Linguistic freakshow: The Rising Australian Intonation and Other Oddities

Michael Studman — Thu, 05 May 2005 23:00:00 -0400

In Java 5 there are the big ticket language improvements like generics, enums, autoboxing etc; and then there’s the more obscure feature of extending hexidecimal representation to floats and doubles.

Firstly I have to flag my absolute irritation with the Rising Australian Intonation (RAI). It’s like “California Valley Girl meets Little Aussie Battler”. It turns on its head the traditional UK rules of pronunciation where a rising intonation at the end of a sentence makes a question out of a statement – for RAI the rising intonation has no purpose yet suffers no existential crisis (at least for the speaker). To my mind though, RAI speech patterns sound a lot like the speaker is somehow seeking aproval or seems uncertain in the deliver of what they say – as if all they say is tentative and requires approval of the listener.

Many US speakers, particularly Californians, also speak with a permanent rising intonation so I’m hazarding a guess that it’s development is not unconnected with the greater traction US media has had in Australian popular culture over the last two decades. This is the price we pay for a decade of Friends re-runs, I guess. It’s also amusing to note that many British have detected a nascent RAI in their youngsters; with Neighbours and Home and Away blamed as the phonological communion wafer in that instance.

While we’re on the topic of Californian influences, another thing that annoys me, like, is like, when people like, say like ‘like’, like totally all the time. It’s a tired and hackneyed conversational filler, it takes about 30 points off your perceived IQ and it’s readily infecting Australia’s young. Australians: just give it up – it’s not native and it just makes you sound rubbish.

Another bizare pattern of Australian speech is the strange, contradictory, construction “Yeah, no, ....” or “No, yeah, ....” in response to a question. This pattern is not just restricted to the Vicky Pollards of our great continent, it’s perpetrated by all sorts. The first word can normally be considered social lubricant, the second normally addresses the question itself. When there is no question being responded to then its anyone’s guess the speaker’s disposition to the topic at hand.

There are many more attractions in this linguistic freakshow but I’ll save those for a later rant.

full fathom five: Linguistic freakshow: The Rising Australian Intonation and Other Oddities

Linguistic freakshow: The Rising Australian Intonation and Other Oddities