Recent xenophobic research led by Martin Schweinberger from the university’s School of Languages and Cultures paints a different picture. Australians are less likely to swear online than people in the US and UK. In an important advance, the journal Lingua recently published an unusual study. It’s the first large-scale analysis of how, and where, offensive language is used in English-speaking countries.
As evidenced by the map above, Schweinberger’s research has found that the United States is at the vanguard of swearing online. The United Kingdom is a very close second. Australia surprisingly did not take the gold for online cursing, despite its notorious ¨she’ll be right¨ attitude about swearing.
“The findings suggest that Australians might still live up to our popular image of having unusually rich and inventive ‘bad’ language,” Schweinberger noted. He told The Guardian that Australia’s relatively low place in the swearing online leaderboard is due to more uptight disposition. This reserved approach carries over to their drafting on online communication channels.
“Australians prefer to swear face-to-face instead of online,” Schweinberger explained. “Swear words are normalized in Australia’s everyday language.” You can witness this normalization in all realms of Australian culture. For instance, tourism promotion campaigns have created well-known idioms that make use of dirty words, such as Australia’s “So where the bloody hell are you?” Did you leave the iron on? Famous first asked by model Lara Bingle.
Oddly enough, even though Australia embraces this kind of art in its urban culture, other countries have been doing a better job at mitigating the risk. The UK was the first country to ban advertisements that featured the word “bloody” from appearing on television and billboards. These ads were only allowed to run after 9 PM. Canada responded by blocking the ad from running in conjunction with family-friendly television programming. It seems this was the rationale for banning this ad, which used the word “hell.”
Despite these findings, Schweinberger is quick to underscore that Australians are actually swearing the least online when compared to other countries. He added that when swearing is necessary, it’s much better in person. This preference may not only drastically reshape the online landscape but potentially uncover a more generalized cultural bias against creativity in language and expression.
“Australians really see vulgarity, swearing and slang as part of our culture — we’re very invested in it.” – Martin Schweinberger
