Talk:Swan Valley Nyungah Community

Australia: Western Australia / Perth / Noongar Low‑importance

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Info from 2006

This information is out of date. The community was evicted and forcibly removed by the WA Government in 2003. Robert Bropho, the community elder is now in prison.

Robert Bropho (born 1930) is an indigenous Australian activist in Perth, Western Australia. He was leader of the Swan Valley Nyungah Community settlement for over 40 years. He organised the protest against redevelopment of the Swan Brewery, and was involved in the repatriation of Yagan's head. In 1986, he published Fringedweller...

"Aboriginal activist Robert Bropho will spend at least the next six months in jail after being convicted of indecently dealing with a young girl. Bropho, 75, was convicted of two charges of indecently touching the young girl when he was head of the now defunct Swan Valley Noongar community in Western Australia. Today in sentencing, Judge John Wisby described Bropho's behaviour as opportunistic. The judge said the fact Bropho pleaded not guilty to the charges eliminated any suggestion of remorse. Bropho received a 12-month jail term for each offence. But John Wisby made him eligible for parole within six months because of concerns for Bropho's health..." ABC News

His daughter - Bella Bropho, is currently in Federal Court fighting the rights to get the comminuty back: [ http://Perth.indymedia.org/index.php?action=default&featureview=409 Perth Indymedia, September 2006]

"the Swan Valley Nyungah Community, the last of the River People, who have never left our Homegrounds, who are the Closest Keepers of the Sacred Area of Bennett Brook the Dreaming Track of the Waugal on behalf of all Aboriginal People where we live on the Edge of the Swamp and where we have Suffered and Died all our Lives Waiting for Understanding and Co-operation and to be looked on as Human Being.." http://www.nyungah.org.au/reports/right-track.html Swan Valley Nyungah

--ErnMalley 17:14, 5 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Variant spellings

The top of the article Noongar lists several variant spellings of Noongar, Nyungah, etc. This is obviously a problem which will not quickly go away when the word is used by Aboriginal people of different levels of education and by non-Aboriginal journalists, lawyers, etc. I submit that Wikipedia has made a wise decision in the said article (Noongar) in adopting the most phonetically correct version. For non-Western-Australians, I should mention that the 'g' here is soft, non-fricative, as in 'hanger', though both syllables are fully pronounced, with main stress on the first, 'oo' as u in 'put'. I guess we have to stick with any different spellings which appear inside quotation marks but otherwise we can and should (imho) settle on a standard spelling which is consistently followed for the benefit of the reader. Cheers Bjenks (talk) 14:37, 21 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Could you please post a copy of this message at the wa project page noticeboard so we have some sort of policy by which to modify any possible weird variations? It would be appreciated - thanks Satu Suro 14:42, 21 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

There was a long-winded discussion a couple of years ago there. I'm happy to reopen the worm can to get some new eyes on it, but I feel that the truth is, there's no right answer. Moondyne 15:22, 21 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

That past discussion seems to bear out a preference for the 'Noongar' usage. ('Orthography' is not a good word to use in this context.) Importantly, it brings non-West-Oz readers close to the actual pronunciation (or better so than those variants using 'yung', etc). Important to acknowledge there is no useful basis of "correctness" here. We are talking about a pragmatic standard to serve the encyclopedic (-/aedic (:-)) norms. Bjenks (talk) 15:57, 21 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]