"The Australian alphabet cocktail was spiked by alcohol. Our forefathers regularly got drunk together and through their frequent interactions unknowingly added an alcoholic slur to our national speech patterns...Aussie-speak developed in the early days of colonial settlement from a cocktail of English, Irish, Aboriginal and German - before another mystery influence was slipped into the mix." A book called The Age, written by Victoria University tutor and lecturer Dean Frenkel, takes a good hard look at the Australian speech template.
Although the Australian speech ranks among the most popular accents in the world, even deemed attractive by a good many people, room for major improvement is acknowledged by Australians themselves. Mr Frenkel qualifies that the perceived flaws in Australian speech have no relation to social or economic class. That, instead, these are apparent among all Australians.
Expert opinions and myths each have tried to explain Australian speech. Some claim this to be the dialect combinations inherited from early migrations. Theories that are on the more humorous side explain the mumbling tendency in Australian speech to have been developed through repeated practice of avoidance of swallowing flies. The drinking theory also seems to have gained popularity among Australians.
The foundation of Australian speech is thought to have been established a generation after the British settlers arrived in Australia.
Linguists from Macquarie University deduce, "The children in the new colony would have been exposed to a wide range of different dialects from all over England but mainly the south east, particularly from London."
These children would have applied speech elements found in their immediate environment as an expression of peer solidarity and developed a new dialect through this. This new Australian speech would have been strong enough to influence the speech of their peers among new batches of settlers.
Even historical luminaries are divided in their opinion. Winston Churchill regards Australian speech as a maltreatment of the English mother tongue. Those in favour includes Mark Twain, who expresses pleasure in its delicate cadence that simply delights the hearer.
