Okay, so I’ve got a bit of a bee in my bonnet (so unlike me, I know…) and I need your help. It’s about a Chinese-related issue. It’s the way Chinese people refer to Australia in Chinese. Nowadays, lots of people, rather than using the standard word for Australia – which is 澳大利亚 Àodàlìyà, use a more recently coined term “土澳” Tǔ’Ào. I have a sense that this word is at its roots, not entirely respectful, but is perhaps so widely used that Chinese people have lost a sense of this. Interestingly, this then sparked an argument with a good Chinese friend of mine and I’m eager to get an outsider’s take on the issue (particularly if you don’t speak Chinese).
The etymology of “土澳” Tǔ’Ào is as follows: “澳” Ào is a shortened version of澳大利亚 Àodàlìyà ‘Australia’ and 土tǔ, which can be either a noun or an adjective, and according to one of the better online Chinese dictionaries, https://www.mdbg.net, can mean any of “earth / dust / clay / local / indigenous / crude opium / unsophisticated / one of the eight categories of ancient musical instruments”. According to the other main Chinese dictionary used by students of Chinese, Pleco (which incidentally, is run on a lexical database that forms the backend for most modern Chinese tools), the adjectival meanings of土tǔ include ‘local / native / homemade / indigenous / unrefined / unenlightened / crude (of opium)’. The meanings relevant to the term “土澳” Tǔ’Ào are ‘unsophisticated’, ‘unrefined’ and ‘unenlightened’.
土tǔ in fact has featured in a number of fairly modern slang expressions, such as:
- ‘土豪’, which is a man who is a rich but style-less country bumpkin
- ‘土腔’, a yucky, unrefined, usually countrified voice/speaking style
- ‘老土’, old-fashioned / corny / old-school
- ‘土味’, (literally: ‘the smell of soil’) tacky, corny, vulgar
Here’s a few online explanations I’ve found in forums about this slang meaning of土tǔ:
“In Chinese slang, the character “土” is some kind of a pejorative; it is often used for belittling something or someone.
For example, if someone says this piece of clothing “很土“, it means it looks very old-fashioned and is completely out of style.
Similarly, when someone says this person “很土“, it means he or she is just like a bumpkin (鄉巴佬), being very uneducated and ignorant, and can never follow the latest trends.”
[https://www.quora.com/What-does-%E5%9C%9F-t%C3%BB-mean-in-Chinese-slang]
“with no class, like a buffoon (as in, 你的衣服好土喔! ‘your clothes are so low class!’); lit. earth, soil”
[https://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Chinese_(Mandarin)/Slang]
“Most beginner learners will have learned this word early on to mean “dirt.” When used to describe a person or object, it can also mean “nerdy” or “unfashionable.”
The origins of this come from the fact that people who work with soil and dirt are usually peasants, and they’re not always seen to have all the class or elegance as a city person might. It’s similar to the English slang of “peasant.”
It’s not a compliment, so be careful when you decide to use this word!
他的衣服有点土. (tā de yī fú yǒu diǎn tǔ.)
“His clothes are a little unfashionable.“
[https://www.fluentu.com/blog/chinese/2016/02/17/mandarin-slang/]
When I’ve asked Chinese people about the meaning of “土澳” Tǔ’Ào and whether or not they think it’s a derogatory term, they mostly say that it’s a “昵称” ‘nickname’ or an “爱称” ‘pet name / term of affection’. When asked about why “土” tǔ is used to describe Australia, they invariably reply with at least some of the following:
- being behind the times and not being advanced
- lacking in basic infrastructure
- lacking city management / city planning
- lacking in lifestyle convenience when compared to China
- being a vast unpopulated land
- Australian people not having high aspirations
- Australian people being “lazy” or lacking the spirit to “奋斗” ‘struggle’
- play being more important than work
- shops closing very early
- Australia being a ‘大农村’ ‘big country village’
- the unpleasant Australian accent [“土”腔]
- everything being expensive
- it being hard to find a taxi
- closeness to nature
- lacking in skyscrapers / tall buildings
- lacking in technology
- lacking in mobile payment technology
Whether or not these are the key characteristics to highlight each time one refers to Australia in Chinese, I’ll leave to one side for now. What’s really interesting, though, is how upon referring to China with some of my Chinese friends as “土华” Tǔ Huá (a word I made up by analogy to “土澳” Tǔ’Ào, ‘华’ Huá being one of several ways in Chinese to refer to ‘China’), they were mortally offended.
Why should this be? Why is referring to Australia as “土澳” Tǔ’Ào fine, or even a term of affection, yet referring to China similarly as “土华” Tǔ Huá is disrespectful and rude?
Upon pressing my friend on this question, they responded by saying “Because China is more modern than Australia, so it doesn’t make any logical sense to say that China is ‘土’ tǔ.” I’m told that the term “土澳” Tǔ’Ào did in fact come into existence through conscious comparison of Australia with China and so to reverse the tables and refer to China in a similar way comes across as “just saying it to be offensive”, as one Chinese speaker told me. This logic, however, seems self-contradictory – it seems that when China uses this term to refer to others, it’s inoffensive because “it’s simply the truth”, whereas using it to refer to China is disrespectful.
Similar to “土澳” Tǔ’Ào, Chinese sometimes refer to England as “腐国” Fǔguó, where ”国” guó means ‘country’ and “腐” fǔ, according to Pleco, means, “UK (slang term reflecting a perception of UK as decadent for its attitudes toward homosexuality)”. Again, regardless of the degree of truth that the component characters may or may not touch upon, it would seem that ‘decadence’, in particular towards homosexuality, has generally not been viewed historically as a way of bestowing praise, and again, referring to a country exclusively by some particular cultural aspect of it would appear to at the same time be over-simplifying, over-generalising, stereotyping and caricaturing it. Just as with “土澳” Tǔ’Ào, my Chinese friend could not fathom why I would perceive there to be any ‘贬义’ ‘negative meaning’ in the term “腐国”.
[Incidentally, another example that was raised to me in retort was that surely I wouldn’t find the Chinese slang term for ‘Japan’ of ‘霓虹国’ Níhóngguó offensive. There are, however, two reasons why this case is different. Most importantly, Níhóngguó is simply a Chinese transliteration of the Japanese pronunciation of 日本国 Nihongo ‘Japan’; and secondly, ‘the neon country’ alludes to images of technological advancement, lights, prosperity and fun and so doesn’t appear to have any obviously discernible sense of possible derogatoriness.]
If referring to “土澳” Tǔ’Ào is, in the Chinese conception, not offensive in any way, but referring to China as “土华” Tǔ is offensive (in linguistics, we call what we have here a ‘minimal pair’), we can thus surmise that the linguistic compositions of these slang terms are not in fact what determines whether they are offensive or not. Rather, it’s purely what the speakers decide a priori as a group that decides the level of offense imbued in the term.
However, there are significant problems with this way of constructing linguistic meaning with terms of reference to social groups. Of chief importance is the fact that in western culture, we have mostly decided that when it comes to terms that refer to vast cultural groups or even whole countries, that it is not the person who invents and uses the term of reference that gets to decide whether or not it is offensive; rather, it is the people who are called that term that get to decide if it makes them feel comfortable and at ease or uncomfortable and disrespected. This is why we don’t anymore call people from Hong Kong ‘Honkies’, or Germans ‘Gerries’ or African Americans ‘the blacks’. We have at some point recognised the importance of referring to social groups in a way that strives for a balance between naturalness, authenticity and respectfulness.
A common retort from Chinese people when posed with the suggestion that “土澳” Tǔ’Ào might possibly come across as slightly offensive to local Australians is that “this is a Chinese term and in Chinese we don’t mean it as derogatory”. This is besides the point. As well as closing off the use of the term from scrutiny by making it linguistically inaccessible for discussion to those who do not speak Chinese, those who do speak Chinese are also told that they must understand the term in the way that Chinese people tell them to and strangely, the local English speaker can find themselves in a minority position, trying to defend a virtuous cause that most Chinese don’t subscribe to and that most other locals just simply aren’t aware of.
It seems that with the same Chinese logic used to justify why “土澳” Tǔ’Ào is an inoffensive term, we could just as easily decide that in the West, we will hereon refer to China as ‘the yellow country’. Should a Chinese person have occasion to tell us, “This is actually a bit disrespectful – it places too much emphasis on our skin colour. And besides, ‘yellow’ in Chinese can imply a bad meaning [it is used to mean ‘pornographic’ in some contexts]”, then by analogy, we would be well within our rights to simply reply, “It’s not a derogatory term, it’s just a nickname – in fact, kind of a term of endearment. Anyway, you guys are yellow!”
I am quite sure that individual Chinese speakers using the term “土澳” Tǔ’Ào in particular contexts are not actively or consciously trying to express any majorly derogatory sentiments towards Australia. However, I do have a sense that the term has come into existence based upon comparative, not-entirely-respectful-and-understanding viewpoints adopted towards Australia and the experiences of Chinese international students studying here and Chinese people working here. From speaking with many such people, I know that these viewpoints by no means always view Australia in a favourable light – in fact, it’s rather coincidental that exactly the gripes that these Chinese speakers complain about having with Australia and its culture are the same meanings conveyed by the term “土澳” Tǔ’Ào. A rather unpalatable example of such a gripe is the (surprisingly commonly) recurring theme that ‘locals are lazy’.
The picture is complicated by fact that Chinese often use derogatory terms with their friends to show a form of intimacy (something along the lines of ‘only because we are so close can I scold you in this way’). Close friends can very often seem as though they are arguing with each other, as this ‘playfully argumentative’ style of speaking is culturally crystallised as indicative of affection. I suspect that something similar has happened with “土澳” Tǔ’Ào – whilst it carries undesirable connotations if you break the word and its etymology down linguistically, its use is already established in the Chinese conception as a way of highlighting certain aspects of Australia in a certain, possibly even affectionate, way. We also must bear in mind that this term is invariably used amongst Chinese people, who find themselves in Australia with different levels of comfort and different levels of adaptation – perhaps highlighting Australia’s perceived flaws in an affectionate way is way of forming solidarity and comfort in an alien environment.
Whether or not Chinese people have any sense of some kind of possible offense or disrespect coming through when they speak of “土澳” Tǔ’Ào is perhaps not the point. Rather, the point is to move beyond old attitudes and values that have become linguistically fossilised in our communications and to understand the world in a more open-minded way that avoids stereotyping and attributing value to things based upon generalised attributes and associative relationships. Given how many things in Australia are seen as appealing to the Chinese – the education system, the environment, lack of pollution, easy-going lifestyle, it could come across to some as a bit of a slap-in-the-face to refer to the country exclusively by its deficits and not by its merits. I suspect that the use of the term “土澳” Tǔ’Ào is protected by the fact that authentic Chinese dialogue is generally impenetrable to the great majority of locals and so the meaning of the term generally does not become an issue, as Australians simply don’t know that the term exists. However, I’m really curious to know :
How do local Australians feel about the term “土澳” Tǔ’Ào?
Let us know in the comments (particularly if you don’t know Chinese)!
中文秘诀 | The Secret of Chinese 