Grimmer Girl here. I'm Mignon Fogarty and you can think of me as your friendly guide to the English language.

We talk about writing, history, rules, and other cool stuff.

Today, in honor of St. Patrick's Day, we'll talk about how the Irish language influenced the Australian language.

And then we'll talk about abbreviations, acronyms, and initialisms.

This first segment is by Howard Mann's and Kate Burridge.

Australian English decidedly finds its origins in British English.

But when it comes to chasing down Irish influence, there are, to paraphrase Donald Rumsfeld.

There are some, no-un-un-know-uns, some, unknown-know-uns,

and a bucket of furfies, a name for rumors or false stories.

The first Irish settlers, about half of whom were reputedly Irish language speakers,

reviewed with suspicion and derision.

This is reflected in the early Australian English words used to describe those who came from Pat land,

a blend of patty and land. The Irish were guided by patty's lantern, the moon.

Their homes adorned with Irish curtains, cobwebs, and their hot headedness saw them have a patty or patty out.

These Irish were said to follow Rafferty's rules, an eponym from the surname Rafferty,

which meant no rules at all. More than a few Irish were Lericans.

In his book, Ostrall English, E. Morris reports that in 1869, an Irish sergeant Dalton

charged a young prisoner with a Lerican about the streets, an Irish pronunciation of

larking or getting up to mischief. When asked to repeat by the magistrate, Dalton said,

a Lerican your word-chup. This Irish origin of Lerican had legs for many years, and perhaps still does.

Unfortunately, here we have our first furfy, with more compelling evidence linking Lerican to a

British dialect word, meaning mischief or frolic some youth. But if Lerican language is anything

...