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Cheveldi asked in Society & CultureLanguages · 6 years ago

What are some English-speaking nicknames for nations like Australia is the Outback? Unoffensive please!?

Update:

English, American, Australian

And Why?

Update 2:

I meant Down Under, I don't know why I wrote Outback, I was thinking Down Under when I wrote it.

Update 3:

What are some English (American, English, Australian, whatever) nicknames for other countries? For Instance, Brits and Yanks (and I assume Aussies) call Australia Down Under.

Does that make more sense?

Update 4:

Like the Boot for Italy, or the Hexagon for France, Or the Land of the Long White Cloud for New Zealand.

3 Answers

Relevance
  • Jim
    Lv 7
    6 years ago

    Unoffensive? GB Shaw: " It is impossible for an Englishman to open his mouth without making some other Englishman hate or despise him. "

    Outback is only the less-inhabited part of Australia. Down-under could be used for both Australia and NZ. "The antipodes" is more elegant. Don't confuse "down under" with "down there."

    Brits sometimes call the USA "the states." The less-populated part is sometimes called "Fly over country," Of course that offends the few people living in the plains

    I've heard the UK, particularly England, called "Blighty."

    As the process of seeking more independence for Scotland and Wales continues, I heard a proposal to change the name of the UK to DQ (Dairy Queen objected).

    It stands for "Devolving Queendom."

    Someone will object to all these, but there are much more objectionable phrases... for instance **** and ******. Not to mention *********.

  • ?
    Lv 5
    6 years ago

    The United States: 'Murica

    Canada: The Great White North

    Russia: Mother Russia, The Motherland, Soviet Russia

  • Mark
    Lv 7
    6 years ago

    I couldn't understand your question very well (and I tried parsing it different ways). But it seems you answered your own question: the middle of Australia is called the Outback.

    In the US, it would be the Midwest or the Prairies, and England doesn't really have a relatively unpopulated area.

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