The Australians
An ode to this wild country of invention
The lift opens onto the wrong floor and I take the stairs the rest of the way, out past the loading dock where a man in hi-vis is eating a vanilla slice over the bin so it doesn’t get on his shirt, and onto the road, and here they are, the Australians: sun-struck, salt-dried, gym-built, thonged, freckled to the gums, a woman frog marching four greyhounds while reading her phone. The most physical people on the face of the earth, gleaming under a sun that is not Europe’s polite grey lamp but something closer and more homicidal, a star that pinks the forearm in the time it takes to find parking; Australians, their utes and their offset accounts and their cousin who does FIFO and earns more than a surgeon, their Welcome to Country recited off a laminated card before the regional sales forecast call by a man who owns the carpark, their land solemnly acknowledged at every meeting by the precise people holding its title deeds, their rented grief over a technicality, their elided final consonants, their servo pies, their inexplicable national veneration of a horse that died in 1932, their backseat sunburn and their schoolies week and their hands already on each other before the introductions conclude, their grandfather who never spoke about Tobruk and their other grandfather who would not desist, their ancestors arriving by hulk and by ten-pound passage and by leaking boat from forty coastlines, none of them certain what the country is or what it is for. Every face is sunstruck and unfinished, possessing the ground and faintly mortified by the possession, and to walk among them is not to fall into a sea of stories but into a heat of voluptuous bodies that has not yet ascertained what it is doing here, only that it is staying, and that it would quite like to remove its shirt. For a moment I wonder, idly, leaning on a bollard that is warm to the touch, whether the glass towers of Martin place contribute anything at all. A bus goes past with an advertisement for a mortgage broker on the side. Then it returns to me, the whole gist of it: that this disorientation i feel is the raw material and the sunburn is the raw material and the borrowed guilt is merely an impediment, that nothing here was inherited and nothing here is owed, that this is a young animal, somnolent in the heat, twitching, all appetite and no memory, not awaiting forgiveness but awaiting someone to make the thing up. There is no fabric to price and no thread handed down. There is the light, and the appetite, and the vanilla slice subsiding in the sun, and the whole long disoriented afternoon, out of which a country worthy of the name will need to be fabricated, after the orgy of youth.
Good observations. We are a bunch of wild tall poppy lopping, sun drinking gamblers with a penchant for snags and home improvement. A country of digging holes and building houses. Its no bloody wonder that we have no Chaucer or Ozzie Proust.
Australian humor is best described as dry, ironic, self-deprecating, and irreverent, serving as a cultural defense mechanism rooted in the harsh realities of the environment and a history of convict settlement. It is characterized by a strong anti-authoritarian stance, where individuals who take themselves too seriously are mocked to maintain social egalitarianism and "keep people in check."
Key elements defining this comedic style include:
Self-Deprecation: Australians frequently laugh at their own missteps or downplay achievements with modesty, fostering humility and inclusive, light-hearted conversations.
Understatement and Sarcasm: Significant events or challenges are often described with mild language (e.g., "Not bad" meaning "fantastic"), and sarcasm is used extensively, requiring listeners to interpret tone and context rather than literal words.
The "Larrikin" Spirit: This archetype embodies a cheeky, rebellious warmth that challenges pretension, often expressed through playful teasing and banter that signals affection and mateship.
Distinctive Language: Humor is heavily reliant on slang (Strine), rhyming slang, and profanity used as terms of endearment or to defy authority, creating a unique linguistic identity that distinguishes it from British or American styles.