Language is essential to culture, especially for Aboriginal people, who use oral storytelling to pass on knowledge from one generation to another.
The impact of colonisation on traditional languages has been devastating. Many of the hundreds that flourished before white settlement have no fluent speakers left.
Wanngan & Yagalinggu woman, Sharon Ford, hopes to change that with a language project she's been working on over the past two years.
The Wirdi Online Dictionary aims to teach people from Wanngan and Yagalinggu Country - located in Central Queensland - their traditional language online.
"Our ancestors were taken away from country and put into missions. Within the missions they weren't allowed to speak language, so the impact of colonisation on our people and our culture caused a loss of language," Ford told NITV News.
Tradional Wirdi language will be revitalised thanks to an online learning resource. Source: Wirdi Language Dictionary
"We don't really have any fluent language-speakers left, (for) this project we relied on video (from) when researchers have gone and talked to our old people, as well as audio from our Aunties and Uncles that (have) passed on."
The new online tool has just launched, and holds a plethora of information on the Wirdi language. Using an interactive dictionary, it aims to revitalise the traditional language.
"The project was developed to encourage learning language, our language is our identity and this project was to help our children and our grandchildren reclaim our identity (and) revitalise our unique language. Growing up, my uncle always told me we were the Wirdi people, and spoke in language to me."
Wirdi woman, Lyndell Turbane from Wangan and Jagalingou Country has been able to watch her children reconnect to their cultural ties.
"The online language app is helping all of my children learn and understand and reconnect. My youngest son Michael aged 7 enjoys learning and is soaking up the knowledge and language being past down for him to learn.
"He learns words at school and then comes home to ask me what our language word is for the words he is learning at school. When we do go back up Country he identifies with the surroundings."
"I get great pleasure from watching them learn our language that my grandparents and parents were told not to speak. With the app it will give the kids a chance to speak to each other in language; our language!"
