Speakers of these languages had a form of
avoidance speech called
gnee wee banott (turn tongue) which required special terms and grammar in conversations when a man and mother-in-law were speaking in each other's company. Thus, if one asked: "Where are you going just now?", this would be phrased in normal speech as: •
Wuunda gnin kitneean? In Gunditjmara avoidance speech the same sentiment would be articulated quite differently: •
Wuun gni gnin gninkeewan? Ngamadjidj The term
ngamadjidj was used to denote
white people by the Gunditjmara, with the same word used in the
Wergaia dialect of the
Wemba Wemba language. The word is also used to refer to
ghosts, as people with pale skins were thought to be the spirits of ancestors. The first known use is to refer to
William Buckley, an escaped convict who lived with the
Wathaurong people near
Geelong from 1803 until 1856. The term was also applied to John Green, manager at
Coranderrk, an
Aboriginal reserve north-east of Melbourne between 1863 and 1924. It was also recorded as being used to describe other missionaries such as William Watson in
Wellington, New South Wales, by the local
Wiradjuri people. The term was a compliment, as it meant that the local people thought that they had been an Aboriginal person once - based largely on the fact that they could speak the local language. Ngamadjidj is also the name given to a
rock art site in a shelter in the
Grampians National Park, sometimes translated as the "Cave of Ghosts". ==Status and language revival==