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Names and naming: Speaking forms

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franca tamisari

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 7 NAMES AND NAMING:
SPEAKING FORMS INTO PLACE
Franca Tamisari

In 1946 Donald Thomson (1946: 157) noted that 'very little has been recorded of the
derivation and use of personal names among the Australian Aborigines'. Despite the
significance that Australian Indigenous people in general give to the meaning and use of
proper names of people and places and to the action of naming in cosmogonic events, with
some exceptions this neglect continues today.l Thomson explains this dearth of research by
the secrecy and the sacredness of proper names and toponyms which derive from their
ancestral associations and by the rules of avoiding names in everyday life. However, like
Keith Basso (1988: 103), I am inclined to suggest that this neglect is the reflection of the
prevailing preoccupation of anthropologists and linguists with the semantico-referential
meanings and functions of names and language rather than with the culturally shared notions
and images all names evoke, provoke and embody in the creative dialogue that people
establish and continuously renew with counily. As Heidegger argues for language
(197la:192-l93): in order to explore the meaning and significance of Yolngu' names it is
necessary to explain them more comprehensively than considering them as simple expressions
of internal feelings and thoughts, as mere representations of reality, as vehicles by which
people communicate, address each other, or in Levistraussian tenus, as a means by which
people classify the world and order themselves within it (see Levi-Strauss 1966:161-190). If
with Heidegger I suggest that 'language speaks' beyond expression and representation, my
concern in this paper is to ethnographically explore what Yolngu names speak of, that is, what
culturally shared images and notions they reveal while saying very little (Basso 1988:103). As
in other regions of Indigenous Australia, Yolngu names - whether they be of individuals,

The following authors have given some attention to the significance of names: Hart (1930); Goodale (1980);
Dussart (1988); Schebeck (1968); Stanner (1937); von Stunner (1978); Williams (1986); and more recently
Biddle (2000) and McKnight (1999).
2 North-east Arnhem Land extends approximately from Cape Stewart in the west to the Gulf of Carpentaria in
the east and from the Wessel Islands in the north as far south as the Koolatong River nOlth of Blue Mud Bay
and includes the major settlements of Maningrida, Milingimbi, Ramingining, Gapuwiyak, Galuwin'ku and
Yirrkala (see map). Yolngu (human being) is the tenn used by north-east Arnhem Landers to refer to
themselves in relation to their western neighbours of central Arnhem Land. By extension the telm Yolngu is
used to mean' Aboriginal or Black people' in contrast to Balanda, 'non-Aboriginal, White people'.

L. HerclIs, F. Hodges and J. Simpson, cds, The Land is a iVlap: placenames ofIndigenous origin in Australia, 87-102.
Canberra: Pandanus Books in association with Pacific Linguistics, 2002.
© Franca Tamisari
87
 88 Franca Tamisari

groups, plants, animals, sacred or non-sacred objects such as cars, boats and dogs - are
associated with the group's specific cosmogonic actions and the movements of Ancestral
Beings who gave shape to the land, brought evetything into existence at particular places, and
bestowed countries and all phenomena upon specific groups of people. The general point
I would like to make is that not only toponyms but all proper names are ideolocal (Casey
1996:26), that is, specific to place, as they derive from and refer to the unique cosmogonic
events and actions performed by Ancestral Beings at particular places (cf. Morphy
1995:192).3 The specificity of names is so precise that in many instances for knowledgeable
men and women the proffering of a name discloses the named person's affiliation with and
his/her potential rights and authority over specific places.
While the link between places, events and names has been repeatedly noted in relation to
Australian Indigenous cosmologies (Stanner 1979a, 1979b; Munn 1970) and ancestral
bestowal of and rights over country (Williams 1986), the interlocking of these elements, the
shaping of places through ancestral events and the ways places and events are condensed in
names need further detailed attention. If language speaks by itself of our being-in-the-world
as Heidegger argues, I suggest that Yolngu names speak of places as events or happenings (cf.
Casey 1996:27) and with places, of belonging, of self-identification with and ownership of
landscape features, ofrights and authority over country.

i
NT i
i
Katherine i
i
.--_._--.-'-.

Map 1: NOlth-east Arnhem Land

3 Casey (1996:26) refers to places as ideolocal as a 'place is more an event than a thing to be assimilated to
known categories. As an event, it is unique, ideolocal'.
 Names and naming 89

1 'WHERE IS YOUR NAME FROM?'

The connection names establish between people and country is well illustrated by the
expression 'to have a name' (ya:ku-mirr, literally name-having) which, in fact, underlies the
link between people and their group's Ancestral Beings, stresses an association with a
pmiicular place and implies notion of belonging and owning country (cf. Williams 1986:42).4
Every Yolngu person is said 'to follow the father' (ba:paw malthun) and is born and is a
member of his or her father's group. Identification with one's patrilineal countty (ngaraka
literally 'bone country') is principally expressed through 'bone names' ([ikan and bundurr,
literally 'elbow' and 'knee') which are inherited, learnt and given during the many stages of
one's gradual acquisition of knowledge from one's patrilineal relatives (both biological and
classificatory). I refer to 'elbow' and 'knee names' inclusively as 'bone names' rather than
'power names' as is common in the literature, in order to maintain some of the Yolngu
associations and imagery. As Yolngu talk about one's patrilineal land as 'bone countty' - the
countiy one's ancestral substance comes from before birth and returns to after death - elbow
and knee names may be seen as at once conveying the sharing of bony substance with
patrilineal country as well as, perhaps, comparing the main joints which give movement to the
body to the dynamic articulation of people, Ancestral Beings and places (cf. Keen 1995:509-
512). Before being conceived, a child announces his/her imminent conception to the
father-to-be by appearing to him in the fonn, 'shadow' or 'image' (mali' or wunguli') of an
animal, phenomenon or plant which is believed to be the embodiment of an Ancestral Being
(wangarr). This embodiment belongs to the father's group or to one of the father's
patrilineally related groups. Such conception signs consist of unusual events happening at a
place in the country of the father or of a patrilineally related group. One of the names given to
the child often refers to such a place (dhawal) where the child first manifested him/herself.
Just as the Yolngu term for 'to be born' translates as 'to think of (such) a place'
(dhawal-guyanga, literally 'place of origin-think') and thus 'associates the individual with
ancestral creativity' (Morphy 1995: 197; see also Williams 1986:88) at a pmiicular named
place through the conception sign, so the same term is used for 'to die'. The expression 'his
place of origin was silenced' (dhawal mukthurra nhangu, literally 'his place [was] silenced'),
not only links the death of a person with a place of conception or origin but also stresses the
'interanimation' (Basso 1996:55) of place, ancestral being and person. One of the purposes of
the mortuary ceremony is to send the ancestral component of a person back to his/her bone
countty: after a person's death until the concluding 'cleansing' ceremony (bukulup, literally
'face washing'), the bone country and/or the place of origin (dhawal) of the deceased
becomes barren and his house, possessions as well as the places where he would spend most
of his/her time while living, cannot be entered, frequented or used. 5
In addition to bone names one also has several personal names (ya:ku), which are given at
birth by several patrilineal and matrilineal relatives such as one's FF (ma:ri-mu), F (ba:pa),

4 The term waldngu is used to indicate that a person does not belong to anyone and anywhere, thus a person
without relatives who care and look after him/her. The expression ya:kumiriw, literally 'name-having-PRIV'
is used to address and to refer to a person whose name cannot be pronounced because it is the same or it
sounds like the name of a recently deceased person which cannot be proffered for a period of time from one
to two years after his/her death (cf. Nash and Simpson 1981).

Dhawal conveys several meanings at once. It refers to 'breath' and 'feeling' as well as to 'the place at which
a child to be born manifest itself through the conception sign.
90 Franca Tamisari

FZ (mukul ba:pa), MM and MMB (ma:ri).6 Given that several relatives may give a newborn
more than one name each, a person may have from four to fifteen proper names which thus
associate him or her with particular places over which the name-givers have strong or
potential rights.
Generally speaking, not only toponyms but all proper names can be said to be ideolocal,
that is, specific to particular places, as they derive from and refer to the unique cosmogonic
events and actions perfonned by Ancestral Beings at particular places where they shaped the
land through bodily processes. That all proper names of groups and individuals refer to
specific events at particular places is well illustrated by the fact that they are said to be
derived FROM (puy) a place (wa:ngaplly ya:ku, literally, 'place-FROM names') or as being
IN (ngur) a place (wa:ngangllr ya:ku literally 'place-IN names'). Thus, when inquiring about
a person's name one asks 'what is your name from?' (nhapllY nhe ya:ku) or 'what is your
name in or at?' (nhangllr nhe ya:ku).' To these questions people answer by saying that their
names are FROM natural phenomena such as the wind, clouds, and rain (watapllY, wukunpllY,
waltjanpllY) or IN Ancestral Beings such as birds, trees, waters and spears (warrakanngllr,
dharpangllr, gapZl/lgllr, and garangllr). While the first answer to this question can just stop
at indicating the generic name of a phenomenon or a placename on a particular country such
as 'from the cloud' or 'from the sea water', the clouds and the seagull are known with the
group's specific names and are associated to particular ancestral bodily actions, an integral
part of the ancestral events which gave shape to the countly as it is today.
The following examples illustrate how names refer to specific places where particular
ancestral events and often particular bodily actions took place at specific times of the year and
locations. s

'name from (a) bird' (warrakangpllY ya:ku):

I) The female proper name (*) 'beak ofa species of seagull' refers to the feeding of the
young seagulls just after the breeding season on the shores at a particular beach
belonging to the Djambarrpuyngu clan of the Dhuwa moiety.

'name from (the) clouds' (wukunpllY ya:ku):

2) The male proper name (*) 'long black clouds, heavy with rain on the horizon'
announces the beginning of the monsoon season as observed from another shore of the
Djambarrpuyngu clan.

'names from (the) rain' (waltjanpllY ya:ku):

6 Falher's father (FF); father (F); father's sister (FZ); mother's mother (MM); mother's mother's brother
(MMB).
7 What is your name? is rendered with: 'yol nhe ya:kll?' literally 'who you name?'
8 Please note that names are glossed with their ancestral references and not translated literally. Given the
general secret/sacred nature of the different types of Yolngu names, the association they evoke, the power
they summon, the authority they confer and the emotive response they might arouse when they are
pronounced, throughout this paper I will omit them by inserting an asterisk (*) and by glossing them in
English.
 Names and naming 91

3) The female name (*) 'small rain' refers to the drizzle that follows the foggy mornings
at the end of the monsoon in Wangurri country of the Yirritja moiety.

4) The male name (*) 'rain which makes one cold' brings the cold season from the east
and makes everything grow on Djambarrpuyngu country.

name derived from ancestral imprinting action on the land:

5) The female name (*) 'from the head' refers to the hill shaped by Shark ancestor hitting
the ground at a particular place on Djambarrpuyngu country.

name derived from ancestral externalising action (see below):

6) The male name of (*) 'low, small white triangle-shaped clouds' refers to the clouds
that were spurted by the Selpent over the inlet where he rests in the deep waters of the
Gupapuyngu-Birrkili group of the Yirritja moiety.

name derived from a conception sign:

7) The female name (*) 'water corm' refers to the unusually large corms through which
the 'shadow' of a baby girl first appeared and thus was 'found' by her father to be at a
place patrilineally related to the Wangun'i group of the Yirritja moiety.'
Despite the fact that 'bone' and personal names and their ancestral associations with
particular places and events seem to be known by most people of mature age, they are seldom
used and in celiain contexts avoided altogether. In addition to the strictly observed avoidance
of pronouncing the proper names of certain relatives, such as the names of a man's sister
(midiku ') and of a woman's son-in-law (gurrung), proper names of recently deceased people
cannot be pronounced aloud in the same way that their photographs cannot be shown in most
parts of Indigenous Australia. If in the first instance the speaking of a name is said to cause
swelling of the speaker's lips, in the second the recently deceased person is said to be
summoned among the living as a duplicate of his/her body (mokuy, cf. Warner 1958:446) or
'flesh soul' as I prefer to refer to it. Pronouncing the name of a recently deceased person thus
disrupts the process whereby the idiosyncratic component of an individual (mokuy) needs to
be dispersed in order to send his/her ancestral component or 'bone soul' (birrimbirr) to merge
with his or her land of origin or 'bone-country'.10 Whereas bone names are mainly proffered
in the songs and chanted in long lists during ceremonial climaxes, personal names are seldom
used as terms of address in everyday life. For everyday social interaction kinship terms,

9 As Ancestral Beings and associated phenomena are group-specific, their names are considered the possession
of the clan. Despite the fact that most Ancestral Beings cross the countries of several groups, during their
travels they change language so that the proper names derived from their actions are different.
10 Onomatopoeic words or as Yolngu say words that are 'close' (galki) in sound to the deceased names are also
dropped from the current spoken vocabulmy and substituted by alternative nouns. In the light of this it is
interesting to note that the sound itself may evoke ancestral association and certainly has the power of
summoniug the 'flesh soul' of the individual which appears like the deceased in all aspects but it is endowed
with supernatural and often malevolent powers. On a few occasions, and mainly for my own benefit, the
name of the deceased was whispered to me. Similarly photographs were occasionally shown to me
underneath a sheet, inside a skirt pocket or sheltered by the hand. A discussion that explores the way in
which sounds, like images, can summon someone to presence cannot be pursued here.
92 Franca Tamisari

subsection or so-called skin-names (ma:lk) and nicknames (wakal ya:ku) are prefelTed and
widely used."
While the 'kind of oneness' as Stamler (l979a:35) remarks, which includes 'notions of the
body, spirit, ghost, shadow, name, spirit-site and totem', has been repeatedly noted in the
Australian Indigenous lifeworld, the interanimation of these elements, the shaping of places
through ancestral events and the act of naming needs to be explored in some detail. If
language speaks by itself of our being-in-the-world, as Heidegger argues, I suggest that
Yolngu names speak of places, and more precisely they speak of the 'corporeal connection'
(Stanner 1979b: 135) between ancestral bodies and country and of the sociophysical
relationship of people with place which is at the basis of people's self-identification,
ownership of and rights over land.
In what follows I will limit myself to explore the corporeal connection between ancestral
bodies and country, how names and the act of naming are fused with processes of bodily
transformation and, conversely, how these bodily transfOlmations involve names and the act
of naming. In order to explore the interpenetration of ancestral bodies, places and names, how
places are shaped by names and how names embody places, it is necessmy to consider Yolngu
cosmogonic events, to which I now turn.

2 NAMING PLACES AND PLACING NAMES

As elsewhere in Indigenous Australia (cf. Strehlow 1947), in Yolngu cosmology, land has
always existed but it was originally empty, shapeless and nameless. The landscape people
inhabit was shaped into its present form by Ancestral Beings (wangarr) who roamed through
the sky, above and below the surface of the earth, in the depths and shallows of the sea and
along the rivers, thus shaping everything into existence in the geographic and climatic
environment through cosmogonic movements and actions. The landscape was fashioned and
oriented, transformed and moulded by the ancestral bodies through several bodily processes.
These have been described as: metamorphosis, imprinting, externalisation (Munn 1970),
placement and orientation." Similar to the way that Munn (1970:142; 1973:132) noted the
association between name, song and visible mark, which are implied in the tenn yirdi and yini
in Warlpiri and Pitjantjatjara languages respectively, the processes of transfo1T11ation, and
especially imprinting, metamorphosis and externalisation, are intrinsically connected with
names and the action of naming. In talking of these transfOlmation processes and dynamics
which link naming and action, language and movement, I will employ the term
morphogenesis in order to avoid the misleading te1T11 of creation. As Williams points out
(1986:28) quoting Stanner, in Yolngu cosmology there is no creation ex-nihilo but rather
processes of generating, shaping fonns into presence. At certain stages of their journeys

II It must however be noted that personal names are often used as terms of address among members of a family
who reside together (cf. Stanner 1937:302). As terms of address, in this context, personal names are often
shortened thus further reflecting the intimacy of these relationships. People have also 'White names'
(balanda ya:ku) which, together with one Yolngu personal name, are mainly but not only used for
bureaucratic purposes and in interacting with balanda (White) people (see Biddle 2000).
" To the cosmogonic processes identified by Munn (1970), Keen adds 'placement' (1978:45) or 'turning'
(Keen 1994:44-45) by which the ancestors or objects used by them are transfOlmed into a landscape feature.
To this list I added 'orientation' as landscapes are not only perceived as transfonnations of ancestral actions
but as being ordered and positioned along the path by the direction and movement of ancestral bodies
(Tamisari 1998:254).
 Names and naming 93

Ancestral Beings metamorphosed, imprinted and extemalised whole or part of their bodies
into topographic features such as a stone, a hill, the trees along a river, clouds, lightning,
animals aud plants. Ochre quarries are said to be ancestral faeces, a yellow clay which turns
red after cooking is their blood, and clouds were fOimed by the water which spurted from
their mouths (name no. 6; see discussion below). During their wanderings over the land, sea
and sky, Ancestral Beings and the objects used by them in a certain manner, left a mark
behind. Where a tree was felled to collect wild honey a long depression is to be seen today,
where an ancestral bee struck its proboscis a round hole is perfectly cut into the surface of a
flat rock. In Yolngu languages, these processes of shaping or imprinting are referred to as
'hitting the country' (wa:nga buma). Whenever an Ancestral Being hit the ground with a pari
of its body a mark remained to manifest its passage and action and to embody its power.
Landscape features thus shaped are not only transformations of ancestral body paris but also
the embodiment of particular actions which identify unique cosmogonic events (cf. Munn
1996:457). It is the uniqueness of these 'action features' that is condensed in the toponyms
and other proper names given by the ancestors in the act of shaping the land and bestowing
tracts of country upon people." Thus names may be seen as localising events, manifesting
actions and congealing movement. Here I use the word 'manifest' in its primary sense of
'palpable' which interestingly derives from the etymology of 'manus' (hand) and 'festus'
(struck) as in 'of-fend' and 'de-fend'. In this sense the term manifestation is apposite in
describing Yolngu cosmogony as revealing the world through form by striking the land with
parts of the ancestors' bodies (see name no. 5).
I will now tum my attention to explore how this shaping of the ground involves the act
of naming and, conversely, how names thus embody ancestral morphogenetic processes.
I suggest that names do not only refer directly or indirectly to specific places stressing their
bestowal upon pariicular groups, but, once again, they reveal the corporeal connection
between people, places and ancestors. As I discussed elsewhere, like designs, songs and
dances, names are manifestations, and as such they are visible marks or, as Yolngu would say,
the footprints of the Ancestral Beings (cf. Tamisari 1998).
Each moiety has what may be referred to as a creation myth which is said to precede all
other ancestral events. The Djang'kawu Sisters along the coast and the Wagilak Sisters inland
are the first Ancestral Beings of the Dhuwa moiety. The Lany'tjung and Barama brothers are
responsible for bringing into form Yirritja moiety countries, phenomena and people. Despite
the fact that these 'first' myths may be distinguished from more clan-specific mythological
stories of ancestral journeying (cf. Morphy 1990:3 I3), they all share similar processes of
morphogenesis which are characterised by the combination of naming, movement and action
upon the land. Although the myth of the Djang'kawu Sisters belongs to the Liyagalawumirr
clan of the Dhuwa moiety and concerns the shaping of the Dhuwa clans' landscapes, it is
referred to and considered by all Yolngu people of both moieties as the first and most
significant cosmogonic story. It was pointed out to me, more than once, that the Djang'kawu
Sisters gave forms and named everything, both Dhuwa and Yirritja. To prove this claim some
people went on to say that the Sisters' language, now sung in the associated songs, is a
mixture of Dhuwa and Yirritja languages. 14

" Djon Mundine (2000: I00) uses this phrase to refer to the visual embodiment of ancestral events in Yolngu
bark painting.
14 On being questioned on this matter, a Yirritja man answered by recognising the role of Latjung and Barrama
as the first Yirritja Ancestral Beings but also confirmed the above claims with the following somewhat
puzzling statement: 'The Yinitja ancestors took the names from the two Sisters wherever they went. They
94 Franca Tamisari

In the following brief introduction to the Djang'kawu song cycles given by Charles
Manydjan·i, one of the eldest owners of the Djang'kawu ritual complex, he focused on the
Sisters' power of morphogenesis through naming. In his words:
The first songs talk about where the two Sisters came from and where they are directed
to. They describe how rich they are in sacred objects (madayin) and how they strode by
using their yam sticks like walking sticks (ngal'gam). The first bird they saw was a black-
tailed cockatoo sitting on a special tree that they called (*).15 They gave that tree a
'elbow-name' (llkan), it is an ancestral manifestation (malagatj). They named all
creatures, birds and places. Where they planted (nhinpan) their sticks springs of fresh
water (milminydjarrk) splUng out of the ground and a sacred tree stood (dha:rra). They
created everything. They created children and clans, they gave names to the land and
gave the land to the people. (Charles Manydjarri: extract of conversation recorded by the
author in Milingimbi, field tapes 1991)
Emphasis is given to walking and planting the yam stick in the ground; and these actions form
the focus of the song text and the rhythm as well as of the movements of the public dance of
the Djang'kawu Sisters 16 Wherever they planted their walking or yam stick, a tree grew
andlor a freshwater spring burst through the ground. Wherever these activities took place, the
Sisters gave elbow names (!ikan) to the land and other phenomena which were then bestowed
upon the human beings that the Sisters also generated in those places. 17 Along their journeying
their acts were the same but their languages changed and thus the names they bestowed to
places were different. Places are named as they are shaped, names are placed as they shape
the landscape. Just as the Sisters imprinted the ground by making a freshwater spring flow,
they also named the country where the spring is now located. Also, the walking stick planted
in the ground metamorphosed itself into a tree which was given an 'elbow name'. Wherever
they shaped the ground by imprinting it (nhirrpan) or by planting the stick which
metamorphosed into a tree, the Sisters named the place. Places are shaped by 'piercing'
(nhinpan) the ground, and by bringing the water there (dha:rra) and by making the walking
stick 'stand' (dha:rra) as a tree. The piercing of the ground contains a sexual component. In
piercing the ground the actions of the two Sisters gave rise to humans who, like the trees and
water springs, are thus given shape and 'stand' (dha:rra) to populate places.
Perhaps it is not a coincidence that proper names are 'pierced' or given (nhirrpan) and are
said 'to stand' or belong (dha:rra) to people and to places. 'This is a person's name' is the
translation of Yolnguwal dhuwal ya:ku ga dha:rra (literally, 'at a person this name stands')
and 'I gave her this name' is rendered with dhuwal nhanukal ngarra Ilirrpallha (literally 'this
name to her I pierced or planted'). Given that names are 'planted' or 'pierced' (nhirrpan) and

did not steal them, they got up onto the Sisters' skin and took them with their bodies. They did not steal them
but the Sisters did not give them.'
15 Male proper name held by a Djambarrpuyngu man, sister's daughter's son (ZDS) of the Liyagalawumirr
clan, owner of the Djang'kawu song cycle.
16 The clan songs recounting the Sisters' journeys are different in musical fonn from other clan songs of the
same moiety as they are not perfomled with a drone pipe but only to the accompaniment of the sound of the
clapping sticks. The result is an almost hypnotic music which echoes the regular pacing rhythm of walking.
Similar to the unique 'walking' quality of the music, dancers shuffle their feet not in the characteristic
'skipping' style but in a slow forward and backward dragging movement.
17 The same images of planting digging sticks which then metamorphose into trees are also to be found in the
Yirritja moietY morphogenetic stories. Wherever any Ancestral Beings speared the ground in Yirritja
countries, an ironwood tree (maypiny, generic) now stands.
 Names and naming 95

'stand' (dha:rra) at places or with people, it might even be suggested that, as the shaping of
the ground involves the act of naming and, conversely, names imply and embody actions of
imprinting and metamorphosis, a person, an object or a phenomenon is not the bearer of a
name, but its embodiment.
It is here pertinent to note that Yolngu language reflects this 'indissoluble connection'
between name and person in what linguists have referred to as 'the grammar of inalienability',
namely 'a permanent and inherent association between the possessor and the possessed'
(Chappell & McGregor 1996:4). In relation to proper names it should thus be noted that the
personal pronoun rather than the possessive is used; thus 'my name is Franca' is rendered as
'I name Franca' (ngarra ya:ku Franca). As Stanner (1937:301) insightfully points out, the
name does not only relate to one's personality 'as the shadow or image does to the sentient
body', but 'is like an intimate part of the body, with which another person does not take
liberties' (Stanner 1979a:25).
The intrinsic connection between naming and the ancestral processes of morphogenesis
through movement and action is further elaborated and will be more clearly explained by the
meaning and practice of guykthun, a term I gloss with 'spurting' or 'vomiting'. This notion, to
which I now tum, requires special attention as it elucidates the link between naming, names
and the transformative bodily process of externalisation.

3 THE ACT OF GUYKTHUN

The term guykthun is a recurrent action through which several Ancestral Beings of both
moieties are said to have given shape to the clouds." The following is a simplified and
abbreviated extract from a tape transcription of Lalangbuy's explanation of the story of how
the Rainbow Serpent shaped particular clouds by the action of 'the spurting of words'
(guykthun).
I am going to sing to you what you can see there and what a Yolngu told us when we took
over that snake, a water python in that inlet called (*). There at (*), the snake 'spurted
words' (guykthun) and (then) went back home. It is here that your snake is asleep. This
snake is a water python, a (*) snake. There, maybe, in his shelter he spilled sacred words
towards the sea water and there stood (dha:rra) low white clouds (coming) from his
spurting (guykthun). Just those clouds you might have seen in the paintings, they stand
over there, they are called (*) and (*). They are fanned (mali'bakthuna) from him, there,
just from that spurting of the snake. And then the snake goes back, over there, to his
home, he returns, he proceeds swaying his tail. (Lalangbuy: extract of conversation
recorded by the author in Milingimbi, field tapes 1991)

18 The expression guykthul1 has several meanings in different contexts. While these are important to understand
the complexity of this notion, they can only be mentioned very briefly here. 1) guykthull can be glossed as
'cursing' in that the 'spilling' of words makes someone or something sacred or tabooed until the curse is
lifted once an agreement is reached by the parties involved; 2) in preparation for circumcision the boy's own
group's design is painted on his chest and water mixed with clay is sprayed on his face (buku guykthull
literally 'face spraying'); with this act the boy becomes the recognised owner of the manifestation of the
Ancestral Being(s) painted on his chest; 3) Bulat guykthun is a synonym of wama:rrkanhe, an expression
which is usually but not only pronounced in complimenting a singer or dancer's virtuosity in perfonnance. In
this case guykthun may be glossed as 'face which has been sprayed with appreciation' (see Tamisari 2000 for
a detailed account of what I refer to as the 'curse of compliments'). In everyday language, the tenn gakthull
means 'to vomit'.
96 Franca Tamisari

It is by spmiing sea water (implied in the word guykthun) and by the 'spilling of words' (also
guykthun) that the Serpent gave shape to the clouds." It is in fact by a combination of the
regurgitation of water and the 'spilling of names' that the clouds are said to have been given
their shape and names. In Lalangbuy's explanation quoted above, I translated mali 'bakthuna
as 'formed'. It is, however, important to specify that the verb is composed of the word mali'
meaning 'shadow', 'image' or 'semblance' and bakthun which may be translated as 'to break
off, 'finish off. I suggest that this term stresses the creation process of making, shaping the
likeness of clouds through a process of 'breaking off from or extemalising a body part of the
ancestor. 20 This act is not only performed by naming but comes about also by the embodiment
of the Serpent's morphogenetic actions through extemalisation. The clouds thus shaped can
be said to be a manifestation of the Serpent through words and actions. These clouds are
sacred and, in paintings, they are usually represented together with the Serpent in the form of
triangles. It follows that the names of these clouds embody this manifestation and with it the
morphogenetic power of the Ancestral Being. The name that constitutes these clouds through
this particular action is thus considered a 'big name' (yindi ya:ku). The 'spurting of water' is
not only a metaphor for uttering words but the means by which the manifestation of the
Serpent's body through spurting is extemalised and becomes forms.
What I would like to stress here is that the act of naming is made powerful and
performative through externalisation and suggests a complex series of transformations in
which body, language and place constitute each other. The ancestral externalisation of power
in action and movement, therefore, gives words their morphogenetic power which is
expressed in the tenn guykthun. Similarly, the term is also used in other contexts in which
words acquire specific potency and have particular effects. In the several contexts in which
the term guykthun is used, for instance as in cursing (see fn 18), the words pronounced by
particular actors are not only perfonnative as defined by Austin (1962), but they are better
described as a poiesis, a disclosing, a bringing into presence. 2l

4 THE KINETIC QUALITIES OF NAMES

Having considered how the act of naming and ancestral bodily actions give shape to places,
I would like to briefly consider the ways in which names condense these actions in describing
their topographic and kinetic characteristics. For this purpose I will refer to four names of a
place at which ancestral fresh water first appeared to begin its joumey across the country of a
Yirritja group. The names of the place where the water bubbled up from inside the ground
refer to specific aspects ofthis event, they are:

19 Other Ancestral Beings of both moieties are said to have created natural phenomena such as clouds, and/or
places through 'the spurting of water and words'. One such example is a Sea Snake ofa Dhuwa group.
20 See MOilon's (1987: 108) discussion of a similar Arrernte term. Another Yolngu term, (*), refers to the action
of 'biting' (literally 'lock in mouth') as well as to naming. Another expression is (*), literally,
'swim-bladder-speak'. By throwing a part of its body onto the beach a fish ancestor of one clan of the Yin'~a
moiety named and shaped landscape features such as trees in the form of the organ that had been
externalised. The terms for these actions are omitted as they are now part of names of places thus shaped.
2l Austin defines performatives as 'doing something as opposed to just saying something' (1962: 133), however
stressing that 'it is not to perfonn an act in some specially physical way, other than in so far as it involves,
when verbal, the making of movement of vocal organs' (1962: 134).
 Names and naming 97

I) (*): this name renders as 'to swell up to shake and tremble' and refers not only to the
force and impetus with which the ancestral water came up but also to the effect
produced on the surface of the ground;
2) (*): evokes the sound produced by the water mshing to the surface of the opening;
3) (*): this name can be translated as 'fresh water pandanus-LOC' and provides an image
of the surrounding landscape where the ancestral action took place;
4) (*): this name refers to an ancestral fish which, with the water, emerged from the
opening in the ground.
These four names evoke rather than describe pmiicular details of an action. Name number
one evokes the kinetic energy of the water pressing from underneath the ground; number two
is an onomatopoeic name which suggestively reproduces the sound of gushing water; name
number three describes the adjacent environment to the action; and name number four stresses
the direction of the action from inside to outside and introduces another Ancestral Being
which, transported by the water, will cross the length of this group's country shaping and
naming the country. Here I would like to focus on name number four, a name that evokes
movement rather than sound. It is in reference to this aspect that I speak of 'kinesiopoeic'
names and nouns: a neologism I propose for those names and nouns that evoke the movement
associated with the thing or action designated. In the context of ancestral travelling over long
distances, these kinesiopoeic names highlight the significance of movement that connects
places along the route of a particular journey. The sites at which Ancestral Beings have
emerged and/or stopped to shape the land are connected by paths marked by the ancestral
body in movement. I suggest that these kinesiopoeic nouns (which may also be names of
people and places) convey the incessant movement of what may be referred to as the 'site-
path flow' (Munn 1973: 137) of ancestral journeying. These nouns capture and reproduce
either a linear motion that traces a path between places or evokes a localised bodily movement
at a particular place. Yolngu song texts are replete with these nouns. Here it is important to
note that these nouns are often but not always associated with and performed as dance
movements.
Some examples of names and nouns that evoke linear and localised movement are listed
below:

linear movement

(*): also a proper male name, this noun evokes the water displaced by a fish ancestor at a
particular site. As the fish advances towards the land, the water sUlTounding him forms a wave
which precedes him to the shore. This noun is repeatedly sung while a line of dancers
advances frontally interlocking their spears at thigh-height.

(*): evokes the swimming motion of the tmile in the water. This noun is repeated in the song
text and refers to both the linear trajectory of the tUlile through the water as well as the wake
or track she leaves behind in the water and on the land at specific places. The turtle's
characteristic movement is also imprinted on the ground by the advancing steps of the
performer of this dance (see Tamisari 2000).
98 Franca Tamisari

localised movement

(*): this noun refers to the strength and might of the sea waves at a particular place in a storm
following the heavy monsoon rains. More precisely this term compares the upright, curved
shape of the wave to the sudden and violent movement that arches the body in the act of
retching.

(*): also a female proper name, this noun evokes the bobbing movement of driftwood floating
on the little waves of the calm sea water after a stonn at particular places. Dawu pugat, one of
the several expressions frequently repeated in the driftwood song units, combines sound with
movement in a suggestive way. Dawu refers to the sound of water slapping the floating
driftwood, while pugat evokes its 'floating dance along the calm water' as the song text says.
In the corresponding dance, perfonners hold a stick at either extremity and lift it up and down
parallel to the ground.

CONCLUSION
I have considered elsewhere the image of the footprint and especially its ontological
significance in relation to the accumulation and transfelTal of knowledge and its negotiation in
the context of individual and group identity (Tamisari 1998). As with landscape features,
Yolngu people talk of stories, kinship, songs, painting and dances as 'footprints' (djalldri) of
the ancestors. Djalldri or [uku (literally 'foot' and by extension 'footprint' and 'step') is the
tenn often used to refer to different aspects of Yolngu Law (rom) which originated from
ancestral journeys and actions that shaped the land. Djalkiri, the footprint, thus refers to all
visible marks left by the Ancestral Beings such as landscape features (wa:nga), kinship
relationships among groups derived from their positioning along an ancestral trajectory
(gurrulu), to the stories that recount the Ancestral Beings' journeys and actions (dha:wu, CF.
Marika-Mununguritj 1991). These visible marks or 'footprints' are continuously manifested
and retraced in paintings (dhulang), songs (manikay) and dances (bunggul). In this context I
argue that the image of the footprint has ontological significance in that it is not simply the
result, objectification or inscription of ancestral and human experiences and events in and on
the land. In phenomenological telms the 'footprint', I assert, is a 'living body' and a 'knowing
body', an embodied consciousness and perception of and in the world, simultaneously a
fragment and an agent of place, a product and actor of social relations, a subject and object of
action and experience. Djalldri, the 'footprints' ofthe ancestors, the manifestation of ancestral
creativity, not only fuse the body, place and event in an indissoluble whole, but mark
connections between places, establish relationships between people, visualise movement,
unravel nalTatives, and embody names. In this paper, I have further shown how this fusion of
body, place and event is condensed in names, and conversely names are manifestations of
ancestral morphogenetic actions. As 'footprints' not only placenames but proper names in
general reveal once again the corporeal connection between people, places and ancestors. As a
'footprint' is static but implies movement, is localised but can be considered only in relation
to other footprints which together fonn a journey, names localise and at the same time
connect. While names embody an event into place and identify a place with a particular group
or individuals, they often imply that these connections are temporary stops along an ever-
moving trajectory which distributes unique ownership of country within a shared knowledge
and authority over wider regions.
 Names and naming 99

From this perspective, I suggest that Yolngu names may thus be considered, as Heidegger
argues, as 'signs of things' (197Ib:97), however not in its 'debased meaning - lines on a
surface' (197Ib:121). The naming of the landscape which brings a localised feature or
phenomenon into existence through the processes of metamorphosis, imprinting and
externalisation, as originating from the ancestral body, should be approached 'de-signs' in
which the word sign should be understood in its etymological meaning of cutting a trace from
the Latin secare as in saw, sector, segment and section. A de-sign says, shows, discloses, lets
appear and determines things as things in the world (197Ib:12Iff). If names say the world
into existence rather than representing it, bring it to presence rather than communicating it, it
is this saying that lets one see and understand. Like poetry, which Heidegger describes as
revealing and fixing the play between words and things, language and being, Yolngu names
participate in the process of emplacing things into presence which, through bodily
transformations, become an integral part of the world. I suggest that the significance and
power of names thus reside in their corpo-reality or bodiliness: indeed their ability of 'de-
signing' and thus showing and making appear, or in Yolngu terms 'piercing' and 'spurting' a
visible mark which fixes acting Bodies, their histOly and experiences into the landscape
features and localises phenomena that constitute places." Thus by combining the act of
naming with bodily transformations and fusing names with things as indissoluble
manifestations of ancestral morphogenesis, Yolngu cosmogonic processes may be more
appropriately referred to as a morphopoiesis, that is speaking forms into place, the making of
place through names.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I wish to thank all Yolngu people of Milingimbi community and especially my adoptive
family for teaching me. Although I omitted proper names and avoided other details, I hope my
discussion has respected their trust and the cultural sensitivities they are required to live under
or observe.

22 The corporeal interpenetration of places, people and ancestral events which is exemplified in the processes of
'piercing' and 'spurting' the world into being is not limited to names. The act of painting is refelTed to as
miny 'tji ympuma, literally, 'paint/colour jabbing or spearing' (cf. Morphy 1989:24). The significance of this
terminology has been recently noted in the sand designs made by women in the Balgo area (Watson
1997: 110).
100 Franca Tamisari

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