Transcript of AE 935 - Expression: Rattle Your Dags

G'day, you mob and welcome to Aussie English. I am your host, Pete, and my objective here is to teach you guys the English spoken down under. So, whether you want to sound like a fair dinkum Aussie or you just want to understand what the flipping hell we're on about, when we're having a yarn, you've come to the right place. So, sit back, grab a cuppa and enjoy Aussie English. Let's go.

G'day, you mob. What's going on? Welcome to this episode of Aussie English. I am your host Pete Smissen, and this is the number one podcast for anyone and everyone wanting to learn Australian English, as well as get a fair dinkum, true blue, Aussie dose of slang history, news and current affairs. All that jazz. Okay, as I always say, learning a language is much more than just learning the language.

It's about learning the culture, the history, and being up to date with pop culture and news, everything like that. Right. You really want to take it to a holistic level. It's not just about learning words and phrases. You're going to become an Australian, right? That's the whole- The whole point of this podcast is to help you guys become as Aussie as possible. So, thanks for joining me.

Don't forget, if you want to get access to all of the premium podcast content, including transcripts and MP3's and the premium podcast player. So, that you can listen and read at the same time and to get access to the video episode of today's episode, where you'll be able to see certain vocab come up on the screen, you'll see clips of what I'm talking about appear on the screen and photos, everything like that.

If you are a visual learner, make sure that you check out the premium podcast. So, how's my week been? Well, at the moment, guys. It has been pretty good. I've been walking a heap. In fact, let me give you a little squiz. Right. I'll give you a look. I've been walking heaps this week. In fact, this month. Let me open it up. Here is May, so I'll show you my little- I've got my little app here that tracks my steps.

Every single one of these red circles is over 10,000 steps a day. Right. Let me hold that up to the camera here so you can see it. So, this month already I have walked 200.02 kilometres over 49.02 hours, which has been a total of 264,411 steps. Insane. Tragically, I haven't lost a great deal of weight, but it's been good fun. And, you know, I've probably prevented myself from gaining weight.

So, all of that is to say that I've been trying to be more active, get out there, drive less, you know, burn less fossil fuels, be better for the environment whilst also being better for my health and walking around. And I don't know if you can hear at the moment, but I'm sort of trapped inside because it is pissing down with rain outside.

So, I racked up a bunch of steps this morning, but this might be the first day this month that I don't get past 10,000 if the rain doesn't pass. Anyway, that's what I've been up to. So, as usual, let's get into today's news story. The population of a tiny outback town in Queensland has exploded this weekend as crowds have flocked to see Australia's biggest wool shearing competition.

The Bulloo Shire attracted more than a thousand people to the Outback Festival in Thargomindah who came to see live music, markets, pig racing, as well as Australia's and New Zealand's best sheep shearers. 80 competitors, both men and women, duked it out on stage to see who could share a sheep the fastest and hopefully go home with a fair slice of the $25,000 prize money.

The Aussies were outclassed, unfortunately, and left feeling a little sheepish- Man, I'm horrible. This year by the New Zealanders who took out first place in both the men's and women's open categories. Jo Van Taiki fleeced a sheep in a mere 29 seconds to take out first place in the open male category, and Amy Silcock, who won the open female competition, separated a sheep from its fleece in an impressive 55 seconds.

So, congrats New Zealand, though this is definitely going to go down as evidence that New Zealanders know their way around a sheep much more intimately than an Aussie. We'll get onto that later, okay. We'll get on to that later. Okay, guys. So, as usual, it's time for a joke. So, slap that kookaburra on the bum and let's get into it. All right. So, today's joke, guys, I wanted to tie in with sheep. So, here it is.

What do you call a sheep covered in chocolate? What do you call a sheep covered in chocolate? You're going to hate me. You are absolutely going to hate this answer. A candy baaaaaaa. Oh, man, horrible, horrible. All right, so the joke there is on the word bar, right. A candy bar or just a chocolate bar, I guess we'd say in Australia. A candy bar is what an American would call a chocolate bar. So, you know, a Mars bar or a Snickers bar or a crunchy bar.

Right. The word "bar" there is the shape of a chocolate bar. It's a bar of chocolate, funnily enough. And the sound that sheep make is "baaaaa". And that's the joke, right. So, what do you call a sheep covered in chocolate? A candy baaaaa, a chocolate baaaaa. Feel free to use it. You don't have to reference me. Tell your friends. All right, guys.

So, now let's go through the words in the expression that we're going to cover today, which is "rattle your dags". I'm going to explain each of these words and then I'm going to talk about what the expression means and then break down the origin of the expression and also talk about the word "dag". I wonder if you've heard the word "dag" before in Australia. This is used a lot, really good Aussie slang. All right.

So, I'm looking for my keys, but I don't have my keys here because that would be the perfect prop to explain the verb "to rattle". Right. If you "rattle" something, it is that you make it or cause it to make a rapid succession of short, sharp knocking sounds. So, if you pick your car keys up and shake them, you're "rattling" them, although you could probably also say jingling if they make a little bit of musical noise too.

You can also use the verb "rattle" to mean to make someone nervous, worried or irritated. Right. So, you might "rattle" someone a little bit if they suddenly see a spider, they may get "rattled", they may get scared. The word "your" this is just the possessive pronoun for "you", "your car keys, your dad, your house". And then a "dag". In this sense, a "dag" is a lock of wool, right. The fur or hair on a sheep, wool.

It's a lock of wool that is matted with dung hanging from the hind quarters of a sheep. So, effectively a "dag" is a poo dreadlock on the bum of a sheep. This is a problem because in Australia we have a lot of flies, so often "dags" need to be removed, right.

That's why the tails get docked on sheep so that they don't get flyblown, which is where they get effectively infested with maggots and flies in their bum and it leads to a number of problems you can imagine. We also use this, strangely enough, this term, a "dag" as Aussie slang and it is an entertainingly eccentric person or character. Right. Kind of like a little bit of a silly person, but we use it affectionately.

So, if my wife told me the joke that I told you guys earlier about a chocolate baaaaa, I'd probably turn to her and sort of laugh and be like, "you're such a dag". Right. So, it's kind of like you're a strange but funny and silly person, and I love you. Right. It's kind of a cute way of of calling someone silly. If you wanted to offend someone, you wouldn't call them a "dag", it's just not offensive.

So, this has been around for a long time, I think since the 1960s is when we first started using "dag" to mean an unfashionable or silly kind of person. But interestingly, the word "dag" is older than that and is a shortening of the word "daglock" when we're referencing the poo dreadlocks of sheep. And that has been used ever since the 1870s in Australia.

Fast forward another hundred years to the 1980s and this is where we get this kind of euphemistic funny expression to "rattle your dags", right. And so, to "rattle your dags" means to get a move on, to hurry up. Go, go, go. Move, move, move. Let's do this. And it's informal slang. You wouldn't really use this in formal situations, you know, you wouldn't go to work and have a colleague there and be like, "rattle your dags".

I mean, you could probably do it. And it's kind of funny, but it's definitely informal. So, I would only do that with people I really knew well, and they knew that I was, you know, kidding around and trying to be silly. I wouldn't use it in a serious, you know, situation that's very formal.

And what it's obviously inferring is that when a sheep runs, if it's got dags on its bum, they sort of get hardened with poo and they'll rattle and smack together, making short, sharp noises, right. The dags are rattling.

So, the idea here is that if someone wants you to "rattle your dags", they're trying to pretend like you're a sheep and you need to get moving because, you know, you're going to cause your dags to rattle and they're going to make a noise, so "rattle your dags". So anyway, now let's go through some examples of how I would use this expression to "rattle your dags" in everyday English. All right.

So, example number one, imagine that your mom is organising a night out for you, right. You guys are going to go out to the cinema. She wants to go see a film, you know, back in the days, maybe she wanted to see films like The Dish or Kenny or even The Castle. Right. That's a great film. And she is just really pumped up and excited. So, she's getting the family ready. She's gone off into her bedroom. She's getting organised quick as a flash.

She gets dolled up, puts her favourite dress on, puts some lippy on. Right. Some lipstick, and then realises when she comes out of her room that no one else is ready to go. Everyone's kind of piss farting around. They are mucking about. They're not hurrying at all. So, she might say to everyone, guys, we've got to get moving, "rattle your dags", you know, hurry up, let's get moving. We've got to go to the film. It starts in 20 minutes.

"Rattle your dags". Let's go. Example number two, imagine that you've gone to a birthday lunch for one of your friends, but you know that you've kind of got a nick off early. So, you know, you've dressed up in this spiffy, smart, nice suit that you've got and then you head down to the shops, to the local bottle-o so that you can lash out on some nice red wine for your friend or maybe some Scotch whisky because you want to get them a good prezzie.

Right. You want to get them a nice present for their birthday. After you've grabbed them a prezzie, you head over to their house. The party's raging. You know, you see your mates and then you see the birthday boy or girl. You have a great time there. Then all of a sudden you notice that it is 7PM and you got to go home to cook dinner for your family.

So, you might walk up to your mate and say, sorry, guys, or sorry, mate, I've got a choof off, I got a, you know, nick off, I've got to go home. I have to "rattle my dags". I've got to get a move on. I have to hurry up. I'm sorry. I've got to rush off. I got to "rattle my dags". Example number three, okay, here, imagine that you are a young girl who is obsessed with soccer, right.

You've grown up with a ball on your foot or in your hand at all times where you've been practising non-stop, sharpening and honing your skills. You're an absolute machine when it comes to soccer. However, the- When you go and train, the coach knows that you're not the fastest on the field.

You're insanely accurate and you can sink the ball into the back of the net from pretty much anywhere on the field as long as the ball gets to you, but that you're not very fast. So, maybe one day, you know, you're at some huge premiership trying to win and the ball gets kicked over to you and you have to try and get it into the net. If the coach is trying to encourage you to hurry up to get a move on, to go, run, run, run, run, run.

He might say to you, mate, go, go, go, go, go. "Rattle your dags". Get out of here. Go for it. Move on. Move, move, move, you know, keep going. Come on. "Rattle your dags". So, there you go guys. That is the expression to "rattle your dags". This is informal Aussie slang that we use to mean get a move on, hurry up, go, move, let's go. So, as usual, guys, let's go through a little pronunciation exercise where you can practise your pronunciation.

If you're working on Australian English, that's brilliant. Just listen and repeat after me. Focus on my pronunciation, particular- Particularly of different vowel sounds. Listen to my intonation and rhythm as well. If you're focussing on a different accent, that's cool too, just use the words and phrases as I say them for yourself to be able to focus on your own pronunciation. Okay, let's go.

"To. To rattle. To rattle your. To rattle your dags. To rattle your dags. To rattle your dags. To rattle your dags. To rattle your dags. I better rattle my dags. You better rattle your dags. He better rattle his dags. She better rattle her dags. We better rattle our dags. They better rattle their dags. It better rattle its dags." Good work, guys, good work.

Now let's go through a little bit of the pronunciation that's happening here. Okay. Boom, you're going to notice "to" gets reduced and you're going to hear the schwa sound /ə/ instead of /u/. "To rattle your dags". t-t-t. You're also going to hear this for "your" the vowel sound /ɔ/ turns into a schwa as well. "To rattle your dags". "Ya, ya". The other thing to notice here is the T and L sound in the word "rattle".

Now, this is difficult, and I cover this in the Australian pronunciation course. You have here a T-flap and then you have the syllabic L sound. Okay, so what's happening here is that there is a T sound that is sort of fusing with the L sound and it's actually a syllabic L with lateral release, it's called. This is very specific language, and you'll learn more about this in the Australian pronunciation course.

But effectively what's happening is the tongue is going up to make the T sound, but it stops, and the sides of the tongue come away from the teeth to let air out. "Rat-tle", and it's almost instantaneous. "Rattle, rattle, rat-tle, rat-tle." This is a really, really advanced sequence of sounds in Australian English, and it also happens in British and American English.

So, if you want to learn more about that, check out the Australian pronunciation course. Before we get into the Aussie fact, I thought I could break down for you, too, that you would have heard me say, "better rattle your dags or he better rattle his dags". When you better do something, this is to need to do something. You should do something. You ought to do something. You must do something. You better do it.

And it's a shortening of the construction, "had better do something". So, you could say, "I had better go home, I'd better go home, I better go home." So, there's no "had" or contraction of the D, and "I should go home." Right. I kind of need to go home. I better go home. Another example might be, "you had better give that back. You'd better give that back. You better give that back. You should give that back."

The only thing here I would mention is that when you say someone better do something, it kind of carries this connotation of if you don't do it, there'll be a punishment or there'll be some kind of consequences or you're going to regret it. Whereas if you say to someone you should do something or you need to do something or you ought to or must do something, it doesn't carry that same kind of "you're going to regret it if you don't". Right.

Like a threat. So, if you better do something, it's because you're often worried about there being bad consequences. Anyway, let's go through the Aussie fact, guys. So, today, I thought I had better talk about the New Zealand and Australia rivalry and a bit about our humour, which often references sheep. So, as you'll no doubt be aware, both Australia and New Zealand have huge sheep and wool industries.

Australia is home to about 70 million sheep at any one time and New Zealand to about 26 million, so per capita that's about 3 sheep for every Australian and upwards of 5 to 6 sheep for every New Zealander. Needless to say, due to the Trans-Tasman rivalry, Trans-Tasman, as in across the Tasman Ocean, from Australia to New Zealand.

Due to the Trans-Tasman rivalry, we get a lot of this, "who's the best country?" Or "who's the best rugby team?" Or "who's the best cricket team?" You know, we're always poking fun at each other, kind of taking the mickey out of one another, taking the piss, making jokes and competing, you know, against one another. Unfortunately for sheep, they tend to be the butt of many jokes or ewe-phemisms.

Get it? A ewe is a female shape and "euphemism" has the sound of ewe at the front. Bad joke. All right. So, yeah, Australians and New Zealanders love using euphemisms and jokes that involve sheep. Usually these jokes, to put it politely, reference the idea of New Zealanders or Australians having intercourse with their sheep. Some of the jokes even poke fun at the differences between accents and pronunciation.

So, I thought I'd tell you a few jokes here. You can substitute New Zealand for Australia in all of these, really. So, if you're a fan of New Zealand, you're in New Zealand, you want to make fun of Australians, you can, you know, use Australia in these jokes. If you're in Australia and you want to make fun of New Zealanders, you can do the inverse and use New Zealand in these jokes.

Warning, though these jokes are crass, they are rude, they are definitely informal. So, if that's not your thing or there are young children around or innocent old ladies, just skip this part of the episode. All right. So, I'm going to tell you three jokes to give you an idea of this kind of humour. And I'm just going to switch between Australia making fun of New Zealand and New Zealand, making fun of Australia.

All right. Joke number one, an Australian goes to New Zealand and sees a guy fucking a sheep on the side of the road, and he says, mate, in Australia we shear our sheep. And the New Zealander goes, fuck off. I'm not sharing my sheep with anyone. So- And it's almost embarrassing swearing on this podcast, but that was the joke. The joke here is that the New Zealanders on the side of the road having sex with his sheep.

And the Australian says, we don't, you know, do that. We shear them. We just, you know, shear the wool off them. The New Zealander hears "shear" thinking he's saying "share". And he says that he's not sharing the sheep. I'm not sharing the sheep with anyone. All right. Joke number two. And this one's about Australians, okay. We switch the tables. The tables have turned.

Why does Australia have some of the fastest racehorses in the world? Because the horses have seen what Aussies do to their sheep. All right. Joke number three, what do you call a Kiwi, which is the slang term for a New Zealander. What do you call a Kiwi with 100 lovers? A shepherd. So, horrible.

So, the joke here being that if someone, if a man or a woman from New Zealand has many, many different lovers, right, partners that they're intimately involved with. What do you call them? And you're thinking, I don't know, you know, a promiscuous person or something. And it's like, no, took a left turn, we call them a shepherd, right. A person who owns a flock of sheep or takes care of a flock of sheep.

All right. So, they're the jokes, guys. Once you know these sorts of jokes, my advice is always erred on the side of caution. You do not have to tell anyone these jokes. You never have to tell a New Zealander or an Australian these jokes, if you think it's going to offend them. You can always mention it if you know an Australian or a New Zealander informally as friends and you want to make them laugh.

The whole point of telling you this stuff was not to equip you with ammunition to offend other people, but more to give you an idea of the kinds of jokes that I definitely told when I was in high school about my New Zealander friends and that my New Zealander friends definitely told about me back in the day. Okay, so pretty much any Australian man is going to know and understand these jokes. Same for New Zealand guys.

I've been rabbiting on a lot, guys. I hope you enjoyed this episode. I hope you got a lot out of it. Learned a bunch of culture, history, Australian slang, everything like that. I'm Pete, this is Aussie English, and I will see you next time. Peace.