What does it mean to be Australian?

Posted by Anura Samara, 27 January 2014

Being so far from home is a good opportunity to think about what it means to be an Australian. I get to mix with people from all over the world – Swiss, French, British, South Africa, the USA, South America and more – so I have plenty of time to compare and contrast Australia with lots of other countries and cultures.

The first thing you realise is that the stories we tell about ourselves are pretty much the same as the stories that people from out countries tell themselves. For example:

• always look out for your mates – pretty much every society has an ethos of helping out others,
• fair go – again, this is pretty much standard for all countries although the definitions may change ie. what they see as a fair go might not seem that way to us,
• supporting the underdog – most countries have stories about the small guy who battles against injustice, sometimes winning and sometimes losing,
• founding stories – many countries have a founding story about fighting (either actually or metaphorically) against an external force to try to create their own independent state,
• our brave troops – nearly all countries express strong support for the actions of their troops in past conflicts,
• sporting excellence – I know that Australians push sporting success to beyond a joke. But guess what? There are lots of sports out there where Australia either doesn’t compete or doesn’t gain success and sportsmen and women from other countries get to shine.

So if that’s what being an Australian is not about, what do I think it means to be an Australian:

• informality – we share an informality with many of the other Anglo cultures (I’m talking about the ones with stronger historical ties to Britain than say the USA). It’s easy to quickly get together with other people for a drink or chat at short notice, and we also enjoy informality in our conversations, even with people we have just met. However, I think Australians take that informality just a little bit further in terms of dress, approaching others (particularly strangers) and attitudes,
• language – our informality extends to our language. As I tell people here, never use 3 syllables where you can get the same idea across in only 2 and of course 1 syllable is the gold standard for Australian conversations. How else to explain all of our words where which we shorten and end with an “o” or “ie”?
• multiculturalism – I often think people are shocked to learn how truly multicultural Australia is. For example, the names of many Australians often don’t fit the expected norm (ie. white Anglo-Saxon) and people seem amazed at the prevalence of cuisines from all around the world. There are many places I go to where the faces I see and the languages I hear wouldn’t feel out of place in Australia (eg. Jordan and Vietnam).
• getting things done – Australians seem to be more willing to get stuck in and make things happen. Whether this means having a go at fixing something or getting stuck in and completed projects quickly, we tend to not overthink things before and just make a start. Of course, in some cases that’s a recipe for disaster but we don’t tend to hang around wondering what’s the worst that can happen – we like to make a start, see what happens and change and adapt when problems do come along.
• distance – this is the big one, literally. People from most other countries just can’t comprehend distance. They come from cultures and societies which traditionally revolved around restricted localities. Explaining what it’s like to drive 8 hours or more, or even take the trip to Sydney and back for a day just makes no sense to them. And they are really turned off by the concept of 20+ hour travelling times to and from Australia.