Mom on a mission to replace mum in Australia by 2030 ... if not earlier

I wonder whether we would notice a shift in the collective Australian accent if we could travel back to 1999? I suspect our language has shifted – all thanks to our embrace of US culture.

I am sure that America’s mom is right now on a mission to supplant Australia’s mum by 2030, if not earlier. Picture: istock

It’s a concept that has intrigued me since I was a teenager: the idea of being able to travel back through time at regular intervals. Interestingly, my time travel musing never placed me in a different country – it was always Australia. And it never took me to important events and/or eras like the Great Depression, the Great War or the threatened invasion by Japan in 1942. Instead, what I wanted to do was to step back in time and to take a “dipstick reading” of Australian society and culture at different intervals.

Imagine being able to spend a day dipping into everyday life 25 years ago, in April 1999, and then return to today. And then stepping back a further 25 years to 1974, and then again to 1949. Imagine being able to take a dipstick reading of Australian life at 25-year intervals. What impressions would we be left with?

In 1999, GST did not exist. Neither did the concept of social media; there was no Facebook, no Instagram, no Twitter (or X as it’s known now). China wasn’t a concern. Ansett airlines competed with Qantas for domestic air travel. We were worried that a computer date protocol known as Y2K might trigger a collapse of worldwide computer systems. (As it happened, nothing happened.)

Fireworks over the Sydney Harbour Bridge in 2000 to celebrate the new millenium. Picture: AAP

I wonder whether we would notice a shift in the collective Australian accent if we could travel back to 1999? I suspect our language has shifted, and not because of Asian and/or Indian immigration but in response to our embrace of American culture. I am sure that America’s mom is right now on a mission to supplant Australia’s mum by 2030, if not earlier.

Let’s push back another 25 years and dip into everyday life in April 1974. The novel idea of credit cards, via Bankcard, was being introduced. Coffee was starting to replace tea as our national beverage. The front pages of the tabloids carried stories of bank robberies. (In the 21st century, bank robbers have been put out of business by white collar criminals and scammers! I wonder what line of business erstwhile bank robbers have moved into?)

In 1974 it was quite acceptable to light up a cigarette on a plane, or in a restaurant. It was even OK to light up between courses as a dinner guest in a private home! A good hostess would fetch an ashtray in anticipation of a guest’s needs. By today’s standards there is much about the last sentence that is offensive.

Let’s move back another 25 years to April 1949, when cheap social housing was being constructed in our cities and towns. When a male was introduced to a female in 1949 it was considered polite for the (hatted) male to nod in their direction. The female might extend a gloved hand in expectation that it would be lightly shaken. At this time Australians did not greet each other with a peck on the cheek. That affectation would arrive via Australia’s aspirant class between 1974 and 1999.

Melbourne in the 70s.

Modern Australia is being transformed by immigration, as well as by our alliance with the US, by our engagement with global technology and by our homegrown capacity for aspiration and the pursuit of lifestyle. We want a better, fairer Australia in which to live comfortable, safe and meaningful lives. I think this ideal is evident when we check in every 25 years to compare how we Australians have lived everyday life since the end of WWII.