1. Australian society is an individualistic society and
Australians tend to control the situation and to achieve
their goals by themselves. The Power is quite
horizontally distributed.
2. Australian society today is multi-cultural and multifaith. Aussies generally respect others’ opinions.
3. Australian society is mainly a male society and even
women tend to be assertive and competitive as men (a
common myth is for example the ‘bushranger’).
4. Australians value modesty, humility and sincerity.
They don’t draw attention to their academic
achievements, to their status or position or to their
success in general. They distrust people who do.
5. Australians give high value to social relationships.
They also commonly exchange small gifts between
friends and between trades people too. They offer
their help to their friends, for example when invited to
a barbecue (a habit in Australia).
6. Australians are direct and assertive in the way they
communicate. They like brevity. They often use colorful
language.
7. Australians like punctuality and don’t like waiting.
8. Australian are informal and casual in greetings and
clothing.
9. Australians generally respect nature and are aware of
environmental issues. Nature has also an important
role in Australian everyday life.
Links:
See the most important links: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australia
http://www.kwintessential.co.uk/resources/global-etiquette/australia.html
http://www.geert-hofstede.com/hofstede_australia.shtml
http://fits.depauw.edu/mkfinney/culturaleresumes/australia/WorldView.ht
m
http://www.youtube.com/ (videos with Cate Blanchett, Megan Gale,
common people, ect.).
Read and listen to the folk song of Australia “Waltzing Matilda”:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6dVZo5a4_Ok &
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waltzing_matilda. Read and listen to the
national anthem of Australia “Advance Australia Fair”:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advance_Australia_Fair#Lyrics (the current
version). See the film ‘Australia’, 2008 by Baz Luhrmann, with Nicole
Kidman e Hugh Jackman.
Part A: phonemic level
General Australian pronunciation:
the usage of /aː/ (the "long a") as opposed to /æ/ ("short a") of the RP
pronunciation in words like ‘graph’, ‘chance’, ‘France’, ‘dance’, ‘demand’, ‘castle’,
‘grasp’, ‘bath’, ‘palm’, ‘start’, ‘bard’, ‘hard’ and ‘contrast’;
Other pronunciation differences:
- Australia pronounced [əˈstɹæɪljə] instead of [aus.'tra.lja];
- G-day where day is pronounced [‘dai] instead of [‘dei] as in the other words
containing the word ‘day’;
- I pronounced [a] instead of [‘ai];
-Good pronounced [‘gəd] instead of [‘gʊd].
 General Australian is also characterized by a rising intonation at the end of
sentences.
Part B: morphemic level
Most common different spelling:
-'program' more common than programme and ‘gaol’
instead of jail
Australians also use ‘youse’ as the plural form of the pronoun
you adding the suffix –se as in American English: 'how are
youse?'.
Part C: lexemic level
 Suffixation with –ie/-y or –o:
Australian(s) that became Aussie(s), then cossie for ‘costume’, barbie
for ‘barbeque’, arvo for ‘afternoon’, journo for ‘journalist’, muso for
‘musician’, servo for ‘service station’, brekky for ‘breakfast’, bickie or
bikky for ‘biscuit’ and so on.
 Vocabulary:
-words which are strictly connected with the Australian history and
landscape:
•Bush or scrub: any wooded area or from a social and/or political
perspective it refers to any populated region outside of the major
metropolitan areas;
•Bushranger: a criminal outlaw who had the survival skills necessary
to use the Australian bush as a refuge to hide from the authorities in
the early years of the British settlement of Australia;
•mate: a friend; a companion;
•paddock: a field in British English;
•dinky-di: 'true', ‘genuine’ or ‘devoted’ in expressions like 'dinky-di
Aussie' that means ‘true Australian’;
- Other useful words:
G’day: ‘good day’, a stereotypical Australian greeting (it
can be used also at night time);
footpath: pavement in British English;
weekender: holiday cottage;
sheila: girl or woman;
lolly: sweet;
shanty: pub;
broke for: in need of;
fed with : tired of.
- Vocabulary influenced by Australian aboriginal languages:
dingo: wolflike yellowish-brown wild dog of Australia;
cooee: as a high-pitched call for attracting attention;
yakka: Hard yakka means hard work;
didgeridoo: a well-known aboriginal wooden musical instrument
dreamtime: in the mythology of most Indigenous Australians, a
"golden age" when the first ancestors and living things were
created.
outback: a sparsely populated area, far from towns;
There are also many other many other words which are used differently in Australian
English. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_English_vocabulary and
http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Appendix:Australian_English_vocabulary for more
explanation.
Part D: syntactic level
•Different usage of : used to
- negative form: in AusE usedn’t to against didn’t used to;
- interrogative form: in AusE used she to do it? against did she used to do it?
•Different usage of prepositions which introduce the object of comparison:
- to/from/than:
AusE : Cricket is different to baseball.
BrE:Cricket is different from baseball.
AmE:Cricket is different than baseball.
•Different concord with sport team names and uncountable nouns:
Aussies use the singular with these nouns which are usually considered plural
nouns in BrE:
- Ex: North Melbourne is playing well.
Part E: textual level
The use of ‘as if’ as an exclamatory rejection:
- "As if they're real tears!“
- "The case was dismissed? As if."
Part F: (normative) pragmatic level
-When Aussies meet they use g'day which means ‘good day, hello’
and it’ the typical Aussie greeting. When they leave they say
hooroo that means ‘goodbye’. When they thank, they just say ta
(‘thank you’, derived from infant speech). Australian use ‘I’m good’
to say ‘I’m fine’.
-They also use expressions like carn (which is an assimilation of
"come on!" or "Go on!") to invite someone. Australians use
expression like ‘Let's go take a gander…’ or ‘Take a squiz at…’ to
say ‘to take a look’.
- Aussies use also a lot of different way to express surprise and
approval as for example:
Crikey! (exclamation of surprise);
hooly dooley (exclamation of surprise used when something out
of the ordinary happens; similar "good heavens", "my
goodness", "good grief", etc.);
beauty! (exclamation showing approval which is roughly
equivalent to ‘Great!’, ‘Fantastic!’ or ‘Wonderful!’);
‘It was the cat's pyjamas/cat's whiskers!’(which means
something great or perfectly suited);
‘she's apples/ she'll be apples!’ (that means everything is all
right);
‘she'll be right’ (that means it will be okay, it'll turn out all right).
- Australians use idiomatic expression as for example:
‘to give it a burl’ that means ‘to try something’ ‘to have a go’;
‘to feel crook’ that means ‘to feel sick’;
‘kangaroos loose in the top paddock’ that’s used to refer to
someone considered intellectually inadequate.
- Colorful language is very common and is used also to talk about
common things as for example:
piece of piss: used to refer to an easy task;
pig's arse: to say ‘I don't agree with you’;
it’pissing down: that means ‘it’s raining heavy’;
shits: used in several expressions including ‘shits me’ (or more
strongly ‘shits me to tears’) and ‘gives me the shits’ all meaning a
combination of ‘annoys me’ and ‘makes me angry’;
- When speaking Australian often have false starts as ‘I…I…I
mean…’. They also use stock phrases as ‘you know’, ‘yeah’,
‘uhm…’ and so on.
Links:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KpBYnL5fAXE&feature=PlayList&p=0A3E1F13FA
145720&index=1&playnext=2&playnext_from=PL
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0EYLMmRCXbs&feature=PlayList&p=0A3E1F13F
A145720&index=0&playnext=1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Rl4rEaAZLM&feature=PlayList&p=A3926C628
DC1C2DE&playnext=1&playnext_from=PL&index=14
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dgYJChshyno&NR=1
http://www.abc.net.au/ra/australia/now/default.htm
http://www.lycos.com/info/australian-english--general-australian-english.html
http://www.doctorconnect.gov.au/internet/otd/publishing.nsf/Content/workAustralian+English
http://reese.linguist.de/English/australia.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_English
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_English_phonology
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_English_vocabulary
http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Appendix:Australian_English_vocabulary
http://www.canberratimes.com.au/
http://blacktown.yourguide.com.au/
http://www.theage.com.au/