Warlpiri - Settlements

Traditionally, shelter was provided mainly in the form of low windbreaks, but in rainy periods more substantial domed huts with spinifex thatch were used. Nowadays, most Warlpiri live in towns ranging in size from 300 to 1,200 people, most of whom are Warlpiri speakers. The core of each town includes a store from which all day-to-day nutritional and material requirements are bought, a clinic, a primary school, a municipal office, a workshop, usually a church and a police station, and a number of European-style houses. The professional staff are nearly all non-Aborigines; all of them are assisted by Warlpiri coworkers and occupy the European houses along with a limited number of Warlpiri. The remainder of the Warlpiri population live in a wide variety of housing, ranging from "humpies" (sheets of corrugated iron arranged in a tentlike structure), through one- and two-room huts, to various kinds of more substantial housing. Access to immediately located water and electricity is poor for all but those in good housing; the situation is, however, slowly improving.