Australian English

Australian English (AusE,AusEng, AuE, AuEng, en-AU) is the set of varieties of the

English language

native to

Australia

.

Australian English is the country's national and ''de facto'' common language. English is the first language of the majority of the population, being the only language spoken in the home for approximately 72.7% of the population. It is also the main language used in compulsory education, as well as federal, state and territorial legislatures and courts.

Australian English began to diverge from British and Irish English after the First Fleet established the Colony of New South Wales in 1788. Australian English arose from a dialectal 'melting pot' created by the intermingling of early settlers who were from a variety of dialectal regions of

Great Britain

and

Ireland

. By the 1820s, the native-born colonists' speech was recognisably distinct from that of British Isles speakers.

Australian English differs from other varieties of English in its

phonology

, pronunciation,

lexicon

, idiom, grammar and

spelling

. Australian English is relatively consistent across the continent, however it encompasses numerous regional and sociocultural varieties. 'General Australian' describes the ''de-facto'' standard dialect which is perceived to be free of pronounced regional or sociocultural markers and which is often used in the media.

History

The earliest Australian English was spoken by the first generation of native-born colonists in the Colony of New South Wales from the end of the 18th century. These native-born children were exposed to a wide range of dialects from across the

British Isles

.. The process of dialect levelling and koineisation which ensued produced a relatively homogenous new variety of English which was easily understood by all. Peter Miller Cunningham's 1827 book ''Two Years in New South Wales'' described the distinctive accent and vocabulary that had developed among the native-born colonists.

The dialects of South East England, including most notably the traditional Cockney dialect of

London

, were particularly influential on the development of the new variety and constituted 'the major input of the various sounds that went into constructing' Australian English. All the other regions of England were represented among the early colonists. A large proportion of early convicts and colonists were from Ireland, and spoke Irish as a sole or first language. They were joined by other non-native speakers of English from

Scotland

and

Wales

.

The first of the Australian gold rushes in the 1850s began a large wave of immigration, during which about two percent of the population of the United Kingdom emigrated to the colonies of New South Wales and Victoria. The Gold Rushes brought immigrants and linguistic influences from many parts of the world. An example was the introduction of vocabulary from American English, including some terms later considered to be typically Australian, such as ''bushwhacker'' and ''squatter''. This American influence was continued with the popularity of American films from the early 20th century and the influx of American military personnel during World War II; seen in the enduring persistence of such universally-accepted terms as ''

okay

'' and ''guys''.

The publication of Edward Ellis Morris's ''Austral English: A Dictionary Of Australasian Words, Phrases And Usages'' in 1898, which extensively catalogued Australian English vocabulary, started a wave of academic interest and codification during the 20th century which resulted in Australian English becoming established as an endonormative variety with its own internal norms and standards. This culminated in publications such as the 1981 first edition of the Macquarie Dictionary, a major English language dictionary based on Australian usage, and the 1988 first edition of The Australian National Dictionary, a historical dictionary documenting the history of Australian English vocabulary and idiom.

Phonology and pronunciation

The most obvious way in which Australian English is distinctive from other varieties of English is through its unique pronunciation. It shares most similarity with New Zealand English. Like most dialects of English, it is distinguished primarily by its vowel

phonology

.

Vowels

The vowels of Australian English can be divided according to length. The long vowels, which include monophthongs and diphthongs, mostly correspond to the tense vowels used in analyses of Received Pronunciation (RP) as well as its centring diphthongs. The short vowels, consisting only of monophthongs, correspond to the RP lax vowels.

There exist pairs of long and short vowels with overlapping vowel quality giving Australian English phonemic length distinction, which is also present in some regional south-eastern dialects of the UK and eastern seaboard dialects in the US. An example of this feature is the distinction between ''ferry'' and ''fairy'' .

As with New Zealand English and General American English, the weak-vowel merger is complete in Australian English: unstressed is merged into (schwa), unless it is followed by a velar consonant. Examples of this feature are the following pairings, which are pronounced identically in Australian English: ''Rosa's'' and ''roses'', as well as ''Lennon'' and ''Lenin''. Other examples are the following pairs, which rhyme in Australian English: ''abbott'' with ''rabbit'', and ''dig it'' with ''bigot''.

Most varieties of Australian English exhibit only a partial trap-bath split. The words ''bath'', ''grass'' and ''can't'' are always pronounced with the "long" of ''father''. Conversely, throughout the majority of the country, the "flat" of ''man'' is the dominant pronunciation for the ''a'' vowel in the following words: ''dance'', ''advance'', ''plant'', ''example'' and ''answer''. The exception is the state of

South Australia

, where a more advanced trap-bath split has taken place, and where the dominant pronunciation of all the preceding words incorporates the "long" of ''father''.

Consonants

There is little variation in the sets of consonants used in different English dialects but there are variations in how these consonants are used. Australian English is no exception.

Australian English is uniformly non-rhotic; that is, the sound does not appear at the end of a syllable or immediately before a consonant. As with many non-rhotic dialects, linking can occur when a word that has a final in the spelling comes before another word that starts with a vowel. An intrusive may similarly be inserted before a vowel in words that do not have in the spelling in certain environments, namely after the long vowel and after word final . This can be heard in "law-r-and order," where an intrusive R is voiced after the W and before the A.

As with North American English, Intervocalic alveolar flapping is a feature of Australian English: prevocalic and surface as the alveolar tap after sonorants other than as well as at the end of a word or morpheme before any vowel in the same breath group. Examples of this feature are that the following pairs are pronounced similarly or identically: ''latter'' and ''ladder'', as well as ''rated'' and ''raided''.

''Yod''-dropping generally occurs after , , , but not after , and . Accordingly, ''suit'' is pronounced as , ''lute'' as , ''Zeus'' as and ''enthusiasm'' as ; however ''tune'' is pronounced as , ''dew'' as and ''new'' as . Other cases of and , along with and , have coalesced to , , and respectively for many speakers. is generally retained in other consonant clusters.

In common with most varieties of Scottish English and American English, the phoneme is pronounced as a "dark" (velarised) ''l'' () in all positions, unlike other dialects such as Received Pronunciation and Hiberno (Irish) English, where a light ''l'' (i.e. a non-velarised ''l'') is used in many positions.

The wine–whine merger is complete in Australian English.

Pronunciation

Differences in stress, weak forms and standard pronunciation of isolated words occur between Australian English and other forms of English, which while noticeable do not impair intelligibility.

The affixes ''-ary'', ''-ery'', ''-ory'', ''-bury'', ''-berry'' and ''-mony'' (seen in words such as ''necessary, mulberry'' and ''matrimony'') can be pronounced either with a full vowel or a schwa. Although some words like ''necessary'' are almost universally pronounced with the full vowel, older generations of Australians are relatively likely to pronounce these affixes with a schwa while younger generations are relatively likely to use a full vowel.

Words ending in unstressed ''-ile'' derived from Latin adjectives ending in ''-ilis'' are pronounced with a full vowel (), so that ''fertile'' sounds like ''fur tile'' rather than rhyming with ''turtle''.

In addition, miscellaneous pronunciation differences exist when compared with other varieties of English in relation to various isolated words. For example, as with American English, the vowel in ''yoghurt'' and the prefix ''homo-'' (as in ''homosexual'' or ''homophobic'') is pronounced as ("long o") rather than ("short o"); ''vitamin'', ''migraine'' and ''privacy'' are pronounced with (as in ''mine'') rather than , and respectively; the prefix ''paedo-'' (as in ''paedophile'') is pronounced with /e/ (as in ''red'') rather than ; many loanwords with in British English (e.g. ''pasta'') are pronounced with ; ''urinal'' is stressed on the first syllable and pronounced with schwa rather than the second syllable and ("long i"); ''harass'' and ''harassment'' are pronounced with the stress on the second, rather than the first syllable; and the suffix ''-sia'' (as in ''

Malaysia

'', ''

Indonesia

'' and ''

Polynesia

'') is pronounced rather than , and the word ''foyer'' is pronounced /ˈfoɪə/, rather than /ˈfoɪæɪ/. As with British English, ''advertisement'' is stressed on the second syllable and pronounced with ; ''tomato'' and ''vase'' are pronounced with (as in ''father'') instead of ; ''zebra'' is pronounced with /e/ (as in ''red'') rather than ; ''basil'' is pronounced with ("short a") rather than ("long a"); and ''buoy'' is pronounced as (as in ''boy'') rather than . Examples of miscellaneous pronunciations which contrast with both standard American and British usages are ''data'', which is pronounced with ("dah") instead of ("day"); ''maroon'' (colour), pronounced with ("own") as opposed to ("oon"); and ''cache'', pronounced with as opposed to .

Variation

Relative to many other national dialect groupings, Australian English is relatively homogenous across the country. Some relatively minor regional differences in pronunciation exist. A limited range of word choices is strongly regional in nature. Consequently, the geographical background of individuals may be inferred if they use words that are peculiar to particular Australian states or territories and, in some cases, even smaller regions. In addition, some Australians speak creole languages derived from Australian English, such as Australian Kriol, Torres Strait Creole and Norfuk.

Academic research has also identified notable

sociocultural

variation within Australian English, which is mostly evident in phonology.

Regional variation

Although Australian English is relatively homogeneous, there are some regional variations. The dialects of English spoken in the various states and territories of Australia differ slightly in vocabulary and phonology.

Most regional differences are in word usage. Swimming clothes are known as ''cossies'' (pronounced "cozzies") or ''swimmers'' in New South Wales, ''togs'' in Queensland, and ''bathers'' in Victoria, Tasmania, Western Australia and South Australia. What Queensland and New South Wales call a ''stroller'' is usually called a ''pram'' in Victoria, Western Australia, South Australia and Tasmania.Pauline Bryant (1985): Regional variation in the Australian English lexicon, Australian Journal of Linguistics, 5:1, 55–66

Preference for some synonymous words also differ between states. ''Garbage'' (i.e., garbage bin, garbage truck) dominates over ''rubbish'' in New South Wales and Queensland, while ''rubbish'' is more popular in Victoria, Tasmania, Western Australia and South Australia.

Additionally, the word ''footy'' generally refers to the most popular football code in an area; that is, rugby league or rugby union depending on the local area, in most of New South Wales and Queensland, and Australian rules football_elsewhere._In_some_pockets_of_Melbourne_&_Western_Sydney_it_will_refer_to_Association_football._Beer_glasses_are_also_Australian_English_vocabulary#Alcohol.html" "title="Association_football.html" ;"title="roup (disambiguation), group of individuals (human or non-human) working ...