The Illustrated Dictionary of
Australian English

Words and Phrases in Afferbeck Lauder

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kanga: 1 a kangaroo; 2 money; How much kanga have you got on you?
3 a prison warder rhyming slang: kanga roo for screw
kangaroo: Perhaps the most well-known Australian English word, it comes from the Guugu Yimithirr language of far north Queensland.; guugu yimithirr from fnq; 1 a marsupial that jumps along on strong hind legs; A common sight in the bush and main streets of large cities.
2 to be slightly insane; She's got kangaroos loose in the top paddock!
3 to make a car jump along by unskilful clutch control; A kangaroo hop
4 to squat over a toilet seat; I'm goin' to kangaroo this dunny, it's filthy!
5 a derisive word for an aussie usa slang
kangaroo valley: earls court, a suburb of london, uk; A major haunt of visitors from down-under
kafuffle: commotion

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keep nit: to act as a lookout during illegal activity; See cockatoo for a similar term.; since 1882
keg-on-legs: 1 a person who drinks an inordinate amount of beer; 2 an obese person
kelly: a crow; A much hated bird in rural areas; possibly a wry reference to Ned Kelly as a thief.; since the 1920s
Kelly country: parts of north-eastern vic and across the border into nsw; The area where the Kelly Gang operated.
Kembla Grange: loose change; Don't forget your kembla.
After the name of the racecourse at Woolongong NSW.; rhyming slang: kembla grange for change
Kenmore tractor: a derogatory term for a city-only four-wheel-drive; brisbane slang
'kenoath: a shortening of fuckin' oath; bogan slang
kelpie: aussie sheepdog; Bred from imported Scottish collies imported to Australia for stock work in the early 19th century. It has a smooth coat of variable colour and pricked ears. Probably takes it's name from an early specimen of the breed.
They were bred to other types of dogs, including the dingo, with an eye to working sheep without direct supervision.
kero: kerosene

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Kickastickalong: an imaginary remote country town; A twin-town of Kickacanalong in NZ.; derisive aussie slang
kick: a pocket on trousers or pants
kick in: contribute
kidstakes: literally, what a kid might bet; Hence, child's play.; since the 1910s
kill a brown dog: disgustingly repulsive food; I'm not eating that muck, it'd kill a brown dog!
killed a chinaman: beset by a series of misfortunes; I must have killed a chinaman!
Referring to a putative Anglo-Australian superstition that killing a Chinese person brought about bad luck.
Historically the Chinese have had a presence in Australia since colonial days, and there was once great folk superstition attached to them.
A sure sign of fortune was attributed to encountering a Chinese person as one engaged in a bet, and it was supposed that killing such an individual would lead to a disastrous run of bad luck.
Similar to a bad trot.; since the 1940s
kinder: a kindergarten
king: 1 an expert; He was a two-up king.; since ww1 2 to king-hit someone; I kinged him before he knew what was happening.
king brown: a 750ml bottle of beer in wa; Generally called a long neck elsewhere, except Qld, where the term tallie is often used.; wa slang
kingie: 1 a king prawn; 2 a kingfish
kingpin: the top person in an organisation since the 1900s
King Shit: a bloke with a very high opinion of himself; He thinks he's King Shit
kip: 1 a flat board; Used to toss the coins in the game of two-up; 2 a sleep or nap; I'm goin' for a kip, wake me up when dinner's ready.
3 to stay somewhere on a temporary basis; He's kipping at Tom's for a couple of days.
kiwi: 1 a new zealander; After the well-known flightless bird, emblem of NZ.
Hence, Kiwiland is New Zealand.
2 the nz dollar in financial slang; new zealand
klicks ∼ k's: kilometres; It's only 100 klicks to the pub!

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knackered: tired, exhausted
knackers: the testicles
knock: to criticise
knockabout: a happy-go-lucky bloke; A man who has seen the world, been knocked about by it, and takes it as it comes is a knockabout bloke He has been about a bit, living on his wits, he’s a jack of all trades, can do just about anything he sets his mind to, will have a yarn with his mates at the pub, will help who ever he can, but will not take shit from anybody, generally just a good all around bloke.; aussie slang
knock back: 1 a refusal or rejection; I asked her out, but got a knock back.
2 to consume, especially rapidly; He knocked back two cans of beer.
knock down: to spend the entirety of your wages from a seasonal job; A former habit of shearers, usually by going on an unrestrained drinking binge, frequently because they were victims of lambing down.; He knocked down his cheque at the local pub.
knock 'em down rains: a violent thunderstorm; Strong winds, lashing rain, and plenty of thunder and lightning are features of the weather in the Top End.Looks like we're in for another knock 'em down tonight.; nt slang
knocker ∼ on the knocker: 1 precisely on time; He was here at noon, on the knocker.
2 immediately; They want cash on the knocker.
3 a person who has nothing good to say about anyone or anything; since the 1920s
knock it on the head: put a stop to something
knock shop ∼the knockers: a brothel
Popular in the mining towns around Kalgoorlie.; wa slang
knock your socks off: something that will amaze or surprise
knuckle: to assault with the fists

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koala: a tailless, grey, furry, arboreal marsupial; The koala, Phascolarctos cinereus of eastern Australia, is about 75 cm long. Although superficially similar to a small bear, there is no zoological justification for the expression koala bear.; Not to be confused with the drop bear, which drops from trees onto unsuspecting tourists.
Kookaburras: the australian international men 's hockey team
kookaburra: a large kingfisher; With a cry resembling laughter, the iconic aussie bird.; from wiradjuri nsw
kooka ∼ kookie: laconic way of saying kookaburra
koori: a person in the aboriginal languages of south-eastern australia; Because of the number of Australian Aboriginal languages, koori has not gained Australia–wide acceptance, being confined to most of NSW and Vic. Other terms are preferred elsewhere.
See Aboriginal Australia for more information.; first nations
Koori: an australian aboriginal people; The term over most of NSW.; aboriginal australia
Koorie: an australian aboriginal people; The term in most of Vic.; aboriginal australia
kybosh: to foil or quash something since the 1830s
kylie: a term for what is known elsewhere as a boomerang; noongar from south-west w.a.

Welcome to Australia!

This is a peculiar country where the principles of culture appear to have been turned upside down. Australians seem blissfully unaware of the achievements of their intellectuals… yet they will celebrate long dead horses, yobbo sportsmen, and bushrangers.

They often forget the words of their national anthem… yet it would be wrong to say they are not patriotic, as a song about a suicidal sheep thief seems to instil them with a great deal of pride.

If they like you, they will not give you compliments. Instead, they might call you names like bastard or drongo — and then laugh at all the silly things you have done. If you have red hair, you might be called Bluey. If you are tall, you might be called Shorty. If you are quiet, you might be called Rowdy.

There is no better way of life in the world than that of the Australian.
I firmly believe this.

The grumbling, growling, cursing, profane, laughing, beer drinking, abusive, loyal-to-his-mates Australian is one of the few free men left on this earth.

He fears no one, crawls to no one, bludgers on no one, and acknowledges no master.

Learn his way. Learn his language. Get yourself accepted as one of him; and you will enter a world that you never dreamed existed.

And once you have entered it, you will never leave it.

Australian history is almost always picturesque; indeed, it is also so curious and strange, that it is itself the chiefest novelty the country has to offer and so it pushes the other novelties into second and third place.

It does not read like history, but like the most beautiful lies; and all of a fresh new sort, no mouldy old stale ones.

It is full of surprises and adventures, the incongruities, and contradictions, and incredibilities; but they are all true, they all happened.
Mark Twain, 1897

first australians

Long before a word of English was ever spoken in Australia, the Aboriginal languages were heard all over the continent.

Each group or mob has its own language, but those languages spoken close to what later became the main centres of European population were those which have had the most influence on modern Aussie English.

Aboriginal words are likely to have been absorbed into Aussie English as local leaders from both native groups and colonists tried to find some tentative common ground; and as the new arrivals sought to find names for the strange new things they were seeing.

Aboriginal words common in Aussie English include yakka, meaning work–common usage is the collocation ‘hard yakka’, and cooee, first used by Aboriginal people calling each other through the bush.

Also of indigenous origin is bung, from the language Yagara in the Brisbane region, meaning "dead" and by extension "broken" or "useless".

Many place names are Aboriginal — the capital Canberra is so‑named because it means "meeting place" in Ngunnawal, the traditional language of the Ngunnawal and Gandangara peoples.

Commonly used Aboriginal words include many animal names, such as kookaburra, koala, wallaby and dingo.

animals of australia

immigrant influences

Whether convicts or willing migrants, the Europeans who found their way to Australia from the eighteenth century onwards came from a wide range of different groups.

At that time, there were great differences between different British English dialects, so that convicts from different regions of England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland would all have spoken very differently.
Some would not have spoken English at all – being Irish or Scots Gaelic or Welsh speakers.

To understand each other, these groups would have begun to create a common language, and words from various dialects would have become part of a new slang and new idioms.

new australians

The children of those early settlers would have been keen to mark themselves out as Australians, rather than Irish or English, and that meant that new accents and speech patterns developed as quickly as the colony itself did.

It was almost as if an informal Australian school of English and Irish arrivals alike had set itself up. Words which found their way into the language via the convicts include tucker, an Irish word for food, and swag a word from the criminal underworld meaning a parcel of goods taken by a thief, but coming to mean a bushman's bag.

the gold rush days

This era brought words such as fossick into common usage.

The Gold Rush Days

the bushrangers

Many terms come from the bushranger tradition, such as bush telegraph, bail up, and game as Ned Kelly.

the first world war

WWⅠ added another layer of slang, such as dinkum , meaning genuine or real.

Australian English is peppered with unique slang words and particular types of phraseology such as strine and ocker.

diminutives in australia

The use of diminutive forms of words such as arvo for afternoon or barbie for barbecue is common. Some words, such as ute, from utility vehicle, a car with a tray back, have become universal.

While many languages make use of diminutives, Aussie English uses them extensively – there are over 5,000 identified diminutives in use in Australia.

let stalk strine!

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australian gazetteer

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From Adavale (Qld) to Zeehan (Tas), this atlas will locate any town in Australia.

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Australian Colours

The Australian Independent Colour Standard AS 2700 was created in 1985. It is used in choosing colour schemes in the industrial, architectural, and decorative areas.

AS 2700 in HTML

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The Illustrated Dictionary of
Australian English

Words and Phrases in Afferbeck Lauder

The Illustrated Dictionary of Australian English

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K

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The Illustrated Dictionary of Australian English

The Illustrated Dictionary of
Australian English

The Illustrated Dictionary of
Australian English