What Is Australian Culture Really like?

Australian ‘culture’ has had a colourful portrayal in the media over the years.

In the 70s we had Monty Python suggesting all blokes were called Bruce, loved beer and hated ‘poofters’. Australian comedian Barry Humphries further enhanced the world’s perception of Australian culture with his fictional character Barry McKenzie.

In the 1972 film ‘The Adventures of Barry McKenzie’ we saw the main character, an Australian, visiting Britain as an uncouth, beer swilling, ignorant and rude loudmouth.

Then we had Paul Hogan and his Castlemaine XXXX adverts in the 80s which clearly showed the men valuing tins of beer far more than their wives and womenfolk.

But, of course, Australian culture isn’t like that at all, is it?

Or is it?

Meet Australians Tony Rogers and Rob Hibbert…

Tony Rogers and Rob HibbertI grabbed that photograph of them from a YouTube video. Normally I would just embed the video, but I’m afraid the language they use in it is just too rich for this blog. As you know, I have a strictly ‘no bad language’ policy.

Anyway, these two guys are comedy writers and they are behind a miniseries on YouTube called “How to Talk Australians”.

It’s a mock documentary about a college in Delhi, India, that trains prospective Indian migrants how to assimilate themselves into Australian culture.

In eight glorious five minutes-ish episodes they cover the following:

  1. G’day Knackers
  2. Grub
  3. Rhyming Slang
  4. Famous Australians
  5. Nicknames – Hello Chopper
  6. The Slack*rse Country
  7. Dunny Budgies & Budgie Smugglers
  8. Citizenship Test

My accountant introduced me to this series of videos, he thought they were hilarious. I think they are hilarious too. Apparently though, some people find this offensive. Good comedy though often is offensive, ask Monty Python, Barry Humphries and Paul Hogan.

The problem with these videos though, is the swearing. Don’t get me wrong, it’s all done for a reason and its ‘funny’ bad language, not ‘bad’ bad language. The result, it’s no surprise to hear, are very funny videos. It’s just that there’s too much swearing for me to embed these videos on my website due to my prudency policy.

Unless, I decided after a great deal of deliberation, I warn you first.

Bad language alert!

Yes, these videos are just too funny to ignore.

Technically, of course, there is still no bad language on my website. The bad language is on this YouTube video, which is hosted on YouTube. Just be aware that if you click the play button, you will hear some slightly bad words.

Not really bad, and we know what those really bad words are don’t we? Just slightly bad. You definitely won’t hear the words **** or ****, but you will hear **** and ******. Just wanted to clear that up.

You will laugh though, I’m sure about that. Here’s How to Talk Australians, episode one…

I hope you found that as funny as I do, to see the others, visit How to Talk Australians on YouTube.

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{ 6 comments… add one }
  • Aldwin November 6, 2017, 8:49 pm |

    thanks for an interesting article

  • Elvis Austalia Culturee October 13, 2017, 3:06 pm |

    People in Australia speak English language. The linguistic diversity of Australia is diverse according to a fractionalization scale which for Australia is 0.3349. Christianity followers is majority among population. 89 of Australia’s population live in cities. This percentage comprises the urban population of Australia. According to data on inbound tourists in Australia, 6 382 000 tourists arrive in the country each year.

  • teebee September 15, 2015, 9:20 pm |

    bonza post, you ****** – can’t wait to move over from Yorkshire and learn the language proper like!

    • BobinOz September 16, 2015, 3:21 pm |

      Why wait to learn, watch the other five videos in the series and you’ll be right, you old ******.

  • Alanfs September 15, 2015, 9:00 pm |

    I remember having a german friend at uni who had been saying for years, “fat income” instead of fair dinkum, it worked. I have been educating the English with regards the difference/similarities between thongs and flip flops.

    Even business trips to the US are fun to get a few Aussie words in to throw them off.

    • BobinOz September 16, 2015, 3:20 pm |

      Very rare to hear someone say fair dinkum these days, I think I’ve only heard it a couple of times or so in eight years. I’ve never heard fat income, which means I’ve never met your German friend 🙂

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