About
Pertame is an Arandic language that is fluently spoken by 20-30 people in central Australia, south of Alice Springs. All fluent Pertame speakers are 50+ years old, which makes the language critically endangered. However, there have been significant revitalization projects for Pertame, including the Pertame School, which is a community-led project to pass the language to the younger generation. The Pertame School includes an initiative to use an immersion setting to teach the language to children (newborn-age five) to create a new generation of native speakers. It also offers classes led by native speakers for all ages. Pertame is also one of the focus languages of the Priority Language Support Project, which is meant to identify and document critically endangered languages with little to no prior recognition or documentation.
Music and Dance
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Also known as: Southern Arrernte
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Language Family: Arandic
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Written Alphabet: Latin
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Category: Critically Endangered
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Speakers: Less than 30
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Paul Kelly sings with the Pertame Children's Choir "From Little Things, Big Things Grow"
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Pertame Children's Choir Sings at Batchelor Institute Graduation Ceremony 2023
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Video Recordings
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