ELECTIONS will be held this year for the positions of state and territory delegates for the FATSIL Governing Committee. The elections will take place by postal vote in August 2006 for the following positions:

pakana luwana liyini

THE CD pakana luwana liyini: Aboriginal Girls  Sing was launched at the 2005 Aboriginal Family Xmas party in Launceston..Tasmania All the songs on the CD were written by young Aboriginal girls in after school Language sessions. Their language is palawa kani, the language being retrieved by Tasmanian Aborigines.

This is the second CD of songs in palawa kani. In 2003 children from Aboriginal Children's Centre in Hobart produced palawa kids kanapila: Aboriginal kids Dance and Sing.

This February marked twenty five years since the history Alice Springs recognition of the workshop that saw the establishment of the Australian Languages Association, and set the groundwork for the formation of FATSIL 15 years later:

DARYN McKenny recently came recognition of the across the first newsletters of the ALA, while going through some old records at the Arwarbukarl Cultural Resource Centre in Newcastle.The first meeting was held in February 198 1 .There are familiar names on the original committee with many of those still involved in language program today.

Ivy Hector Nambijna with her children, Tom and Anna

TOLD in a mix of Bilinarra, Ivy's traditional language, and Kriol, the Aboriginal language widely spoken across the Top End, the writing describes what life was like for Ivy and her family when she was a young woman working at Pigeon Hole cattle station, south-west of Katherine in the Northern Territory.

"Antha pukatyi puntyu wirralhuku wayarnda," says the first voice, the Goanna Woman. "I want to buy some stink beetle meat." "Arayi. Manirnda," comes the response from the bush-store keeper - "OK, Get it"

The voice of the oldest speakers 0( the Arabana language can now be heard on CD-ROM through a series of creative, entertaining and educational language modules far Arabana students of all ages and for learners of other Aboriginal languages.