Our History
Pertame (Southern Arrernte), is an Indigenous language spoken to the south of Alice Springs.
Pertame belongs to the country around the Finke and Hugh Rivers, 110km South of Alice Springs. Pertame country starts at Running Waters (Irrpmangkera) and follows the Finke River (Lhera Pinta) down to the community of Finke.
The Pertame grandparent generation grew up on Pertame country, speaking Pertame as their first language, steeped in their culture and community. However, due to the forces of colonization, punitive language policies, the stolen generation and English-only schooling, Pertame is a severely endangered language, with less than 30 Elder fluent speakers still alive. Without serious action, Pertame will be lost within the next generation.
Pertame is an ancient and rich language, carrying 60,000+ years of history, heritage, knowledge of the country and a unique perspective of the world. Urgent action is required to teach Pertame to the next generations while we still have our precious few fluent Elders with us.
Christobel Swan, Pertame Elder and Co-Founder
“I remember when I was about ten, we used to come in from the station. We'd be walking along the street and people would say "Don't talk that language". Even at school they used to give us a hiding in the playground. And I often used to think why should I speak English? That's not my language!"
Pertame family at Henbury Station
Pertame family at Henbury Station
Pertame stockmen working at Henbury Station
Kathleen Bradshaw-Swan, Pertame Elder
"When colonisers came into our country, they took away our land, language and culture. They tried to make us like them. They separated us through stolen generations, put us in towns with other languages and mixed us all up. We lost our identity, who we are and where we belong. Now we have hope of finding ourselves once more through the revitalisation of our language, reconnecting back to country, families and community. Pertame people are still here, we still have our language. Our children and apprentices are learning their language with Elders through the Pertame School."
How We Started
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Recording Pertame
In 2015, Pertame Elder Christobel Swan and her friend Jodie Clarkson began work at Batchelor Institute, recording and archiving the Pertame language. Together they repatriated Pertame language materials and recorded over 800 Pertame words and sentences to produce a Pertame dictionary.
This small recording project created the relationships needed to later launch Pertame into a community-wide program.
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Pertame School Dream
Starting a language school was a long held dream of Christobel Swan and her niece and co-founder Geraldine Stewart. In 2016, Christobel, Jodie and Geraldine invited friends from Melbourne to visit their homelands, shared their country, art, stories and their vision for the Pertame School. In 2017, Christobel and family were kindly gifted a philanthropic donation from their friends to run four on-country language camps at Boomerang Bore homelands.
Since this seeding donation, the Pertame Project has gone from strength to strength, growing to include school holiday programs for children, in-school classes, adults' evening classes and a Master-Apprentice program.
