Ngura languages

Ngura
Eastern Karnic
(areal?)
Geographic distribution:	Northwest New South Wales, southwest Queensland, Australia
Extinct	ca. 1990
Linguistic classification:	Pama–Nyungan; some languages may be Karnic, some Maric, but most are unclassified
Subdivisions:	Wangkumara–Bundhamara Galali ? Bidjara ?? Dhiraila ?? Garandala ?? Mambangura ?? Mingbari ?? Ngurawarla ?? Yarumarra × Badjiri
ISO 639-3:	ekc (Eastern Karnic)
Glottolog:	ngur1261  (Ngura)[1]

Ngura is an ethnic designation of central Australia.

Of the various languages that have gone by this name, Bowern (2001) classifies Galali/Garlali and Wangkumara-plus-Bundhamara/Punthamara (AKA Ngandangara/Yarumarra) as Eastern Karnic. Bidjara (not to be confused with the Bidjara language of the Maric languages) may be another, but there is not enough data to be sure. Bowern believes that Badjiri was probably not even a Karnic language, but again the data is too sketchy to be sure.

Other poorly attested varieties listed in Ethnologue are:

Dhiraila, Garandala (Karendala), Mambangura, Mingbari (Minkabari), Ngurawarla.^[2]

None of these can be usefully classified, and it's doubtful Mingbari was an actual dialect.^[3] However, in 2013 the ISO code ekc was assigned to 'Eastern Karnic', including only the questionable varieties, despite the fact that it is not clear that there is any data for this 'language'.^[4][5]

References

1. Nordhoff, Sebastian; Hammarström, Harald; Forkel, Robert; Haspelmath, Martin, eds. (2013). "Ngura". Glottolog. Leipzig: Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology.
2. Ngura at Ethnologue (16th ed., 2009)
3. AIATSIS:Minkabari