:Wp/nys/ but Category:Wp/nys/Djerap is only for the birds :) Categories help in organizing the Noongarpedia to find related pages without having to specifically make links to another page.

This is an example link to [[Wp/nys/Keny mia|the main page]].

==Djandjarak Waarnk - Stories about the Black-winged Stilt==

== Ngiyan waarnk - References ==

<references/>

[[Category:Wp/nys]]

[[Category:Wp/nys/Djerap]]

Templates and Wiki code

See this Wiki Help page for a guide to editing Wiki pages. Note that this is specifically a guide to editing the English Wikipedia. There are some differences in editing the Noongarpedia as will be found in this Noongarpedia cheatsheet below.

Source?

The template is {{Wp/nys/Citation needed}}, which produces the insert ^[source?]

Redirect

Redirect example #REDIRECT [[Wp/nys/Birak]]

Alternative Noongar spelling template

Wp/nys/Using and Editing the Noongarpedia

Ballardong	kalla
Wudjari	karla

• {{Wp/nys/spelling |Amangu = |Ballardong = kalla |Bibbulmun = |Binjareb = |Juat = |Kaneang = |Koreng = |Minang = |Njaki Njaki = |Njunga = |Wardandi = |Whadjuk = |Wiilman = |Wirlomin = |Wudjari = karla }}

Which is rendered as on the right. See the source code for better spacing (the code tag used here ignores new lines). Also note it automatically picks up the page title from the page where it is used.

Quote template

Example:

• {{Wp/nys/Quote |text=Nidja boolya birdya ... }}

“ Nidja boolya birdya ... ”

Wiki links

Update 5 March 2023: the link function has changed, now you no longer need the Wp/nys to refer to links to other pages in Wp/nys, simply put e.g. [[Wardan (Ocean)]], which appears on the page as Wardan (Ocean). Links to other wikis of course will still require id of the other wiki, e.g [[W:Luritja dialect|Luritja people]] which appears on the page as Luritja people

Obsolete advice: To link to other pages in Wp/nys suggest you use [[Wp/nys/Wardan (Ocean)|Wardan (Ocean)]], which appears on the page as Wardan (Ocean). This code will be now be autocorrected to [[Wardan (Ocean)|Wardan (Ocean)]].

To link to pages in the English wikipedia use [[W:page name in Wikipedia|page name wanted]], e.g. [[W:Luritja dialect|Luritja people]] which appears on the page as Luritja people.

Links can be made plural simply by adding an 's', e.g. [[W:Luritja dialect|Luritja people]]s which which appears on the page as Luritja peoples.

• You can use 'W' for the English wikipedia, or 'Wp/nys' in these links as appropriate. Links starting with a lower case letter are now deprecated. This also applies to categories, which are also links, and categories starting with a lower case letter will be automatically corrected to start with an upper case letter.

Link to a category, not a page

• [[:Category:Wp/nys/Biddi|Biddi (walk trail)]]

Biddi (walk trail)

Without the leading colon ':' this code would just add the Category 'Wp/nys/Biddi and monuments' to the list at the bottom of the page, i.e. it actually doesn't matter where you add a category in a page, but for later editing it is more readable if it is added at the end. All categories, as with all links, start with a capital letter. This is now autocorrected.

Youtube icon

[[File:YouTube icon (2011-2013).svg|50px|title]] '''[https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=4&v=3_AhTvYcSYM Australian Space Agency Brand Animation]''' appears as below (don't forget the closing ''':

Australian Space Agency Brand Animation

Page titles

The preferred format for page titles is Noongar word (English word). Note both initial letters of the words are capitalized. This has the advantage that a link to the page reads as normally wanted, e.g. 'a type of tree found in Noongar boodjarak is the Biboolboorn (Paperbark)', and that a search in Noongar or English will return the same page.

Request a page be deleted

Writing {{delete| Miscellaneous}} on a page results in "This page may meet the criteria for speedy deletion. The given reason is: Miscellaneous'. This flags the page so an administrator will then speedily delete it. Other possible reasons are: General, Articles, Images - see Meta:Deletion policy.

Do not delete a page with a Noongar title just because it has been replaced or superseded by a different spelling, the old page can stay as a redirect (assuming it is a valid Noongar spelling). Indeed, redirect pages can be specially created for alternative Noongar spellings.

Test Wiki activity

1. Go to the page Wp/nys:Nyungar Wikipedia. "This is an open test wiki of the Wikimedia Incubator ... "

Click on 'Check test wiki activity' to see monthly stats

To see the total number of pages see 'Overview' in the monthly stats, e.g. on 24 December 2019 there were: "957 pages (including categories, templates, talk pages, and redirects)".

2. Click on Category: Wp/nys at the bottom of every page to see a list of pages in the category. This list does not gives a count of pages with the prefix Wp/nys but of pages in the category Wp/nys. There will be pages with the prefix Wp/nys but without the category code which will be counted in total 1 but not in 2, so total 1 (e.g. 957 pages) will be higher than total 2 (e.g. 525 pages).

e.g. as of 24 December 2019: "Pages in category "Wp/nys". The following 200 pages are in this category, out of 525 total."

3. Please click here for a list of pages with the prefix Wp/nys. This list does not tell you the total number of pages but gives you all the pages with the prefix Wp/nys, with or without redirects.

References and categories

Suggest standard reference section is:

== Ngiyan waarnk - References ==

<references/>

[[Category:Wp/nys]]

[[Category:Wp/nys/Djerap}}]]

All pages should have the category 'Wp/nys', but 'Wp/nys/Djerap' is just for the birds! Categories, as with all links, start with a capital letter. This is now autocorrected.

N.B. The <references/> tag normally has no effect, since references go at the bottom of the page anyway. It is only a safety feature in case somebody puts something following the Ngiyan waarnk - References, e.g. External links or whatever. An alternative seems to be to use {{Wp/nys/Ngiyan waarnk}} or {{Wp/nys/reflist}} instead of <references/>.

Reference format

Referencing is complicated. It is simplified here by only using a full stop '.' for punctuation, in place of commas and colons and semi-colons - unless it is clear a comma is needed e.g. in a list of authors. Otherwise we try to follow the referencing standard for the English wikipedia.

Also to help people who don't use references often, we should use Vol, Iss, p and pp for Volume, Issue, page and pages, instead of 11, 3, 5-10. This example in the Noongarpedia should be referenced as Vol 11. Iss 3. pp 5-10 (N.B. pp is standard for a range of pages, Pp would look odd).

Most people use variants on the Harvard Style of referencing, e.g. in text example - (Jennings 1997) or (Conley & Galeson 1998), but Wikipedia uses the IEEE referencing style, e.g. [2]. The Harvard referencing style in a reference section is e.g.:

Conley, TG & Galeson, DW 1998, "Nativity and wealth in mid-nineteenth century cities", Journal of Economic History, vol. 58, no. 2, pp. 468-493.

Note the title is not italics but the journal is, so we should try to always keep the title in double quotes ("title") and not in italics. The year comes after the authors and preferably in brackets to fit with Harvard in-text style citations Also don't use a full stop before the date unless there are multiple authors. Suggested Noongarpedia style for the ref above as the example in refs below. The rules for commas, full stops, etc. are pretty arcane, and anyway the template used on the English Wikipedia just ignores these rules and uses full stops everywhere, so suggest we do the same. People have said they can't do referencing because of all the arcane formatting rules, so that's a qwop reason to just use full stops! Except after standard words such as 'vol', 'pp' and after authors' initials where it's best not to use full stops to make it easier and cleaner to read and faster to edit. Also use the authors' names as written by the author instead of last, first. last, first. etc. This uses less commas and gets the name right, which is a potential problem when different cultures put the family name is a different order to the European style. And the full stop at the end of the ref can also be omitted.

English Wikipedia auto template example below and in ref section for how this should appear in the Noongarpedia:

Alfven, H.O.G. (1990). "Cosmology in the plasma universe - an introductory exposition". IEEE Transactions on Plasma Science. 18: 5–10.

N.B. Standard wikipedia referencing is for the ref tag to come immediately after punctuation (usually a full stop).

Useful references for Noongar names and words

Search Placenames.

<ref name="Boodjar">Len Collard. [https://www.boodjar.sis.uwa.edu.au/boodjar-placenames/Meelup "Boodjar - Nyungar Placenames in the South-West of Western Australia/Meelup"]. Curtin University Sustainability Policy (CUSP) and the School of Indigenous Studies (SIS) at the University of Western Australia]. Retrieved 3 May 2023</ref>

Dictionaries

• Kaartdijin Noongar

<ref>[http://www.noongarculture.org.au/Babanginy/ Kaartdijin Noongar - Noongar Knowledge/Babanginy]. Pub South West Aboriginal Land & Sea Council. Retrieved 3 May 2023</ref>

• Bernard Rooney

<ref>Bernard Rooney (2011). "The Nyoongar Legacy". Batchelor Press. ISBN 978 174131 232 4</ref>

• Mayakeniny - Restoring on-Country Performance

<ref>Mayakeniny - Restoring on-Country Performance. [https://www.mayakeniny.com/language-list/ Mayakeniny Word List]. Retrieved 25 December 2023</ref>