Australian English

Australian English is the aggregation of all varieties of English used throughout Australian society, including ethnocultural varieties and Aboriginal English. Over the past decades Australian English has been influenced by various cultural factors. International culture has been manifesting itself in Australia through the mass immigration from Europe and Asia whilst popular culture is being imported from the United States via entertainment. Technological culture has engrained itself into Australia; Australians regularly use various forms of electronic-mediated communication such as texting. These factors have caused Australian English to merge closer to the other national varieties of English in the world. Nevertheless, Australian English remains quite distinct from the other national varieties due to the resilience of the Australian accent and Australian Aboriginal English.  

  The influence of Australian popular culture imported from the United States has caused Australian English to converge towards American English. Australians are exposed to American culture and language through various modes of entertainment: television, film, and music. As a result of this exposure young Australians have incorporated American lexemes into their vocabulary, and hence into Australian English; the terms ‘what’s up,’ ‘fair enough,’ ‘go figure,’ ‘buddy’ and ‘man’ are commonplace in their discourse. Distinctively Australian terms are being replaced by American equivalents; the American terms ‘buddy’ and ‘man’ have replaced the Australian term ‘mate’ and the American greeting ‘what’s up’ is replacing the Australian ‘how ya goin’ (sic). These two things, particularly the substitution of Australian phrases for American ones, highlight how Australian English is adopting features of American English and is, by extension, losing some of its distinctiveness.

  Technological culture in the form of electronic-mediated communication (EMC) has brought with it a convergence of the...