Charlie Listens [by Bob Holman]

Language Matters with Bob Holman is now available to stream on PBS Video. 

 

Charlie Listens

 

Put earbud in west ear

Put other earbud in east ear

Charlie listens

 

Clapsticks, didj, now your voice

Recorded yesterday, Mt Borredale, 

In Amardak, you’re the Last Speaker

Hear? Your voice doesn’t sound so good

You sang good, but the recording was no good

Could you sing now, Charlie, please?

Charlie nods. Charlie listens

 

Clapsticks, didj, now your voice,  please - Now

Charlie listens

Now Charlie listens

OK Charlie, we need you to sing Now

Charlie nods and listens

Now Charlie listens

Cue Charlie – listens

 

Get Jamesy

Jamesy tells Charlie

Charlie listens

 

Get headphone splitter

Jamesy puts on headphones

Charlie and Jamesy listen

Clapsticks, didj. Charlie’s voice

Jamesy sings a little

Jamesy looks at Charlie

Charlie looks at Jamesy 

OK? Charlie listens

 

OK, Jamesy now speak Iwaidja with Charlie

OK, Charlie listens, Charlie nods

OK Jamesy looks at Charlie

OK clapsticks in fingers

OK Charlie listens, didj

OK now. Now Charlie sings

Ma barang!

 

Asking Charlie Mangulda, the Last Speaker of Amurdak, to overdub his performance from the sacred site of Mt. Borradale, was one of the most complex and unnerving directorial moves—to me, not to him—I’ve ever had to do. John Tranter, our local sound guy, is  just a dynamite practitioner. But recording Charlie’s voice, two, cracking clapstick players, and a bulbous didgeridoo on a cave’s platform under an ancient painting of a Rainbow Serpent, proved to be too much for our top-of-the-line digital equipment. This poem tells the story. I won’t repeat it. I won’t even tell you what Ma barang! means, I’m sure you already know. And if you don’t know, then you really do already know. 

What I do want to talk about, briefly, is the opening lines. In Amurdak, Charlie’s language, is one of the very few instances where you can actually see a difference in consciousnesses between languages. The idea that some languages are more primitive than others is simply cultural prejudice: you can say anything in any language, and every language has a full syntax and grammatology. But in Amurdak, Charlie doesn’t know his left from his right. This concept, which until the 1960s was thought to be universal, actually doesn’t exist in a few languages. The way Charlie designates direction is simply and solely through cardinal directions. And it’s been shown that it doesn’t matter where speakers of these languages are placed, they are automatically oriented to the compass points, so that they can say of the choices, “I’ll take the one on the southwest.” 

Now, you could infer from this that Amurdak people don’t see themselves, each one, as the center of the universe, where left and right is always and only consistent to the person speaking. Instead, the Amurdak people—or in this case, Charlie, the Last Speaker—is simply a point standing somewhere on Earth. But that’s just an inference. Or maybe a poem. 

One more thing before we close. When Charlie was translating the creation myth of Warramurrungunji, he listed the dozen or so languages that the Goddess dropped, thus bringing humans to the place she had created. Somehow, under the disturbing lights of the camera, with the intrusion of the microphone, Charlie remembered three words of a language that linguist Nick Evans, an expert on cultures of Northern Australia, didn’t know he could speak. And when Charlie mentioned Wurdirrk and gave Nick some words,  it was the first time that this language has ever been recorded. That’s correct. I think this was The Apotheosis of the whole shoot of “Language Matters.” I could see the headline in the Times: Documentary Crew Discovers Lost Language. 

The words Charlie spoke translate to: “I want to listen to you,” “yam-digging tool,” and “give me fire.” The first thing that was apparent to Nick from these three words is that they are unlike any other language, which means Wurdirrk is not a dialect—without these words, we never would have known that. 

As a poet, I’d like to say one more thing about the words. If you triangulate from them, what you have is a whole culture. “I want to listen to you,” the essence of the community. “Yam-digging tool,” the basis of the community’s relationship with the earth and it also means “digging deeply into the meaning of something.” And “give me fire,” the essence of light, of heat, a great song title, and the best joke in the book. 

For “gimme fire,” I envisioned Charlie as a little boy, these strange people coming out of the darkness late at night, shivering and cold, needing some of this precious fire for light and heat. Later, Charlie would give me the deeper meaning of this idiom. Hey buddy, you got a match? 

Comments

[Forker Girl]

Fantastic how a culture is revealed through these words, meanings seem so clear as you reveal them --got me thinking a little bit (and hope to think more on this later) culture revealed (or not) in those "Alice and Jerry readers I had in first grade --"Spot" the dog) --anyway, Bob, I liked the little boy you envidioned, and strange people (always useful, sometims, the stranger the better, but that's getting away from your story, piggybacking into other cultural tales just forming in my "big head" [swelling nicely, thank you] of dreams; strangers coming out at night, shivering and cold, needing --that's importantm isn't it, to be in "need" --there's a basis for some community right there! --thee has to be some form of need --and in this case, "needing" ( as we all do) some of the preciousness of Fire for light and heat --dual purpose!-- even better, to need both! --and these ideas seem so big, almost impossible to encomoss, light and heat can have huge implications and can also be considered as incredible local forms, light of eyes, heat of a body close by, ann even more local and portable in "Hey Buddy, you got s match?" --so the light and Heat can fit in s pocket, can br something you can't do without on some point on earth .... Will think further about this, Bob; things stay with Fan #1 for a very long time, as I make light, hest, either one or both, but, Bob, I never play with matches, mostly because of how my braids caught Fire when I was 8

[Forker Girl]

Fantastic Bob, love when you talk about culture revealed in those three words --I asmit to thinking about
Osijek culture revealed in those "Alive and Jerry" books I read in first grade (nit these were cultures such as anything that you've found --I was simply thrust in these locations when I was in first grade,mand now could I forger (obviously I didn't since he's emerging right now: "Spot" the dog --but that little,boy you imagine is related, more-or-less, to that Jerry --stories you tell become (whether or not they should) to stories I remember --and hadn't thought about until I read your post again, one of those strangers coming out,malts at night (midnight here) shivering and cold, "needing" --isn't that importantm and a basis for community right there! --to be "in need", and not in need of just anything, but in need of what has become "precious" --Fire!! For both light and heat! --such purpose! Not sure that there was any preciousness in "Alice and Jerry" --maybe more in Spot, named for his blackness, such a contrast with those white bones he was served but this is taking me even further from (or,then again, bringing me back to either or both light and heat,(indeed, I'm getting "fired up" ----and light and heat can be manifestations of things quite huge! --but you apply reigns and maintain connections with the local (you're quite good at that, Bob) --"Hey buddy, you got a match? --heat and light becoming potable, able to fit in a pocket where heat and light are anyway, pockets of existence, --and that's very good, but I leanred to keep,away from matches --when my braids,caught fire, when I was eight years old, something for me to think about --I have so much to,think about, even more illumination (light and heat)'from tlur posts, Fan #1 is still on the heated job.