Have you ever heard something via conversation or social media and thought: Huh?

Absolutely
For sure
No doubt

Our language has become a brand new way of speaking but also in the mix are generational terms as well which are not always easy to understand for an oldie like me.

All one needs to do is listen to a sportsperson giving an interview, and you’ll pick up on all the catchphrases and rehearsed words that immediately tell you how they rate their or the team’s performance. I often wonder if professional sportspeople are schooled on acceptable words and phrases. I really think they need to review the syllabus.

100%

Sitting on the train recently, I overheard an entire conversation from school-age teens that the only words I recognised clearly were hi and bye. Not that I was taking much notice, really, but at first, I thought these young adults must’ve been from a different planet. Is terminology and language suburb related, school related, family related? No. It’s just a new way of saying old things.

Keeping it fresh bro’

One of my friends’ daughters mentioned that her mate was ‘drip’. When she’d stopped laughing at my blank facial expression she explained that it meant her friend was very stylish. Yeah nah…I thought calling someone a drip meant something a little more derogatory.

On the pulse

My childhood was littered with phrases like:

Useless as a wet week of Sundays
Chop chop!
Smooth as a baby’s bottom
Don’t get your knickers in a knot!

Nostalgic sigh here: at least I could understand the words even if the intent of the phrase was not always identifiable. Not sure where or why some of them came into being, but I GOT them!

Done and done

BUT, along with totally new words in the vocabulary we still have the longstanding grapple of same same but different – words for the same thing from different states. No wonder confusion sets in when travelling through this wonderful land! 

I have a Fritz and sauce sandwich at home in SA, but elsewhere in Australia, Fritz becomes Devon. Same with Yiros, the tasty treat that morphs into a Kebab on the Eastern seaboard. How about Berliner buns and Kitchener buns? (This one’s ok, I like both versions!)

Even clothing is not immune: togs, swimmers, bathers; or a hoodie compared to a windcheater. Sneakers versus sandshoes versus trainers.

Major huh?

I could continue for a few more hundred examples but my already thoroughly confused brain would implode.

For real for real

We have a wonderful, vibrant, multicultural society, and it was inevitable that there would be cross-pollination of cultures and language. But I think it’s time to call our national language something more in tune to reality.

Not English, or Australian but Pseudostralian.

Keeping it relevant

Yep yep

Locked in!

Editor’s Response

Thanks, Bel! Language has always been a moving target—what was once sharp and witty in our youth is now “retro” to the next generation. Articles like this remind us how words can both connect and confuse across age groups. For those of us over 50, it’s not about keeping up with every new phrase but about enjoying the play of language and recognising that each generation stamps its own personality on how we speak. After all, our own sayings once raised eyebrows too!