Where does the word Australia originate?

Answer 1

I am not a linguist, or specialist in languages, but I do have some logical suggestions for the Australian English accent. We all know that Australia was initially settled by the English--as a penal colony, I believe. (This is excluding the native Aborigines.) The United States of America was also initially settled by the English, with a smattering of Spanish and French here and there. English is the primary language of both Australia and America. But notice the interesting word inflections and accent variations. I can only guess at the reasons for those differences. America, as a much larger mass of land, has a greater variety of American English accents than Australia has. One has only to get into a car located in Washington, DC, and start driving to the west coast, to hear the great variety in American English accents scattered across our land. (I have done that--though I started in Alabama and drove to Southern California, then up the California coastline from L.A. to San Francisco.) Australia seems to have retained more of the English accent than America has, though it is distinctly Australian English. Aussies are far less formal, and their manner of speech seems a bit twangy. Very likely this can be attributed to the environment found by the earliest settlers. There were no villages or towns, hotels, or diners. I understand the land is pretty hostile to man, for the most part. This is not even including the "Outback." I would love to know what others think of this question!

Answer This is a complex question. Part of the development of a regional language has to do with what the original settlers spoke- what their dialects were. Australia's first settlers were mostly convicts (there were obviously soldiers, sailors and administrators, as well as free settlers too). Most of the early convicts were from the London area, the SE of England, and from Ireland. So language traits from those groups, mixing together, quickly made Australian speech different to that in any one area of Britain. In addition, as most of the settlers were convicts, their "patois" or slang (called "flash") came into common usage, as did some sailor's slang. In addition to this, most convicts were from the "lower classes" and had a different culture and language to middle and upper classes (and had a great effect due to their disproportionate numbers compared to say, middle-class immigrant sheep farmers). Also, there were many strange landforms, flora and fauna to be described and named, and many of the words for these came from Aboriginal languages, just as occured in USA & Canada with Native American borrowings.

On top of all this, Australia was a harsh and difficult country so Australian character was shaped by this, leading in part to our propensity to colourful idiom.

Answer 2

The word Australia is derived from the Latin Australis, meaning "Southern".

So is derived the same as originated? (sorry if this is a dumb question)

Answer 3

by boats