Living and Working in Australia

A city by city guide to life in Australia

Slang

For some of us Brits, our only experience of Australians and their language is from watching Home and Away and Neighbours, neither of which present a fair representation of the Aussie language. (However, I can confirm that the wonderful Aussie mullet is well and truly alive and being sported by more men than it should be.) In fact, more than half of the population of Australia speak languages other than English, including Italian, Lebanese and Greek, so anyone who is expecting to hear ‘crikey’ and ‘possum’ in every sentence is in for a surprise! The true Aussie language is full of colloquial expressions, slang words and slang phrases which locals have adopted into their daily language.