The Australian vernacular was christened “strine” back in the 1960s by the famed Australian academic and linguist, Affabeck Lauder. I give this tidbit as some background for the topic of this post and the video below.
I was asked by a YouTuber to explain some Aussie slang which they apparently find impenetrable. Bloody Seppos. Strictly speaking, strine is about the accent, not the slang (“strine” is how far too many Australians pronounce “Australian”) but I never let the facts get in my way. So if you need a quick primer in what the hell Australians are talking about, watch this:
Angry 365 Days a Year 
Streuth! That brought back some memories.. does anyone still use that term? Oh and I had an outdoor dunny for a few years growing up on the outskirts of Sydney, which makes me more westie than your average westie.
G’dye. 😉
I’ve long been fascinated by Oz, since I was a young boy in fact, and this brought to mind an experience I had back in my university days in the late 1970’s.
In Toronto, there’s an annual cultural festival called Caravan (http://www.caravan-org.com/) and one of the venues back then was the local TRANZAC club.
Naturally, that was a must for me — good beer, lots of fun and (pseudo)culture like a group of expat Kiwis doing Maori war dances.
What this post reminded me of most though was a leaflet they handed out called something like “Let Stalk Strine” which gave some examples of, well, Strine.
For instance: “It’s ‘ot in ‘ere, turn on the egg nisher”
What’s that, you say?
“It’s hot in here, turn on the air conditioner” of course 😉
There were some others that escape me now, but it’s still a dream of mine to someday visit Oz (where, as they say, the men are men and the sheep are nervous…)
ROB!!! That’s the Kiwis!!! The trans-tasman rivalry (The Tasman is the “Ditch” (They pronounce it “Dutch”) between Oz and NZ), and the general belief of either side, is that the other side spends all it’s time rooting sheep. I live on a sheep and cattle station, and I can honestly say I’ve never rooted a sheep.
Honest!!!
But there’s this calf I know….
And Mr A, I might “head out bush” today and do a vid response (In my typical Yass style)…
Michelle: I say “stewth” too, I was going to put that in the video but I forgot.
Rob: The Oz accent can make the most basic thing unintelligible, particularly to North Americans. I remember an incident where a singer from New York couldn’t understand an audience member talking about his car. “Your ka? What’s that?”
Grunstki: We think the kiwis are sheep shaggers, they say we are, the english think the welsh are… everyone has someone they think is a sheep shagger. And definitely do the video! Maybe we could do a series…
I loved those Afferbeck Lauder books, Nose Tone Unturned (if I’ve got that title right.) is the only one I can find anymore though, Let’s Talk Strine seems to have been lost.
I seem to remember neighbours characters refering to a person as a “flaming gala”. I never really thought anyone would use that in real life though.
Full marks for picking up on the chav being used over here in the UK. To be specific it refers to tracksuit wearing, white trainered, lager swilling thugs in burberry knockoff clothes.
Both wanker and shout are brit-slang too.
“Flaming Galah” is 100% dinky-di. I have heard it used often in my life, far more often in the country than the city. It’s a polite way of saying fucking idiot.
you could have explained bogan a bit more, being American i don’t quite get the exact definition but i believe from just common knowledge it means basically an obnoxious all around annoying person am i correct?
Yep, you got it.