I was asked by a subscriber to this blog if there was a word for a parent who has lost a child. We have widow for the woman who has lost a husband, and widower for the husband who has lost a wife, and orphan for the child who has lost their parents, but nothing, it seems, for the parent who has lost a child.
Read MoreThere is an idea related to speciesism (our prejudice against creatures other than the human race) that the language we use allows us to regard animals as lesser beings. It follows the argument for non-sexist language that we should change the way we speak to change attitudes.
Read MoreCollective nouns have a fascination for us. The collective noun is the name we give a group of things or animals or people. There is one fish, but a school of fish for the many. One starling but a flock of starlings. Ever since the first collection, The Book of St Albans, was put together by a prioress, Juliana Berners, in 1486, we have been attempting appropriate and, we hope, catchy additions.
Read MoreNow you may wonder why I am writing about an obscure word of the New Forest dialect in the UK. It is a departure from the concerns of Australian English I admit. But a friend mentioned it as a word to enjoy and I agreed.
Read MoreI noticed that in amongst all the more formal descriptions of Scott Morrison, after it was discovered that he had been acquiring ministries in secret, was the term dodgy. I thought it was good that an Aussie word like dodgy was still part of the conversation so I checked it in the Australian National Dictionary — and there it wasn’t.
Read MoreDonald Trump Jr puzzled the House committee investigating the Jan 6 attack on the Capitol by reporting that he had told Trump’s Chief of Staff that he had to persuade Trump ‘to condemn this sh*t ASAP’ (i.e., the violent taking of the Capitol). Meadows agreed. Trump Jr went on to say’ this one you go to the mattresses on.’
Read MoreA loose unit is, I think, a variation on the football use of big unit and describes someone (let’s face it, a bloke — this is all bloke talk) who is a law unto themselves, a maverick. Complete disregard for the rules. Does stuff that others would regard as hair-raisingly risky or shocking.
Read MoreA ghost candidate — one who is nominally up for election but has never been sighted in the electorate — is not an entirely new phenomenon but this is the first election where we have had so many of them.
Read MoreWhen we approach an election I am always on alert for the significant words or phrases that become permanent items of Australian English. John Howard produced one in the 2001 Election — the barbecue stopper, and now we always ask What’s the barbecue stopper for this election?
Read MoreWhen Anthony Albanese gave an interview in which he worked perhaps too hard to present himself as middle-of-the-road and centrist in his views, it was summed up by the Daily Telegraph as Albanese claiming “I am not WOKE!’ This was promptly followed by Morrison claiming to be even more woke. It all became a bit ridiculous — except that it is all deadly serious.
Read MorePoliticians who are both blue (Conservative) and green (environmentalist) are now identified as teal which is a mix of blue and green.
Read MoreThis is not a common colloquialism, restricted as it seems to be these days to the context of sport, in particular cricket and football (all codes), where it means an over-the-top enthusiast for the game. It seem to be particularly strong in Victoria.
Read MoreThere is at the moment one definition of the quokka in the Macquarie Dictionary.
But we are about to have a second definition.
Read MoreI see this as a stab of lightning going from China to Russia. Morrison has chosen to follow the idea of having a snappy mantra as George Bush did with the Axis of Evil. I’m not sure that Arc of Autocracy has the same impact as Axis of Evil. Autocracy is a bit of a clunky word.
Read MoreThe second word in our political lexicon for 2022 is nark which is defined in Macquarie Dictionary as ‘a complaining person’ and ‘a spoilsport’. In the Thesaurus spoilsport lines up with killjoy and wowser. Scott Morrison talked about the ‘narks … in the bubble’ who had ‘a crack’ at him for doing a spot of welding.
Read MoreI have never quite understood the claim to be ‘a living person’, sometimes ‘a natural person’, made by people who describe themselves as sovereign people. They have much the same beliefs as sovereign citizens but possibly favour the Magna Carta as their justification rather than the American Constitution or other American texts. They also feel that the term sovereign citizen seems to admit to a citizenship which they deny.
Read MoreElections always throw up key words and phrases so lexicographers follow them with interest for both the politics AND the lexicon. But who would have thought that one of the first salvos in the election that is on everyone’s mind (though not officially called yet) would be the term Manchurian candidate.
ZG: 8
Possibly this will create a revival for the movie as we all try to work out what the term Manchurian candidate could mean in this Australian context.
Read MoreThe year has barely begun and already the new words are rolling in. So it is some satisfaction to package up last year’s collection into an ebook called New Words 2022: Changes in Australian English. You can read about it here.
Read MoreIt would seem that the campaign by the New Zealand Manuka Honey Appellation Society to trademark Manuka Honey as a specifically New Zealand name not to be used by others (particularly Australians) is not going too well. For the story so far check my blog on manuka or tea-tree.
ZG: 7
I think we all feel strongly that words in the general domain should not be captured and owned by commercial interests.
Read MoreObviously the bulk of the new words this year were to do with COVID-19. Some were jokey words related to our reactions to COVID. But other things have happened.
P.S. You can check out any words you don’t know under New Words.
P.P.S This is the final blog for this year. Happy Christmas everyone.
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