Aussie Life
Aussie life
I’ve just watched Senator Fatima Payman’s performative ‘I quit but not really, I’m moving to the crossbenches’ media conference. It…
Language
Angry people keep chanting ‘Free Palestine’ on our streets. They shout that ‘Palestine’ should stretch from the Jordan River to…
Aussie life
For most of China’s 1.4 billion population, 2024 has been the Year of the Dragon, which makes it, according to…
Language
I’ve been searching through the language used to describe the train wreck of a presidential debate between Joe Biden and…
Language
How are you enjoying dealing with the bureaucrats who run our lives these days? (I heard your answer, and you…
Aussie life
Being an AFL umpire does not look like a job for the thin-skinned. Given the passion of the code’s fan…
Language
My thanks to Speccie reader Ian from Cairns for suggesting that the members of the Albanese government are post turtles.…
Aussie life
I’m in a nursing home. It’s St Vincent’s, Australia’s biggest not-for-profit aged care provider, one of several in Brisbane run…
Language
A Speccie reader asks for a word that explains the obsessions of the woke around us. Looking for a single…
Aussie life
Encomium or insult, tribute or travesty; the line between portrait and caricature can be a very fine one. Readers who…
Language
This is an appeal to Speccie readers to join a modest campaign to ban the use of ‘begs the question’.…
Aussie life
As the Q&A host was telling me, the conservatives have a ‘problem with women’. Or with more election campaign zing,…
Language
Here’s one to add to your Weird Word collection: ‘empleomania’. This is a mania for holding public office. and there…
Aussie life
It is a point of principle for the residents of the smarter parts of Manhattan not to notice – and…
Language
The word ‘colonialism’ has become (at least for some people) a ‘snarl word’ – something that is always bad, and…
Language
If your younger acquaintances start referring to you (or anything you do) as ‘mid’ they are not being polite. For…
Aussie life
As the terrible events in Bondi Junction last month reminded us, fortune doesn’t always favour the brave. Indeed, the courage…
Language
Speccie reader Terry writes to ask when and where did ‘non-binary’ come into the language – and who applied it…
Aussie life
From a nation that gave us riot police, rude waiters, baguettes and non-negotiable submarine contracts we have a new word,…
Language
The expression ‘non-racist’ is still missing from most of the world’s major dictionaries (Oxford, Merriam-Webster, Collins, Macquarie) but perhaps this…
Aussie Life
Almost exactly 50 years before James Cook’s first encounter with the Gweagal and Gameygal peoples on the shores of what…
Language
Writing in the current issue of Quadrant magazine, Paul Prociv says, ‘The field of Aboriginal affairs is awash with sloppy…
Kiwi life
Softly, softly, catchee monkey – the alphabet community’s grab for our children Somewhat naively, a New Zealand commentator thinks there’s…
Language
The University of Chicago has what it calls a ‘Parrhesia Program for Public Discourse’ – aimed at teaching students to…
Aussie life
It’s been a long time since the beer garden of the iconic Oaks Hotel in Sydney’s Neutral Bay lost all…
