The most common Australian slang for a brawl is "blue" (as in "bung on a blue"), but other terms include "biffo," "stoush," "barney," or "ruck," all referring to a fight or scuffle, from minor disagreements to full-blown fights.
A blue is a fight, dispute or row. You can bung on a blue, stack on a blue or turn on a blue. The slang word has been around since the 1940s and is used to refer to everything from fisticuffs at the pub to a brawl on the footy field.
In Australian slang, "avo" means avocado, while "arvo" means afternoon; they sound similar but refer to different things, with "arvo" being a shortened form of "afternoon," often pronounced with an "ah" sound, and "avo" being a short form of "avocado".
Aggro: short for aggressive. Someone might get aggro if you take the last Tim Tam (see below) in the packet. Ambo: this is an abbreviation of ambulance.
Woop Woop is used to refer to a place in the middle of nowhere. People use it to signify that a location is far away, unfamiliar to them, and difficult to get to.
In the US fanny is a commonly used word for backside; in Australia the equivalent word is bum, as in "he kicked him in the bum". Fanny is not an acceptable word in Australia or New Zealand - it refers to the same general region of the female body, at the top end of the legs, but at the front, not the back!
A Flaming Galah is Australian slang for someone who is a bit doofus, a bit of a fool, a bit of a mentalist but nonetheless is a very loveable creature. A Flaming Galah is a person who makes a fool of themselves but isn't afraid to laugh at themselves when everyone else starts laughing at them.
Common Australian slang for a girl includes "Sheila" (older, sometimes dated or slightly derogatory), "chick," or just using general terms like "mate," "gal," or "lass," with context and tone being important, but "girl" is still widely used; some slang, like "moll," can refer to a girlfriend or a promiscuous woman, while "bogan" describes an unsophisticated person.
(Australia, colloquial) Goodbye.
"Oy oy oy" in Australia is most famously part of the patriotic chant "Aussie, Aussie, Aussie, Oi, Oi, Oi!" used at sporting events to show national pride, but "Oi" also functions as a general Australian informal interjection, like "hey" or "excuse me," to get someone's attention. The chant itself comes from the British "Oggy Oggy Oggy" cheer for Cornish pasties and became popular in Australia after the 2000 Olympics.
The dunny was originally any outside toilet. In cities and towns the pan-type dunny was emptied by the dunny man, who came round regularly with his dunny cart. Dunny can now be used for any toilet. The word comes from British dialect dunnekin meaning an 'earth closet, (outside) privy' from dung + ken 'house'.
Common Australian slang for police includes Coppers, Cops, Jacks, Blue Heelers (from the TV show), Wallopers, and sometimes more derogatory terms like Poh-Poh or Grasshoppers, often used with a mix of respect and disrespect, similar to international slang like "fuzz" or "5-0".
Gen Z slang uses internet-driven, often ironic terms to describe feelings, people, and situations, with popular examples including "rizz" (charisma), "drip" (style), "bet" (yes/okay), "no cap" (no lie), "bussin" (delicious/good), "mid" (average/bad), and "slay" (to do something exceptionally well). These phrases, heavily influenced by social media and AAVE, allow for quick, expressive communication, often using single words or short phrases to convey complex ideas.
A brawl is a fight, especially a big one involving a lot of people. Brawl can also be used as a verb meaning to fight or to participate in a brawl. A person who does this or who's known for fighting in general can be called a brawler. Much less commonly, brawl can also be used as a slang term for a wild party.
Fans were brawling in the streets after the game. Their days of brawling in a bar seem to be in the past. The video shows two men brawling in the plane seats while a woman and a man try to break up the fight from the aisle. All five brawled in and around the ring, using chairs and stairs liberally.
Missus. A person's wife or girlfriend. I'm taking the missus out for their birthday.
Pommy or pom
Newspapers in Australia were using the term by 1912, with it appearing first in Western Australia, and was said to be short for pomegranate, with the terms "jimmy" and "jimmigrant" also in use. The term Ten-pound Pom refers to British (subsidized) migrants to Australia and New Zealand after World War II.
Australians use a couple of other colloquial words for a hen's egg. The Australian English word googie or goog is an informal term that dates from the 1880s. It derives from British dialect goggy, a child's word for an egg. A closer parallel to the jocular bum nut, however, is the word cackleberry.
Woop Woop (wop-wops in New Zealand) is an Australian term meaning a place that is a far distance from anything.
The bird that goes "woop woop woop" in Australia is the Pheasant Coucal, a large, ground-dwelling cuckoo known for its distinctive, resonant, bubbling call that sounds like "oop-oop-oop-opp" or "whoop-whoop-whoop," often heard morning and night, and sometimes mistaken for rain.
Australians primarily call sausages "snags," a popular slang term often used in the context of a "sausage sizzle" (a casual BBQ, often for fundraising) or a "democracy sausage" (sausage in bread at polling stations). Other less common terms might include "snarler" or "snork," but "snag" is the overwhelmingly popular and recognized term, stemming from the idea of a quick grab or light meal.
Sexual intercourse. Root. Sexual intercourse, similar to the British word 'Shag'. Can also be used as a verb.
nounWord forms: plural cockies Australian informal. 1. short for cockatoo (sense 2) 2. a farmer whose farm is regarded as small or of little account.
Australians call flip-flops "thongs" because the footwear has a strap, or "thong," that goes between the big toe and the second toe, a term derived from Old English for a strip of leather. This naming reflects the shoe's structure, similar to how thong underwear has a string that passes between the buttocks, though the footwear term is much older than the undergarment's popular usage in the 1990s.