''Me and Hamish are goina feed the potties in the bottom paddock.''
''Hamish and I are goina to feed the potties!''
I grew up on the central western tablelands, just outside the rural city of Dubbo. My father came from Medooran, seventy odd kilometres northeast of Dubbo and had studied English in the 80's before becoming a teacher. My mother grew up in Quirindi, among a Catholic family. My father had grown up as a builder's son, and regarded Dubbo as a major city. My mother found her metropolis in Tamworth. Both arrived in Dubbo with a sense of novel urbanity, and brought with them individual dialects unique to their culture- my father's low drawl and laconic ribaldries, and my mother's proper catholic intonations.
Growing up in Dubbo meant vast skies and dry open landscapes. The peoples around me spoke with a lazed drawl, worn and careful with the dry heat and harsh winters. Laughter was loud and unabashed. Teachers slipped out of propriety often, and idioms unique and often puzzling highlighted lessons. A boy's life revolved around the seasons and their sacred practices- cricket in the summer and rugby league in the winter.
Dubbo is located upon Wirajuri country, and 17 percent of the city is made up of First Nations peoples ( as contrasted by Newcastle's 4 percent). Despite rampart racism, both direct and indirect, colloquial speech of the Wirajuri people has soaked into the local dialect. It wasn't uncommon to hear from the sidelines of a Saturday footy match a paradox almost comical- ''Guon! Get the black dog!''
As a child, I didn't recognise the difference between myself as an Anglo-Saxon Australian and the Wirajuri children around me. My best of friends were a mixed bag and our differences only became apparent through the comments and displayed behaviour of older generations around us. I spoke as they spoke, and lived as they lived- as we all did, those of us attending the local public school and sporting clubs. Our dialects were defined by our class, not our race. Naidoc day was a week long treasured event, and dream time stories were told to us all as we crafted black, red and yellow beaded bracelets, smoke was ceremoniously blown over all of us as we danced like dinawan and wambuwuny to clapping sticks and didgeridoo.
My father spoke to me in two dialects- his learnt academic English, when addressing us at the dinner table or in public and when we fell into familiar proletariat landscapes his lazed drawl would sound- Urgent warnings and demands in the shed, or out on the field giving criticisms to a bat-stroke or a pass of the football. Silence was an important part of his speech. Some of my most poignant memories involve long drives through dry golden landscapes, with long silence only interrupted by laconic observations- types of trees and birds, or agricultural practices.
My mother had been raised in a Catholic household that prided itself on being among the first free settlers after Cook landed. Despite her parents proletariat involvement within the local community, (my Pop who worked in the local printing factory, and my grandmother a school teacher then town postie), ABC English was spoken with care. My mother wagged war on my adopted dialect, and with unerring patience corrected lazed statements and free-form grammar. Despite her best efforts and pride, even she herself was vulnerable to the local environment, and at times gave out frustrated bursts of drawl.
Moving to the coast in my teens, I found myself contrasted in dialect, idiom use and lexical choice with the locals. I found my burred speech mocked and laughed at, and found myself laughing at the local salty sway of speech. My long trusty idioms fell on dim ears, and lost their lazy humour in their explanation, and my grasp of slang was blurred as new words surrounded me. Despite moving only within the state, I found myself within a new culture, and within a new language.