Australian and NZ English PDF

English Around The World 5. Australian and NZ English Timeline of the Development of Australian English 1788: Arrival of the First Fleet - British colonization begins, bringing various dialects of English from Britain, Ireland, and other parts of the British Empire to Australia. 1800s: Formati...

English Around The World 5. Australian and NZ English Timeline of the Development of Australian English 1788: Arrival of the First Fleet - British colonization begins, bringing various dialects of English from Britain, Ireland, and other parts of the British Empire to Australia. 1800s: Formation of Early Australian Vernacular - English in Australia begins to develop distinct characteristics influenced by the diverse linguistic backgrounds of settlers, including convicts and free immigrants. Late 1800s-1901: Establishment of Australian Identity and Federation - The distinct Australian accent and lexicon begin to take shape, with words like bush, dingo, and swag gaining prominence. The Federation of Australia in 1901 further solidifies a national identity, contributing to the development of a more distinct Australian English. Late 1800s-mid 1900s: Emergence of Cultivated Australian English - Some Australians, particularly those in socially aspirational classes, began modifying their vowels to align with British Received Pronunciation. This period saw the rise of elocution teaching, aimed at promoting British speech patterns, which led to the development of "Cultivated Australian," a more British-influenced form of Australian English. 1980s-Present: Recognition and Standardization – Following the decline of the Cultivated Australian speech patterns, Australian English is recognized as a distinct variety of English. Efforts are made to document and standardize Australian vocabulary, pronunciation, and grammar. Australian culture Australian culture is stereotypically associated with several traits such as egalitarianism, authenticity, resilience, irreverent humor, and national pride. These are reflected in well-known Australian English words. For example, the word larrikin /ˈlærɪkɪn/ was originally used in the 19th century to describe ‘a rowdy young person or a hooligan.’ But the word has evolved to refer to someone who is mischievous, irreverent, and challenges authority, but in a way that is more playful and good-natured than malicious. This concept ties into the broader Australian cultural traits of egalitarianism, a disdain for pretentiousness, and a willingness to flout rules or social norms for the sake of humor or individuality. 27  KAJ / CSJAQ & KAJ / SAJ Task 1 The following is a selection of distinctly Australian words that reflect the main Australian characteristics. Insert the words in the blank spaces. Aussie /ˈɒzɪ/, battler, fair dinkum /ˌfeər ˈdɪŋ kəm /, mate This phrase means genuine or honest, and it reflects the Australian cultural trait of valuing authenticity and straightforwardness. Being ______________ is about being real and true to one's word. A colloquial term for ‘Australian,’ ____________ represents the relaxed, informal, and self-reliant nature of Australian culture. It encapsulates national pride with a laid-back attitude. Reflecting the Australian values of egalitarianism and camaraderie, mate is a term of endearment and respect used between friends and strangers alike, symbolizing the importance of friendship and mutual support. This term refers to someone who works hard and perseveres despite difficulties. The Aussie _______________ is an important cultural archetype, symbolizing resilience, determination, and a refusal to give up in the face of adversity. Features of AusE grammar Australian English (AusE) has some distinctive grammatical features, though many of them are subtle and align closely with other varieties of English, particularly British English. One could make the case that the AusE grammar is virtually indistinguishable from standard English in England. The following is a list of several typical characteristics associated with Australian English. 1. Variable use of the Present Perfect: Where British English might use the present perfect, Australians may use the simple past tense: AusE: I just ate lunch. / I’ve just eaten lunch. BrE: I’ve just eaten lunch. Adverbials like yet and already are used differently in some varieties of English. Cockney and AmE prefer the simple past, standard BrE the present perfect. mAusE permits either, though the simple past may be more informal than the present perfect, as these examples show: (57) "Did I ever send you a copy of his photocopied 'classroom version'?" (pers. letter, Brian Taylor, 4 December 2001) (Leitner 2004: 138-139) 2. Diminutives and Hypocoristics: Common Use of Shortened Words: Australians frequently use diminutives, often adding "-ie," "-o," or "-a" to the ends of words. These often replace full forms in casual speech, as in brekkie (‘breakfast’), servo (‘service station’).  English Around The World Many hypocoristics of common nouns, personal names and placenames are in widespread use in New Zealand and Australia, though they are most common in casual speech and informal writing. While many are spontaneous formations, or restricted to particular trades and hobbies, some, such as rego ‘registration’, compo ‘compensation’, info ‘information’, have made their way into common use. Most consist of one syllable from the base form followed by a vowel (/i/ written “y” or “ie” or “ey”, /oʊ/ written “o” or “oh”, or /ə/ written “-er” or “-a”) or other ending (-s, or -as written “-ers” or “-as”), as blowie ‘blowfly’, journo ‘journalist’, acca ‘cadet who enjoys academic work’, turps ‘turpentine’, preggers ‘pregnant’. Occasionally other sound changes occur, as in the s > z alternation found in Aussie ([z]) from Australian ([s]). Several of the endings are phonetically identical to endings used for creating words for new things which have no existing names (the agentive suffix “-er” which creates nouns from verbs, and its derivative the processive suffix, and the adjectival suffix “-y” which creates adjectives from nouns). (Bardsley & Simpson 2009: 49) While many hypocoristics are confined to Australian and New Zealand English (e.g. pinky ‘newly shorn sheep’), several have gained recognition and usage internationally. Task 2 The following is a list of hypocoristics in New Zealand and Australian English. Which ones have become familiar internationally? arvo ‘afternoon’ foggy ‘the foggiest idea’ hissy ‘hysterical fit’ tantie ‘tantrum’. preggers / preggo ‘pregnant’ barbie ‘barbecue’ brekkie ‘breakfast’ uni ‘university’ cuppa ‘cup of tea’ telly ‘ television’ 3. Tag Questions: Use of eh and but: While tag questions are common in many English varieties, Australian English often uses eh or but in informal settings: It’s hot today, eh? or You’re coming, but? STATE EXAM TERMINOLOGY In conversation analysis, turn-yielding cues and turn-holding cues are important concepts that help explain how participants in a conversation manage and regulate the flow of speech. These cues are subtle verbal and non-verbal signals that speakers use to indicate whether they are ready to hand over the floor to someone else (turn-yielding) or whether they intend to continue speaking (turn-holding). Table 1. Typical turn-final cues found in studies of English conversation. (Skantze 2021: 4) Empty Cell Turn-yielding cues Turn-holding cues Verbal Syntactically complete Syntactically incomplete, Filled pause Prosody Rising or falling pitch, Lower intensity Flat pitch, Higher intensity Breathing Breathe out Breathe in Gaze Looking at addressee Looking away 29  KAJ / CSJAQ & KAJ / SAJ Task 3 Decide whether the Australian tag questions (eh? and but?) represent turn-yielding cues or turn-holding cues. 4. Unique Pronouns: The second-person plural pronoun youse is used informally to refer to more than one person: Are youse coming to the party? Note that standard English has lost the distinction between singular and plural for the second person pronoun you. Originally the second person singular pronoun was thou, but it was supplanted by you. STATE EXAM TERMINOLOGY Standard English is an internationally acceptable variety of English whose features are shared by the major international varieties of English. It is free from features that are unique to regional varieties. Thus, forms like ain’t , youse, or he don’t speak English too good are not part of standard English. Table 1 Second person pronouns in varieties of English (Table 19 in Hickey 2014: 60) 6. Collective Nouns: Similar to British English, collective nouns can take either singular or plural verbs depending on whether the group is seen as a single entity or as individuals: Example: The team is / are winning or The committee is / are arguing. Agreement for collective nouns. Words such as committee and team (which refer to groups or bodies of people) can combine with either singular or plural verbs. You could say: The committee has decided to break for lunch or The committee have decided to break for lunch.  English Around The World The plural option is exercised less often in Australian and American English than in Britain—at least in print. They are nevertheless common in speech generally, and in sports reporting particularly in reference to a team: Australia have won the tournament a record 11 times. Pronunciation Australian and New Zealand English share many phonetic features, and, in fact, they can at first be difficult to tell apart. In terms of pronunciation, similarities include ‘linking r’ (so that ‘law and order’ becomes lawr and order); ‘l-vocalisation’; and the pronunciation of the /t/ sound between vowels so that ‘writer’ and ‘rider’ would sound the same. They also share an intonation feature known as a ‘high rising terminal’ where a declarative clause (or statement) has rising intonation at the end, making it sound like a question. This is sometimes referred to as Australian Questioning Intonation, although it is now also found in several other varieties of English. However, there are some differences between Australian and New Zealand English, most noticeably with the vowel in ‘bit’. In Australia this is raised and fronted (pronounced higher and towards the front of the mouth) so ‘fish and chips’ sounds more like feesh and cheeps. In New Zealand, it has gone in the opposite direction, resulting in a pronunciation something like fush and chups. (Smith 2012: 221) Australian English is not a ‘rhotic’ variety, so /r/ sounds pattern more similarly to British English than U.S. English. However, some speakers ‘flap’ /t/ between vowels (in words such as bitter or in phrases such as get out) in a similar way to U.S. speakers. This appears to be in increasing phenomenon, although there remains variability and at least three other types of /t/ are documented: a British-like /t/., one with /s/-like frication, and a possibly more context-restricted glottal stop. Our Australian English model condenses these into simply ‘unflapped’ and ‘flapped’ transcriptions, /t/ and /d/ respectively, and both forms are given. Purely for consistency, the unflapped pronunciation is given first in each case. (https://www.oed.com/information/understanding-entries/pronunciation/world-englishes/australian-english/#model) Swearing So is there a quintessentially Australian swear word? In the 19th century a visitor to the colonies, Alexander Marjoribanks, in his book Travels in New South Wales (1847) claimed that the word bloody was ubiquitous in Australia – in fact, it was, he declared, “the great Australian adjective”. While travelling through the colonies he observed with disdain that “[o]ne man will tell you that he married a bloody young wife, another, a bloody old one; and a bushranger will call out, ‘Stop, or I’ll blow your bloody brains out.’ ” He calculated that the average Australian bullock-driver – a notorious figure in the history of Australian bad language – would, in a lifetime, say this “disgusting word” no less than 18,200,000 times. Sidney Baker in his classic study of Australian English, The Australian Language (1945), identifies bloody as one of what he calls “the four Bs”, sitting alongside bugger, bastard and bullshit. None are exclusively Australian, of course, but each would likely evoke particularly Australian associations for many of us, and have been well used through our history. Root entered Australian English in the 1940s and quickly established itself in the lexicon. While our first recorded evidence is for the transferred sense of rooted meaning ‘to be finished, ruined, exhausted’, it almost certainly comes from the more literal sense of root meaning ‘sexual intercourse’ (noun and verb both first recorded in 1958). According to the Australian National Dictionary, the origin of the term probably comes from root ‘penis’. By the 1950s popular culture was using get rooted in the sense of ‘get stuffed’ or ‘get fucked’, as well as rooted in the sense of ‘exhausted, fucked’. (Amanda Laugesen, Rooted – An Australian History of Bad Language) 31  KAJ / CSJAQ & KAJ / SAJ Task 4 Match the following expressions with their meanings / functions. (We’re / I’m) not here to is code for sex, which is why Aussies deride Americans fuck spiders for “_____ing” for their favorite team. Fuck me dead is Australian slang used to indicate one has serious business to pursue and should not be wasting time. Shitcunt is used to convey excitement, surprise, anger, or disbelief. Root is a mild insult, as well as a term of endearment used to address very close friends. The social acceptance of swearing explains why obscene language charges in Australia and New Zealand are now typically dismissed, with courts ruling that words such as fuck, shit, and cunt are no longer “offensive” (Allan & Burridge 2009: 382) Compare this to Clean Airwaves Act, which bans specific swear words during TV and radio broadcasts: Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That section 1464 of title 18, United States Code, is amended-- (1) by inserting ``(a)'' before ``Whoever''; and (2) by adding at the end the following: ``(b) As used in this section, the term `profane', used with respect to language, includes the words `shit', `piss', `fuck', `cunt', `asshole', and the phrases `cock sucker', `mother fucker', and `ass hole', compound use (including hyphenated compounds) of such words and phrases with each other or with other words or phrases, and other grammatical forms of such words and phrases (including verb, adjective, gerund, participle, and infinitive forms). (https://www.congress.gov/bill/108th-congress/house- bill/3687/text) A swagman was a foot-traveling seasonal laborer in 19th-/20th-century Australia, later in New Zealand, who carried his belongings in a "swag." They were common during economic downturns like the 1890s and the Great Depression, often seeking farm work in exchange for food and shelter. Their swags, sometimes called Matilda, inspired the song "Waltzing Matilda." English Around The World Homework Read the passage and answer the questions Australian English differs from other Englishes primarily in its accent and vocabulary. The major features of the accent were established by the 1830s. In the period between colonial settlement (1788) and the 1830s, when the foundation accent was being forged, new lexical items to describe the environment, especially its flora and fauna, were developed either from Aboriginal languages (billabong, coolabah, wombat, wallaby, and so on) or from the ‘transported’ English word stock (e.g. wild cherry). Many more vocabulary items were later added in response to the nineteenth-century process of settlement and pastoral expansion. All of this seems at once predictable and inevitable—this is the way a colonial society imposes its linguistic footprint on a subjected land. Pronunciation: cultivated, broad, and general Australian And then, at the end of the nineteenth century, something curious and largely unpredictable happened to Australian English. In response to a newly-developed concept of Received Pronunciation in Britain, which was closely tied to notions of social prestige, some Australian speakers modified their vowels and diphthongs in order to move them towards the British exemplars. From the 1890s, and well into the 1950s, elocution was in the air, and elocution teachers found a ready market for the teaching of British vowels and diphthongs to the socially-aspirational classes. This modified form of Australian speech came to be called Cultivated Australian. As if in response against this new British-based Cultivated Australian, a diametrically opposed form of Australian English developed in the first part of the twentieth century. This form moved the Australian vowels and diphthongs even further away from what was now the British standard of pronunciation, and emphasized nasality, flatness of intonation, and the elision of syllables. This second modified form of Australian speech came to be called Broad Australian. While it is true that when non-Australians hear any Australian say ‘mate’ or ‘race’ they are likely to mistake the words for ‘mite’ and ‘rice’, the mishearing is most likely to occur with speakers of Broad Australian. The majority of Australians continued to speak with the accent that had been established in the first fifty years of settlement, and this form of speech came to be known as General Australian. General Australian was now book-ended by Cultivated Australian and Broad Australian, and these forms of Australian English came to carry with them very different sets of values. Cultivated Australian, for example, came to express a longing for British values and a nostalgia for a country that was still regarded by many as ‘home’. Broad Australian was strongly nationalistic, and carried with it notions of egalitarianism that were antagonistic to a perceived class-obsessed and hierarchical Britain. All three forms of Australian English included most of the vocabulary items that had developed in the second half of the nineteenth century: billy (any container in which water may be carried and boiled over a campfire), swag (transferred from the underworld sense of ‘booty’) as the collection of belongings of a bush traveller, and swagman as their bearer; the outback and the never-never to describe country far from urban areas; and so on. The rise of an Australian lexis In lexis, a number of the most culturally important Australian terms developed towards the end of the nineteenth century, at precisely the time that Australian English was generating its Cultivated and Broad forms. Battler (especially in its present manifestation of little Aussie battler) is one of the most positive words in Australian English, and it usually refers to a person who works hard to make a decent living in difficult circumstances. Initially, the battler was a person who scrounged a living on the edges of society: an itinerant and irregularly employed rural worker struggling to survive (1898); a person who frequented racecourses in search of a living (1895); a prostitute (1898). Battler eventually divested itself of the associations of the prostitute, but even in its earliest uses there is evidence of strong sympathy and admiration for working-class people who eke out their existence with resilience and courage. The opposite of the battler is the bludger—one of the most derogatory of Australian words. The bludger is a person who lives off the efforts of others, a cadger and an idler, a person who expects others to do all the work. The history of this word helps to explain something of the moral condemnation that bludger and its verb to bludge typically carry. Australian bludger is a form of Standard English bludgeoner ‘a person who is armed with and doesn’t hesitate to use a bludgeon, a short stout club’. In Australia the bludger became a pimp who was prepared to protect his financial stake in a 33  KAJ / CSJAQ & KAJ / SAJ prostitute by resorting to the violence of the bludgeon. The salient feature in this, and all later senses, is that the person who is called a bludger is living off the work of another and, from this sense, it is a short step to the use of bludger as a generalized term of abuse. Dinkum emerges at about the same time. Dinkum is from British dialect, where it meant primarily ‘work; a fair share of work’. The notion of ‘fairness’ has always been associated with dinkum, and it is from this connotation of ‘fairness’ that the particularly Australian meaning ‘reliable, genuine, honest, true’ developed in the first decade of the twentieth century. It was also at this time that the collocation fair go appeared, an important expression of egalitarian principles. The continuing significance of this phrase in Australian society is evidenced by the fact that a recent Federal Government booklet Life in Australia (2007), aimed at new migrants, explains what is meant by a fair go in Australia: ‘Australians value equality of opportunity and what is often called a “fair go”. This means that what someone achieves in life should be a product of their talents, work and effort rather than their birth or favouritism. Australians have a spirit of egalitarianism that embraces mutual respect, tolerance and fair play. … The aim is to ensure there are no formal class distinctions in Australian society’. Although dinkum (and its variant fair dinkum) appeared in the 1890s, the evidence indicates that its really widespread use occurred during the First World War. Australian English and national identity These Australianisms were very much a part of Broad Australian and General Australian. They were certainly not a part of Cultivated Australian, the prestige form of Australian English in the public domain where, in the first half of the twentieth century, the Australian accent and the colloquial elements of the Australian vocabulary were condemned, with reference to putative and actual British standards. Here was a paradox: the Australian accent and the core words that carried and embodied Australian values (and which were therefore central to notions of nationhood and identity) were judged to be substandard and second-rate. In the second half of the twentieth century, the weakening ties with Britain (especially as a result of Britain’s joining of the European Economic Community) and the emergence of new forms of nationalism, this situation was gradually reversed. Australian English became ‘naturalized’ in its own country, its accent and vocabulary were accepted as a national norm, and it was celebrated in such works as the Australian National Dictionary of 1988. In the first half of the twentieth century Cultivated Australian had been the socially prestigious accent; by the end of the century its utterance was likely to generate derision and laughter. As a result, Broad Australian, too, has been in decline, as if this extreme form was no longer required now that the imperial elements were dead. General Australian is now to the fore—as it had been before the false dawns of Cultivated and Broad. (https://www.oed.com/discover/introduction-to-australian-english/) 1. What are the primary features that distinguish Australian English from other Englishes? A. Grammar and syntax B. Accent and vocabulary C. Punctuation D. Spelling When was the foundation accent of Australian English established? A. Before colonial settlement B. During the colonial settlement period C. In the early 19th century D. In the late 19th century How were many new lexical items introduced into Australian English? A. By borrowing from European languages and inventing entirely new words C. By adopting words from Aboriginal languages and adapting existing English words What is the Australian word for a ‘cooking utensil’? A. outback  English Around The World B. bludger C. battler D. billy What was the impact of Received Pronunciation on Australian English? A. Its popularity lasted only in the first half of the 20th century. B. Its legacy continues to be felt in present day Australia and New Zealand. B. It caused Australian English to become more similar to American English. C. It resulted in the creation of the current Australian accent. What point does the author make about Broad Australian? A. It was intended to sound distinct from Cultivated Australian. B. It was created to emulate Received Pronunciation. C. It was more prestigious than General Australian. D. It was modeled on New Zealand English. What is the meaning of the Australian term dinkum? A. ‘a hardworking person’ B. ‘far away from cities’ B. ‘genuine and true’ C. ‘a lazy person’ How has the status of Australian English changed over time? A. It has become less respected and less widely used. B. It has become more standardized and more accepted. C. It has become more influenced by other English varieties. D. It has become less distinct from other English varieties. What is the current dominant form of Australian English? A. Cultivated Australian B. Broad Australian C. General Australian D. Aboriginal English References Hickey, Raymond. (2014). A Dictionary of Varieties of English. Oxford: Wiley. Skantze, Gabriel. (2021). Turn-taking in Conversational Systems and Human-Robot Interaction: A Review. Computer Speech & Language 67: 101178. Smith, Jennifer. (2012). English and Englishes. In Philip Seargeant & Joan Swann (Eds.), English in the World. History, Diversity, Change. Oxford: Routledge. 35