The grammar and conceptualisation of motion in Iwaidja

Different languages have different ways of using spatial language, grammatically and conceptually. This paper reports on aspects of the language of motion in Iwaidja, an indigenous Australian language. The way that Iwaidja groups and separates spatial concepts such as direction, height and movement in relation to another object are briefly described using examples from a route description task. The implications are discussed in terms of how understanding these grammatical features can help teachers of Indigenous students, as well as providing keys to cross-linguistic investigations of mathematical cognition.Spatial frames of reference in Iwaidja (Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies