Jane's mog - Australiana

Jane's mog - Australiana

Jane's mog Index

Australiana

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What do I love about this "Lucky Country"?

Firstly, the landscape, best described by Dorothea Mackellar in her poem My Country.

As it is subject to copyright I can't reproduce it, but you can find it by clicking here.

Secondly, I love this country for its values: If we don't always live up to them, we nonetheless try to give everyone a fair go, take people as we find them, give generously to strangers in trouble, and value our freedom - for which so many have given their lives or their health.

I'm also rather fond of our dry, off-beat humour, our sometimes daggy birds and other animals, and our willingness to learn about and engage with the rest of the world.

Australiana Index:

How to say "Aussie" like an Aussie
Australian slang
Strine
Australian slang or colloquialisms used in this mog

How to say "Aussie" like an Aussie [©08/12/09]

If you remember The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet, just say Ozzie. Or think of Oz, which lies at the end of the yellow brick road. Pretend the word Aussie is spelt Ozzie. The word "Aussie" should not be pronounced with a hard S sound, as in "horsie". If you want to go the whole hog and sing "Aussie, Aussie, Aussie, oi, oi, oi", just remember the word "goy" - singing "Ozzie Ozzie Ozzie, oy, oy, oy."

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Australian Slang — [the old Jack Lang] [©01/10/07]

Cockney Rhyming Slang
In the second half of the 19th Century, members of the London underworld developed a Secret LANGuage based on two-part rhymes. For example, they might use the expression "apple and pears" to mean "stairs".

Outsiders [such as the police] could not know what was being said unless they knew the meaning was based on a rhyme, and also knew what the rhyme stood for.
When the second part of the rhyme was dropped in conversation — for example, simply saying "apple" instead of apple and pears, the conversation was even harder for an eavesdropper to understand.

Over time, this form of slang was adopted by — and became associated with — Cockney costermongers [Costermongers being them what pushed a barrer rahnd, floggin' things in the streets, like].

Although some English slang came to Australia with white settlers, rhyming slang was not used very widely in Australia before the 1900s.

How Australian Slang Works
By its very nature, slang is colloquial, and reflects the culture and attitudes of the people who develop it, so Australian slang, at its best, laughs at things and people that are Australian. Sometimes it is an Australian version of Rhyming Slang, and sometimes it is completely different.

One Australian habit is to take a perfectly short and adequate word and make it longer than necessary, or even invent a long word just for the sake of it:

Someone whose name is John might be called Jonathon, or Jonathon Apple, or Jonathon Apple Tree or Jonathon Apple Tree Planting and Pruning Proprietary Limited, even though his parents simply named him John.

Someone who cheats at marbles, by moving over the line before firing, is a "fanannywhacker" rather than simply a "cheat".

Conversely — perhaps even perversely — we like to shorten things which are already long.

Thus, the word "underwear" becomes "undies".

For many of the early years of Australian TV, Reg Grundy was a man/company that produced most of our TV game shows.
Naturally, one or two people noticed the word "undies" rhymes with "Reg Grundies".
Eventually, the expression Reg Grundies was shortened again to "Reg's" and then, now that Reg Grundy only has the occasional show on our TV screens, the word for underwear has been lengthened again [by some] to "Reginalds".

Australian slang is not so much secretive as it is, sometimes, obscure! [Six degrees of separation applied to words, no less!]

Famous people with two-part names
are popular sources of new, humourously slang expressions.
"Jack Lang" became slang for "slang" a long time ago — when Australians still knew or remembered that Jack was the Premier of the State of New South Wales, [1925-1927 and 1930-1932].

As his memory has faded, so has the use of the expression, but new expressions based on new names are popping up all the time.

If you really want to sound like an Aussie when you use rhyming slang, the following rules generally apply:

RULE 1 - try not to use the second part of the rhyme, unless necessary for the hearer to "get it"

My oldest brother is a fanatical supporter of the Essendon Football Club, and their coach for many years was the highly successful Kevin Sheedy. So, if my brother said "I could eat another pie, but I don't want to be Kevin" I would know [from the context] he means he doesn't want to be greedy.
If he were talking to someone else, he might use the whole name Kevin Sheedy, just to make sure the other person had a chance to enjoy the joke. Or he might not use rhyming slang at all, if the person he is talking to might not know how it works.

RULE 2 - never ever use the second part of the rhyme if it is a euphemism for something quite rude or possibly offensive

Many people use the expression "drop kick" to mean someone who is a bit of a dill... meaning not the brightest crayon in the box... as in a couple of ants short of a picnic...

Although this is a rather friendly and harmless insult today, it originally started out as a reference to two types of kick in Aussie rules football, [not just a drop kick]. So, no, it was never intended to mean something rhyming with kick — rather it was originally intended to rhyme with another word ladies or gentlemen would never use. In fact, it was so rude I think we'll just move on to rule 3:

RULE 3 - avoid using names that are no longer topical

A cricketer called Rodney Hogg lent his name some years ago to a euphemism for taking a trip to the bathroom, but this would no longer be current. [It would, actually, be a little rude - but far more "polite" than the word his name was a substitute for.]

RULE 4 - avoid cockneyisms

like "apple and pears" for stairs. When I was younger [truth is... much younger] my uncles used cockney slang, but only the first word, [e.g. "apple"] That was a jolly long time ago. The use of cockney is now hackneyed! ...

RULE 4 -THE CORROLLARY - use words for things that are popular with Australians, like beer, football, cricket, horseracing [and other highly evolved cultural icons]

Germaine Greer is not so topical as she once was, so I would not expect many people to use her name as slang for "Beer" these days. [Unless she's back in Oz at the time, for one of her brief, guerilla skirmishes with our sensibilities].
On the other hand, one of Sydney's important racetracks is Warwick Farm, so this will continue to mean "arm" for some time to come.
"Noah's Ark" for shark will fade, and probably be replaced, as the number of children taking bible studies diminishes.

RULE 5 - Be aware of state rivalries and geographical distances

Williamstown is a seaside suburb west of Melbourne, Victoria, so I might use the expression "Williamstown Piers" for ears, but someone from Western Australia might better understand the expression "Busselton Piers".

Busselton Pier WA — construction of this jetty began in 1865 — it is now 2 kilometres long, and has a train on it to take people from one end to the other

RULE 6 - try to find an expression that actually epitomises what you are trying to say

Stuart Diver is apt for "survivor". In case you missed the story, in 1997, there was a landslide at the Thredbo Snow resort, and 18 people were killed, but Stuart survived for 65 hours buried below freezing rubble and snow.

"Merri Creek" was an apt and popular expression for "Greek", because it flows through or near suburbs which had a high Greek population. By the way, did you know Melbourne is one of the largest Greek cities in the world, outside of Athens? Are we non-Greeks happy about this?

Oopa, oopa, moussaka!
Kataifi, Baklava!

Alternatively, try to find an expression that is unlikely, or creates an image at odds with the topic at hand

like the great Australian gourmet treat, a "dog's eye" [for pie] with "dead horse" [for tomato sauce] — yum!

RULE 7 - use rhyming slang sparingly

Surprise is one of the ingredients of humour, so any joke can wear thin after a while.
Fortunately, there are always other jokes available, as the main ingredient of humour is simply truth. In fact, as Mark Twain observed, sometimes, the truth just can't be topped:

Two members of Australia's previous federal government were Tony Abbott and Peter Costello. From time to time they obliged our media by saying or doing questionable things at the same time... so when the headlines talked about Abbott and Costello, they were talking neither Rhyming Slang nor who's on first...

RULE 8 - Something that sounds weird might not be slang, it might be just weird

For many years, a popular dish "peculiar" to South Australia was the pie floater. This consisted of a meat pie dropped into a bowl of pea soup. I can't say they taste disgusting, because I've never tried one... couldn't bring myself to...

Strine

Strine is not rhyming slang but if you are younger than I am [and the odds are you are] you might be curious about the origins of this word which means "Australian".

In 1965 Ure Smith publishers released a book called Let Stalk Strine, ostensibly by an author named Afferbeck Lorder. The title and author's name translate - with an Aussie accent - into "Let's Talk Australian" by Alpabetical Order. The real author's name was Alistair Morrison, and many of the examples he used in this book [and the sequel, Nose Tone Unturned] became widely loved euphemisms for common expressions. For example, if you wanted to know the price of something, you simply asked "Emma?", or Emma Chisett [how much is it?].

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budgie-smugglers - Budgies [or budgerigars] are small birds of the Australian genus melopsittacus, 17 to 20 cm tall [about 6.5 to 7.8 inches in English]. They are actually very small if you ignore the long tail feathers. In fact, the body is really, really small. Budgie-smugglers are male swimsuits of the Australian genus Speedo. [In the US budgies are more commonly known as Pet Parakeets.] back to article

thongs - comfortable and practical footwear - NOT underwear - which is an important part of the Australian National Costume. Some un-Australians call them "flip-flops", because of the irritating noise they make if one does not know how to walk in them properly. - back to article

billy lid - rhyming slang for "kid". A billy is a tin for boiling water in, or making bush tea. The sort of
thing a jolly swagman might use while camped by a billabong, under the shade of a coolabah tree.
- back to article

ANZAC - an acronym for Australian and New Zealand Army Corps. Also the name of a popular biscuit [cookie] - originally made for diggers [soldiers] during WWI. You will find a recipe for these at http://www.bestrecipes.com.au/recipe/Anzac-Biscuits-L79.html - back to article

gubba - white person, from various corruptions of the word "government", e.g. "gubbamin" - back to article

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