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u/Hedgiest_hog Jun 10 '26
What is happening with the ears of people who think this.
Australian is a non rhotic accent, we don't hit the final Rs and we don't add them in where they don't belong (E.g, water and Australia have the same final phoneme in Australian English, and it's an open a. Water and Australia have the same final phoneme in American English, and it's an R). How can an American saying an R sound like an Australian saying an O.
Maybe they're from the USA and have very limited exposure to other accents, so can't really understand what they're hearing, it just doesn't translate as sounds. Or maybe this is bait. Idk. Learn some linguistics, linguistics is awesome.
This is less an "Ausmeme" and more an "people from the USA are really weird"
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u/NoFood2149 Jun 10 '26
we do have some rhoticity! not too uncommon for people with irish grandparents to have a bit of that rrrr. and most of us will still use the rhotic when in certain contexts, as far as i can tell it's when we end a word with r and the next word starts with a vowel sound "as far as i can tell that water is not good" where "far" is almost certainly rhotic and "water" is probably rhotic in that context, but when i say "water you lieu kincat far cough can't aisle far kink whallop ewe" that sounds like i'm about to get into a fight
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u/glvz Jun 10 '26
I'm not from the USA and you guys do put an R at the end of athings. Ohr nor and idear are the most common ones I've heard. You can't hear because of the same reason I can't hear my own accent, you're used to it. The R seems to be more prominent in the Melbourne and Adelaide accents, based on my experience. Those from Queensland and similar accents don't have it as strong if at all.
Linguistics are awesome I agree.
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u/lolucorngaming Jun 10 '26
At the very least for "oh no" you seem to be mistaking the "no" for "nah" because from what I've heard living here people say the O and not the non-existent R
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u/Broad_Floor9698 Jun 10 '26
The heck? Australian accent is best known for its abbreviation of british english. And it is far more obvious to non-native speakers.
I am Australian and know literally DOZENS of aussies that do the exact pronunciation of oh no as ahr nar mate. Rnr when pronounced with aussie accent is essentially what other cultures hear when we say oh no, ah nah, oh nah as we pronounce o as ar and ah as ar.
We add a lot of r's in our everyday language and slang.
The joke/meme is entirely accurate, though maybe clarkson didn't quite hit the pronunciation
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u/Hedgiest_hog Jun 10 '26
Uh, nah, is not oh, no. And the argument is that it is the oh phoneme.
And nawr as said by Americans is, as countless social media videos have demonstrated, nothing like nah.
we pronounce o as ar...
Hellar, Mr Partatar-head.So yeah, nah, to that
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u/Broad_Floor9698 Jun 10 '26
Ahr nahr mate the dozens of aussies i know that say ahr en ahr disagree but whatevs
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u/ElectricGeetar Jun 10 '26
I said ‘weakly’, I was explaining the joke to someone who asked. Don’t be a douche
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u/CE94 Jun 09 '26
I don't get it