Talk:Australia

Pronunciation of "Australia"

The proper pronunciation of Australia should be ɒˈstreɪljə, not əˈstreɪljə/ (i.e. o-stray-lee-uh, not uh-stray-lee-uh). I think this is particularly relevant to Americans whose accent generally produces "aah-stray-lee-uh", when a correct IPA key would produce something closer to the correct pronunciation.

114.78.199.28 (talk) 04:02, 13 December 2010 (UTC)

I don't know. I pronounce it more "A-Strayle-yah" or "Uh-Strayle-yah" with only 3 sylables. I think the way it is is accurate, but I could be wrong. Anoldtreeok (talk) 05:00, 13 December 2010 (UTC)

As an Australian, I always say it as 3 sylables, eg, A-Strayle-yah, and I think this is the main pronunciation here. I don't know any group that says it in 4 sylables, although I hear British people say Or-strayle-yah, and my Irish friends typically say Os-rail-yah and leave out the T altogeher. (obviously regional variations exist).--Dmol (talk) 05:23, 13 December 2010 (UTC)

As I always say, "Australia" rhymes with "failure" and "genitalia". Does anybody say fail-i-ya or jen-i-tail-i-ya? Someone being extremely precise and deliberately sounding out the syllables slowly might say o-stray-li-ya or jen-i-tail-i-ya, but outside that specific context, it'd be o-strayl-ya and jen-i-tail-ya. And always fail-ya. -- Jack of Oz ... speak! ... 05:34, 13 December 2010 (UTC)

I agree with this. I always say and hear 'aw-strayl-yuh.' I would look funny at someone who said 'uh-strayl-yuh' or 'aw-stray-lee-uh.' My IPA transliteration would use the regular 'a' symbol though, because for me it's the same vowel as in 'father.' (aˈstreɪl'jə). 74.232.83.13 (talk) 20:59, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

But that's not the same vowel as "aw", which you mentioned first. -- Jack of Oz [your turn] 21:13, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

You'd look weirdly at someone who says "Uh-Strayl-yuh"? I've always thought the "aw-strayl-yuh" pronunciation sounded weird. It always sounded to me like the way Americans would say it. Not that it's wrong, I've just never pronounced it that way. Anoldtreeok (talk) 23:35, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

Ha ha - rhymes with "genetalia" and "failure". An alternative pronunciation is "Straya" as in "Slayer". On a serious note, I'm of no use with the IPA keys etc. sorry. --Merbabu (talk) 23:40, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

It should be "Os-tra-lee-ah" as your common Ostraleein would pronounce it.210.185.7.199 (talk) 12:51, 11 January 2011 (UTC)

The British RP pronunciation is "os"tralia or "aw"stralia, the general american pronunciation is "ah"stralia, and the general australian pronunciation is closer to the american than the british, but more like "uh"stralia or simply "a"stralia. so in other words the əˈstreɪljə is correct. its like how the british pronounce words like "dance" "plant" and "chance" with an 19th century corrupted vowel "daarnce" "chaaarrnce" "plahhrnt" whereas the americans and australians, because we were founded before that vowel shift occured in the UK, use the older pronunciation of simply "chance" and "dance". —Preceding unsigned comment added by 122.108.254.44 (talk) 02:06, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

The traditional pronunciation is more like the British "os"tralia than the American. I'm 51 and I was taught the British pronunciation of words when I was at school so the vowel shift explanation has little credibility with me. The difference in pronunciation is far more recent and, at least in my experience, has been more the result of a wider exposure to Amerrykan influences in recent times, starting with the introduction of colour TV and VCRs. --AussieLegend (talk) 04:55, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

Where are these IP editors getting their notions of how Americans say the name? As one myself, I have always said and heard aw-strayl-yuh. Of course we may pronounce "awe" differently (ours rhymes with "fall"), but we certainly don't pronounce the country "ah-" anything. -Rrius (talk) 06:19, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

Pictures

The MOS states "Avoid sandwiching text between two images that face each other." However, in my browser this article has a few cases of sandwiching.

• The History section has text sandwiched between the picture of Port Arthure and the caption of the map of routes.
• The Economy section has text sandwiched between both pictures
• The Culture section between the first two pictures (and I assume the second and third ones for larger browsers)

I'm not sure that they can be rearranged to fix this, so perhaps the only solution is to remove one or two? Chipmunkdavis (talk) 05:02, 9 January 2011 (UTC)

Doesn't look too bad to me, only minor compared to some other articles. Personally I wouldn't get too pedantic about sandwiching, but I wouldn't object to any changes/removals if other editors thought the article would read/flow better. Anoldtreeok (talk) 05:23, 9 January 2011 (UTC)

There's always room for improvement. But I'm not too hung about these apparent small deviations from the guidelines. --Merbabu (talk) 09:23, 9 January 2011 (UTC)

promotion of a wine initiative?

i don't know when this snuck into the article, but the wine subsection now has two sentences on the Australia's First Families of Wine initiative. Where to start? It looks to me to breach WP:UNDUE, it has peacock language (eg "to highlight the quality and diversity of Australian wine"), it is a sales pitch, it breaches NOTNEWS, and appears, in short, to be sales hype that has been buttressed by a ridiculous number of inline cites, which themselves seem to highlight the fact that the text does not deserve to be there. The text also does not make sense in places: "showcasing a representative of its landmark wines..." and "former Hon Tony Burke MP" - I wonder if there might be copyvio beneath the surface as well? Can anyone give us some good reasons why these two sentences should not be deleted with extreme prejudice?! Cheers, hamiltonstone (talk) 04:56, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

(ec) PS. Seems whole section was added in one hit here by an editor who has done a lot of good work on Aust wines and appears just to have got carried away on this occasion. hamiltonstone (talk) 05:09, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

A topic definitely of interest to me, but yes, clearly marketing, pure and simple. That's POV. It should go. HiLo48 (talk) 05:05, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

Add maybe a sentence or two to the Cuisine section, perhaps move to Cuisine main page, though the way it is currently written it seems like it would belong in Economy Chipmunkdavis (talk) 06:08, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

OK, I'm having a go at redistributing and editing material. hamiltonstone (talk) 09:13, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

English is not 'Legislatively Official', lets make that a little more clear

I propose the statement "Australia has no official language", be changed, the title "official" language is vague and the citation used to back it up has been taken out of context. I was just reading this article and was interested in the statement that English is not the official language of Australia. While this fact does not particularly surprise me, I am cautious of believing it's true. Now, I have no knowledge of whether there has ever been any legislation passed on this matter, nor whether the claim is true or false, but I think the statement warrants consideration.

let me clarify: In my opinion, the sentence cited to prove the claim has been taken out of context. the sentence: "English has no de jure status but it is so entrenched as the common language that it is de facto the official language as well as the national language", does not appear to imply that Australia has no 'Official' Language, it simply states (without any citation itself) that it has no status 'concerning law'. it does however state that it is the National Language. yet another vague title, yes, but I ask you to think, does it being the National language make it the official language? does not having legislation passed mean it is not Official?

I might also cite the Australian Courts of law. it is required that those facing prosecution in court either understand english or have a translator present so that they can understand.

to be concise, I propose the statement read something along the lines of 'Australia has no Legislated Official language'. I just feel the word 'Official' can be better understood if the statement follows those lines.

Lastly, I think this warrants suggestions for a better source citation, article thats actually cited doesn't focus on the issue at hand, though it does have a few more 'supported' statements that suggest english is not the Officially 'Legislated language', eg: "In 1987 the Federal Government adopted a National Policy on Languages, becoming the first English speaking country to have such a policy and the first in the world to have a multilingual languages policy" (CFAC 1994:29)." this may be found in the conclusion.

I hope you consider my suggestions and openly discuss them Cheers all Yungur (talk) 15:43, 28 January 2011 (UTC)

I'd just like to point out that we've discussed the issue of language previously:

• Talk:Australia/Archive 15#Australian Official Language
• Talk:Australia/Archive 14#Official Language of Australia
• Talk:Australia/Archive 11#Language
• Talk:Australia/Archive 10#Official languages
• Talk:Australia/Archive 7#Languages

To summarise, "no Legislated Official" is redundant. --AussieLegend (talk) 08:33, 29 January 2011 (UTC)

Update to 2010 GDP

Go to the list of countries by GDP (nominal)

update the GDP figures for both nominal and the less relevant PPP in the right hand side column and economy section

they currently show 2009 figures

the GDP figures for 2010 are now listed on the aforementioned articles. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 122.108.254.44 (talk) 05:48, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

My god. One would think such a major and crucial detail would be updated immediately, let alone still be left unchanged weeks after the suggestion was made. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 122.108.254.44 (talk) 14:23, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

'Culture' section

I've found a few oddities under the culture section on the article, and I don't yet have the ability to edit the page.

• Brett Whitely is described as an 'abstract expressionist', and is in a section inferring his influence by American modernism. More rightly his influence is from Sydney, Lloyd Rees, and Japanese calligraphy. And though there still may well be the case for referring to an American modernist influence, there is nothing abstract about his work, at all.
• Under cuisine there is the sentence: 'For most of Australian history, the cuisine was based on traditional Indigenous bushfood using native berries, fruit, fish, kangaroo and even insects such as the witchetty grub.'; that bolded 'even' is extraneous, and perhaps patronising.

This is my first time editing a discussion page. Apologies if anything's presented incorrectly.Rylie James Thomas (talk) 17:44, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

You're quite right about the "even". I've removed it. Thanks for picking up the problem. I will leave the art question to someone who, unlike me, knows something about it. HiLo48 (talk) 21:45, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

Pronunciation of "Australia"

The proper pronunciation of Australia should be ɒˈstreɪljə, not əˈstreɪljə/ (i.e. o-stray-lee-uh, not uh-stray-lee-uh). I think this is particularly relevant to Americans whose accent generally produces "aah-stray-lee-uh", when a correct IPA key would produce something closer to the correct pronunciation.

114.78.199.28 (talk) 04:02, 13 December 2010 (UTC)

I don't know. I pronounce it more "A-Strayle-yah" or "Uh-Strayle-yah" with only 3 sylables. I think the way it is is accurate, but I could be wrong. Anoldtreeok (talk) 05:00, 13 December 2010 (UTC)

As an Australian, I always say it as 3 sylables, eg, A-Strayle-yah, and I think this is the main pronunciation here. I don't know any group that says it in 4 sylables, although I hear British people say Or-strayle-yah, and my Irish friends typically say Os-rail-yah and leave out the T altogeher. (obviously regional variations exist).--Dmol (talk) 05:23, 13 December 2010 (UTC)

As I always say, "Australia" rhymes with "failure" and "genitalia". Does anybody say fail-i-ya or jen-i-tail-i-ya? Someone being extremely precise and deliberately sounding out the syllables slowly might say o-stray-li-ya or jen-i-tail-i-ya, but outside that specific context, it'd be o-strayl-ya and jen-i-tail-ya. And always fail-ya. -- Jack of Oz ... speak! ... 05:34, 13 December 2010 (UTC)

I agree with this. I always say and hear 'aw-strayl-yuh.' I would look funny at someone who said 'uh-strayl-yuh' or 'aw-stray-lee-uh.' My IPA transliteration would use the regular 'a' symbol though, because for me it's the same vowel as in 'father.' (aˈstreɪl'jə). 74.232.83.13 (talk) 20:59, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

But that's not the same vowel as "aw", which you mentioned first. -- Jack of Oz [your turn] 21:13, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

You'd look weirdly at someone who says "Uh-Strayl-yuh"? I've always thought the "aw-strayl-yuh" pronunciation sounded weird. It always sounded to me like the way Americans would say it. Not that it's wrong, I've just never pronounced it that way. Anoldtreeok (talk) 23:35, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

Ha ha - rhymes with "genetalia" and "failure". An alternative pronunciation is "Straya" as in "Slayer". On a serious note, I'm of no use with the IPA keys etc. sorry. --Merbabu (talk) 23:40, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

It should be "Os-tra-lee-ah" as your common Ostraleein would pronounce it.210.185.7.199 (talk) 12:51, 11 January 2011 (UTC)

The British RP pronunciation is "os"tralia or "aw"stralia, the general american pronunciation is "ah"stralia, and the general australian pronunciation is closer to the american than the british, but more like "uh"stralia or simply "a"stralia. so in other words the əˈstreɪljə is correct. its like how the british pronounce words like "dance" "plant" and "chance" with an 19th century corrupted vowel "daarnce" "chaaarrnce" "plahhrnt" whereas the americans and australians, because we were founded before that vowel shift occured in the UK, use the older pronunciation of simply "chance" and "dance". —Preceding unsigned comment added by 122.108.254.44 (talk) 02:06, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

The traditional pronunciation is more like the British "os"tralia than the American. I'm 51 and I was taught the British pronunciation of words when I was at school so the vowel shift explanation has little credibility with me. The difference in pronunciation is far more recent and, at least in my experience, has been more the result of a wider exposure to Amerrykan influences in recent times, starting with the introduction of colour TV and VCRs. --AussieLegend (talk) 04:55, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

Where are these IP editors getting their notions of how Americans say the name? As one myself, I have always said and heard aw-strayl-yuh. Of course we may pronounce "awe" differently (ours rhymes with "fall"), but we certainly don't pronounce the country "ah-" anything. -Rrius (talk) 06:19, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

Pictures

The MOS states "Avoid sandwiching text between two images that face each other." However, in my browser this article has a few cases of sandwiching.

• The History section has text sandwiched between the picture of Port Arthure and the caption of the map of routes.
• The Economy section has text sandwiched between both pictures
• The Culture section between the first two pictures (and I assume the second and third ones for larger browsers)

I'm not sure that they can be rearranged to fix this, so perhaps the only solution is to remove one or two? Chipmunkdavis (talk) 05:02, 9 January 2011 (UTC)

Doesn't look too bad to me, only minor compared to some other articles. Personally I wouldn't get too pedantic about sandwiching, but I wouldn't object to any changes/removals if other editors thought the article would read/flow better. Anoldtreeok (talk) 05:23, 9 January 2011 (UTC)

There's always room for improvement. But I'm not too hung about these apparent small deviations from the guidelines. --Merbabu (talk) 09:23, 9 January 2011 (UTC)

promotion of a wine initiative?

i don't know when this snuck into the article, but the wine subsection now has two sentences on the Australia's First Families of Wine initiative. Where to start? It looks to me to breach WP:UNDUE, it has peacock language (eg "to highlight the quality and diversity of Australian wine"), it is a sales pitch, it breaches NOTNEWS, and appears, in short, to be sales hype that has been buttressed by a ridiculous number of inline cites, which themselves seem to highlight the fact that the text does not deserve to be there. The text also does not make sense in places: "showcasing a representative of its landmark wines..." and "former Hon Tony Burke MP" - I wonder if there might be copyvio beneath the surface as well? Can anyone give us some good reasons why these two sentences should not be deleted with extreme prejudice?! Cheers, hamiltonstone (talk) 04:56, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

(ec) PS. Seems whole section was added in one hit here by an editor who has done a lot of good work on Aust wines and appears just to have got carried away on this occasion. hamiltonstone (talk) 05:09, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

A topic definitely of interest to me, but yes, clearly marketing, pure and simple. That's POV. It should go. HiLo48 (talk) 05:05, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

Add maybe a sentence or two to the Cuisine section, perhaps move to Cuisine main page, though the way it is currently written it seems like it would belong in Economy Chipmunkdavis (talk) 06:08, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

OK, I'm having a go at redistributing and editing material. hamiltonstone (talk) 09:13, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

English is not 'Legislatively Official', lets make that a little more clear

I propose the statement "Australia has no official language", be changed, the title "official" language is vague and the citation used to back it up has been taken out of context. I was just reading this article and was interested in the statement that English is not the official language of Australia. While this fact does not particularly surprise me, I am cautious of believing it's true. Now, I have no knowledge of whether there has ever been any legislation passed on this matter, nor whether the claim is true or false, but I think the statement warrants consideration.

let me clarify: In my opinion, the sentence cited to prove the claim has been taken out of context. the sentence: "English has no de jure status but it is so entrenched as the common language that it is de facto the official language as well as the national language", does not appear to imply that Australia has no 'Official' Language, it simply states (without any citation itself) that it has no status 'concerning law'. it does however state that it is the National Language. yet another vague title, yes, but I ask you to think, does it being the National language make it the official language? does not having legislation passed mean it is not Official?

I might also cite the Australian Courts of law. it is required that those facing prosecution in court either understand english or have a translator present so that they can understand.

to be concise, I propose the statement read something along the lines of 'Australia has no Legislated Official language'. I just feel the word 'Official' can be better understood if the statement follows those lines.

Lastly, I think this warrants suggestions for a better source citation, article thats actually cited doesn't focus on the issue at hand, though it does have a few more 'supported' statements that suggest english is not the Officially 'Legislated language', eg: "In 1987 the Federal Government adopted a National Policy on Languages, becoming the first English speaking country to have such a policy and the first in the world to have a multilingual languages policy" (CFAC 1994:29)." this may be found in the conclusion.

I hope you consider my suggestions and openly discuss them Cheers all Yungur (talk) 15:43, 28 January 2011 (UTC)

I'd just like to point out that we've discussed the issue of language previously:

• Talk:Australia/Archive 15#Australian Official Language
• Talk:Australia/Archive 14#Official Language of Australia
• Talk:Australia/Archive 11#Language
• Talk:Australia/Archive 10#Official languages
• Talk:Australia/Archive 7#Languages

To summarise, "no Legislated Official" is redundant. --AussieLegend (talk) 08:33, 29 January 2011 (UTC)

Update to 2010 GDP

Go to the list of countries by GDP (nominal)

update the GDP figures for both nominal and the less relevant PPP in the right hand side column and economy section

they currently show 2009 figures

the GDP figures for 2010 are now listed on the aforementioned articles. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 122.108.254.44 (talk) 05:48, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

My god. One would think such a major and crucial detail would be updated immediately, let alone still be left unchanged weeks after the suggestion was made. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 122.108.254.44 (talk) 14:23, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

'Culture' section

I've found a few oddities under the culture section on the article, and I don't yet have the ability to edit the page.

• Brett Whitely is described as an 'abstract expressionist', and is in a section inferring his influence by American modernism. More rightly his influence is from Sydney, Lloyd Rees, and Japanese calligraphy. And though there still may well be the case for referring to an American modernist influence, there is nothing abstract about his work, at all.
• Under cuisine there is the sentence: 'For most of Australian history, the cuisine was based on traditional Indigenous bushfood using native berries, fruit, fish, kangaroo and even insects such as the witchetty grub.'; that bolded 'even' is extraneous, and perhaps patronising.

This is my first time editing a discussion page. Apologies if anything's presented incorrectly.Rylie James Thomas (talk) 17:44, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

You're quite right about the "even". I've removed it. Thanks for picking up the problem. I will leave the art question to someone who, unlike me, knows something about it. HiLo48 (talk) 21:45, 31 January 2011 (UTC)