The phonology of Aboriginal English

Like Australian English, Aboriginal English is characterized by a recognizably similar pronunciation across the continent. Unlike Australian English, it may bear interlanguage features in some areas associated with Indigenous languages or creoles.

The treatment here will be inclusive, providing information on the main areas where, at least in some places, Aboriginal English shows most contrast with StE. There has been no focused study on the phonology of Aboriginal English, but descriptions have been provided (often for the assistance of school teachers) in the context of descriptions of the dialect as a whole. The description here will draw principally on work carried out in Queensland (e.g. Readdy 1961; Alexander 1968; Flint 1968), the Northern Territory (e.g. Sharpe 1976) and Western Australia (Eagleson, Kaldor and Malcolm 1982; Malcolm 2001).