Comments on: A New Voice from Down Under: "Thinking 2.0"

By: Clay Burell

Clay Burell — Fri, 13 Jul 2007 13:46:00 +0000

Another etymology fan! I wish my president had the wit (and the English fluency) of your fmr P.M. I think the word “antipode” would garner blank stares from Americans. But so do words like, I dunno, “Canada” and “Mexico.” It’s not our fault. We have the shortest vacation periods in the developed world, and we’re isolated by the two biggest oceans. We don’t have time to get out much.

By: Cindy Barnsley

Cindy Barnsley — Fri, 13 Jul 2007 13:28:00 +0000

Hi Clay,
Thanks for the encouragement. Being from “Down Under” does sound a little weird doesn’t it. There was once a “cultural cringe” associated with living, as our former Prime Minster Paul Keating so eloquently put it, at the “arse end of the world”, but I’m not bothered by it or by the term “Aussie”. I do rather like “Antipodean” though - it has a more exotic ring (etymology- Antipodes (from Greek anti- “opposed” and pous “foot”) means “diametrically opposed”, and more specifically refers to the opposite side of the Earth, the region of the antipodal point, and those to those living there. In Britain in particular, “The Antipodes” is often used to refer to Australia and New Zealand.
Cindy

By: Jane Nicholls

Jane Nicholls — Fri, 13 Jul 2007 11:06:00 +0000

An Aussie is an Aussie and a Kiwi is a Kiwi and never the twain shall meet. The same as a Canadian is not an American. I am an Australian living in New Zealand and I’m sure that the Kiwis living in Australia would say the same