’I’m trying to find a way of putting all the language I’m learning into a song, just like our ancestors have always done,’ says Nathan Schrieber.
At the start of European settlement, there were around two hundred and fifty Aboriginal languages. Today, only twenty are widely spoken. Gunggay, was about to be lost until Nathan Schrieber made it his mission to bring it back. Dinner with the family is a chance for Nathan Schrieber (M.I.L '18) to speak the Gunggay language with his four children, aged between three and 12. New words are regularly added to the conversation, but the best sign the language is finding new life is Nathan's youngest. He is effectively becoming bilingual, speaking to Schrieber in Gunggay as effortlessly as he converses in English. "I think back to before the Anglican Church came here.
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