Bagglish for beginners

Not sure if this is the right forum to post this in. Move if necessary.

The following column gives some insight into Australians.

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Bagglish for beginners
by Danny Katz
The Age - October 30, 2009

Bagglish is pretty much the official language of Australia. It's that delightful mix of bagging and English which is spoken in a delightfully sarcastic and affectionate tone that can sometimes make people feel delightfully confused and suicidal. So for anyone who is unfamiliar with this richly poetic, vibrantly colourful and maliciously insensitive lingo, here is a quick primer called ''Bagglish for Beginners (You Dumb Drongo)''.

Lesson 1: a pleasant surprise in the city

Wayne is walking along Swanston Street, just minding his own business, when who should he bump into but his dear old friend Griff, who he hasn't seen ''in yonks'' (an extremely long length of time, about three-fifths of a ''donkey's''). Now, one would expect Wayne to smile warmly and say ''Hello good friend, how wonderful to see you!'' as would be the norm in most modern civilisations with highly developed social customs - but not in a Bagglish-speaking nation. Instead, Wayne scowls disdainfully, slaps his forehead in disgust, and shouts ''Awwwwwwcrap, I was hoping I'd never see YOU again, ya ugly old bugger!'' and then Griff responds in Bagglish, saying ''Jeeeeeeeezmaaaaate, what the frick happened to your head? - turn away cos your fat baldie scone's makin' my eyes bleed!'' and this exchange means that Wayne and Griff like each other very much and are very pleased to bump into each other on this pleasant day in the city.

Lesson 2: a lovely Sunday in a Melbourne backyard

[see full article]

Lesson 3: handy bagglish phrases that you can use every day

Before going any further, it's important to make clear that Bagglish is a language that can only be spoken between good friends and family members: you cannot just go up to a complete stranger and say ''Hey dipstick, your face makes me retch'', because they may not understand that you're being affectionate and warm - though you can always convert it into Bagglish by adding ''Just joshing'' afterwards, and then they'll nod and chuckle and say ''Oh I get it, good one, ya cheeky smartarse!''

So now you are ready to try some common Bagglian expressions of your own! When visiting your friendly local shopkeeper, why not say ''Hey ya shonky crook, give me your most tasteless overpriced bread, and make sure it's yesterday's!'' (Translation: ''One of your finest fresh loaves please, and thank you for your always reliable service, oh noble merchant.'') When walking past a co-worker in the workplace, you can yell ''Oh gawwwwwwd Trish, who dressed you this morning? - you look like a Liquorice Allsort!'' (Translation: ''My, your outfit is splendid! I only wish I had your funky Euro-chic design-sense!'') And finally, when curling up in bed with your lover, you can even be romantic in fluent Bagglish: ''Y'know, I probably could've done heaps better than you but looks like I'm stuck with you for good so roll over and let's get this done, ya bristly old sow.'' (Translation: ''I treasure you, dearest darling, I am honoured to have you as my bed partner, you do not need to pluck your chin.'')​

 

Any idea about the origin of the name "Bagglish"?

 

The origin of the name "Bagglish", as far as I am aware, is the linked article.

 

So Katz made the word up? The only two Google hits are that article and this thread. We don't use "bagging" that way over here so it doesn't make a lot of sense; it doesn't even show up as Australian slang under "bag" in Dictionary.com.

That post was in Bagglish, right?

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Yes.

Interesting. To "bag" somebody may be an Australianism. Katz didn't make that one up - it's not uncommon.

If I had to guess at the origin of the verb "to bag", I'd guess it is related to something like sheep stealing. If you "bag" a sheep, you literally grab it an put it in your sack, as in the Australian classic song Waltzing Matilda:

...And he sang as he stuffed that jumbuck in his tuckerbag
You'll come a Waltzing Matilda with me​

(I think a jumbuck is a male sheep with horns, and a tuckerbag is a sack you keep your food - "tucker" - in.)

So, by extension, when you "bag" a person, you "score points" off them by insulting them in a way that they can't really deny.

The closest modern alternative to "bagging" somebody, I think, would be to "pwn" them, though the meaning of "bagging" is not as wide.

 

When I was a kid sarcasm was common in the USA, and it was one of the most common schticks for professional comics.

Somehow I seem to lack the enzyme to digest it, as I do for lactose, baseball and soul music, and I often don't catch it unless it's packaged in the extreme tone of voice that comedians use. When I try to do it absolutely everyone thinks I'm serious and it has gotten me in trouble a few times.

Today it seems to be on the wane, except in the specific province of professional comedians. I think the reason may be that such a large portion of our population is now either from somewhere else or was raised by parents who were from somewhere else, that a form of humor based entirely on the subtleties of cadence, inflection, and a blind guess about the speaker's attitude, is simply lost on them. Although obviously I personally won't miss something I never perceived, just as obviously American culture will be the poorer for it. Especially if the replacement is the vulgar, boneheaded humor of rap music.

I can appreciate that. Most Americans take themselves too seriously, and we definitely take America too seriously. I thought we'd overcome that in the Flower Power era, but when the hippies became parents they turned into their parents, substituting left for right and rock for swing.

There you go. They don't understand your type of sarcasm, which relies on the non-semantic characteristics of your speech. Humor is tied closely to language, and often even to culture within a language community. Americans and Britons can usually understand each other's speech quite well, but that isn't always enough to laugh at each other's jokes.

You guys are even harder for us because we haven't spent forty or fifty years being exposed to your movies and TV shows. Your slang is much more impenetrable than British slang.

Although we have no trouble understanding AC/DC and Keith Urban.

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"Bag" means "to take" here too. Not necessarily stealing but, for example, finding something in the store you've been looking for for months, grabbing it, and "bagging" it by putting it in your own shopping cart before somebody else does. Hunters talk about "bagging" their game. "I've been on this elk-hunting trip for a week and I thought I was going to have to go home without bagging one, but I got lucky this morning."

"Waltzing Matilda," oddly enough, was a song that was quite popular here in my day, and all the kids in my school learned it. With our childish naivete we assumed it was the Australian National Anthem. (How silly, of course it's "I've Got Big Balls."

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) Our teacher dutifully explained swagmen, jumbucks, tucker and billabongs.

Dictionary.com says it's just a sheep, from the Kamilaroi language word dimba. Of course it doesn't explain where the word for "sheep" comes from in any Native Australian language, since they're not native to the continent. Being an American dictionary it may not go deeply enough into Aussie slang. It's quite possible that it's perceived as containing the element "buck," therefore applying only to male herbivores, and it's common (universal?) in ovine species for only the rams to have horns.

Hmm... Sarcasm is so easy in internet speak. It has its own punctuation mark:

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