Aussie Life
Aussie life
Recent reports of a WA man being killed by a kangaroo have been syndicated by foreign news agencies for much…
Language
The word ‘they’ has two legitimate uses and one illegitimate use. The first proper and legitimate use is as the…
Aussie life
Prior to the threatened rewriting of the Australian constitution can we stop re-writing the English dictionary and the meanings of…
Language
According to American journalist Kaylee McGhee White (writing in the Washington Examiner) it is now officially okay to use the…
Aussie life
As I sit in my study at the end of the day listening to the heavy rain and wondering when…
Language
European and Indian languages seem to be related in the very distant past. Linguists are able, for example, to trace…
Aussie life
‘I’d rather see a church burn,’ is my usual response to a glass of wine getting knocked over. So if…
Language
The word ‘map’ no longer means just a bit of cartography – it now also means ‘minor attracted person’. In…
Aussie life
What is it about Daniel Andrews, quasi-dictator of Victoria? He runs what Tony Abbott last week called ‘the worst government…
Language
The word ‘sovereignty’ is recorded as part of the English language since at least 1340 – a very old word…
Aussie life
Anthony Albanese’s republican sympathies were a matter of public record when a Voice to Parliament wasn’t even a whisper in…
Woke language
Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889-1951) once said: ‘The limits of my language mean the limits of my world.’ And if the woke…
Aussie life
The Uluru Statement from the Heart is one of those documents, like the ‘Bringing them Home’ report that everybody has…
Language
When radicals want to upend society they often cloak their intentions under kind-sounding words. So, if the plan is to…
Aussie life
‘Why can’t a woman be more like a man? complains Henry Higgins in My Fair Lady, a musical whose title…
Language
British journalist Richard Godwin has alerted me to what may be the trendiest word of the moment: ‘namecore’. This is…
Aussie Life
‘Give it up for the band!’ cried Van Morrison from the stage at King John’s castle in Limerick the other…
Language
As the contest to replace Boris Johnson draws towards its protracted close, we should remember that many of the original…
Epigram
Our Marriage Soundtrack I think of our marriage quite often. I think of the music as well. It started with…
Aussie Life
I read in the Australian last week that the Queensland parliament is considering criminalising stealthing. And no, that’s not a…
Language
A Speccie reader has alerted me to the use of an odd word ‘alum’ to refer to the graduates of…
Aussie life
New US Ambassador Caroline Kennedy had them at her first media conference interjection: when the white, stale male journalist (the…
Language
It was Will Self (writing in The Speccie) who drew my attention to the new word ‘uberise.’ He says he…
Aussie life
Sport has always played a big part in Australian life, but in the interests of diversity it would be wrong…
Language
No sooner had the words ‘blue murder’ appeared on the cover of this august journal than a Speccie reader was…