Boswell smashed over china plate 'threat'
Posted
Updated
Dogs eye and dead horse... Professor Seal says rhyming slang is still common in Australia. (Kate Shannon )
Queensland Nationals Senator Ron Boswell has defended his choice of words during last night's Senate Estimates hearings, saying he was not being racist.
Senator Boswell was forced to withdraw because one of his comments to the department's secretary, Martin Parkinson, was seen as a threat.
"You are making this a high farce. Now just watch it, china," Senator Boswell said, referring to the rhyming slang phrase "china plate" meaning "mate".
Committee chair Helen Polley struggled to regain control and called on her Upper House colleagues to show more self control.
"Senator Boswell, can I just remind you of the standing orders. It is inappropriate to threaten a witness. I ask you to withdraw those comments," she said.
"I withdraw the comment, if it was considered threatening," Senator Boswell replied.
Today Senator Boswell said he used the word "china" to mean "mate" and it was neither threatening or racist.
"I haven't got a racist bone in my body; I'm certainly not racist," he said.
"I don't think anyone would take it up as racism. It was just the old slang of the 'dog and the bone' - the phone - and china plate and a mate - that's the way I use it.
"I was getting very frustrated because estimates are a time when you have a right to question public servants and I just wasn't getting any response at all."
'No Dalai Lamas'
Curtin University Professor of Folklore Graham Seal, who has also written a book on rhyming slang in Australia, says using the term "china" is definitely not racist.
"China plate is definitely a rhyming slang for mate and doesn't have any racist connotations or implications," he said.
"It's a piece of cockney rhyming slang that we used in Australia for I guess 100 years or so."
Professor Seal says it does not seem unusual for 60-year-old Senator Boswell to use the phrase as it was probably a popular term for his generation.
"I think the thing with rhyming slang it tends to sort of go to sleep for a while and it can pop up in another generation," he said.
"Even though some of these terms are quite old and are often used by people from particular generations because they were around at that time, quite a few of them still survive and live on.
"I think china plate's still around. It's a term that's certainly around in Australian speech."
Professor Seal says more modern rhyming slang has also been introduced to the Australian vernacular in recent years.
"Things like Britney Spears for beers, these are more modern ones," he said.
"It used to be Germaine Greers for beers, but that was a generation back.
"There's a few other ones around. When the Dalai Lama was around a year or two ago someone coined the term Dalai Lamas for no dramas."
Comments (12)
Comments for this story are closed, but you can still have your say.
-
Neo:
09 Feb 2010 1:45:17pm
The ABC is getting very petty lately, picking up on small and osbcure comments, and turning them into "news". Any comment by Tony Abbott that in any way can be linked to putting women down, and now a common bit of slang by a Senator is somehow racist.
Come on, surely there are bigger things going on in the federal arena, and surely ABC readers are after more meaty stories.Agree (2) Alert moderator
-
Vox Liberalis:
09 Feb 2010 2:07:09pm
The ABC is doing exactly what Abbott wants, they are giving him publicity. Abbott and his Ferengi collegues have no credibility left, they have to rely on deception and racist and sexist comments to get attention because they have no real NEW policies.
Agree (1) Alert moderator
-
-
altzheimer:
09 Feb 2010 1:58:55pm
I.m not of the senator's generation, but I have used the expression "my old china ..." or "cob" etc to mean mate, but it can also be intonated to be infuriating - exactly the same way as refering to someone as "sunshine".
Agree (0) Alert moderator
-
mark:
09 Feb 2010 2:01:00pm
Dear ABC,
This is not actually news. I could just as easily invent a story claiming that the ABC alleged Boswell was beaten to a pulp at the hearings because the word "smashed" was used in the headline. Another year of this petty criticism of everything the Libs/Nats do and the silent majority will vote for Abbott just to prove a point. I believe he used the word "housewife" today, and the ABC is running a story about this too. Get real.Agree (1) Alert moderator
-
Kevin Begaud:
09 Feb 2010 2:05:38pm
Neo is spot on! Pull yourself together Auntie, your left wing slip keeps falling and it ain't pretty
Agree (0) Alert moderator
-
whyisitso:
09 Feb 2010 2:06:34pm
Hey Bozzy. Get with it. This is an Australianism and as such deeply politically incorrect for the ABC. Almost as bad as the flag (well not quite - nothing is an offensive as that to "true" Australians, that is those who live east of Glebe).
Agree (0) Alert moderator
-
mjy:
09 Feb 2010 2:07:03pm
Its pretty to easy to see how to other generations using the word china could be seen as racist, especially if you don't know much about the different uses of language here. I have to say I enjoyed that quick little lesson on Australian slang! I can understand Senator Boswell's frustration, but losing your cool and making a threat is unacceptable. Well done to him at least for withdrawing the comment. Now I'm off to see my china and have a Britney Spears!
Agree (0) Alert moderator
-
Ned:
09 Feb 2010 2:08:49pm
For heaven's sake, who suggested 'china' in this context was racist? Whoever did is nothing more than an ignoramus - a bit like the good Senator actually.
Agree (0) Alert moderator
-
Robert:
09 Feb 2010 2:08:49pm
"I was getting very frustrated because estimates are a time when you have a right to question public servants and I just wasn't getting any response at all."
Well now see there's your problem Bosy my old son, liberal party policy dictates that you must meet with the public servant prior to estimates to "draft" the questions and answers. Where's the gaffer Seanator Abetz when you need him!Agree (0) Alert moderator
-
Sync:
09 Feb 2010 2:09:29pm
I assume it was the "just watch it" that Boswell was cautioned about. "China Plate" is a long standing piece of slang - while I happen to think Boswell is one of the bottom-feeders of Federal politics, it really was a pretty mild epithet and not at all offensive.
Agree (0) Alert moderator
-
Keith Ealanta:
09 Feb 2010 2:09:56pm
I can see that he might have meant "mate". I've not heard him in casual conversation to hear if it's a colloquialism he's likely to use. On the other hand "China" as a nickname or racist label for someone with oriental features has also been a common colloquialism, and if (as earlier reports suggested) this was directed toward ms. Wong, then I'd be more likely to suspect racism than rhyming slang.
I do think an author on rhyming slang commenting that calling someone china isn't racist is just pointless. It's like getting an expert on 1920s language to affirm that "gay" has no sexual connotation.Agree (0) Alert moderator
-
Richard:
09 Feb 2010 2:16:18pm
Boring. Is this really how the media treat estimates hearings? The substance of the hearings are likely to actually have relevance to ABC loyalists.
Agree (0) Alert moderator
Comments for this story are closed, but you can still have your say.
Search ABC News
Featured Video
-
Video
A Melbourne woman has recovered from brain surgery after being struck in the skull by a golf ball, whilst sitting in a taxi.
-
Video
Watch some of the dramatic vision of the floods that have swept across Queensland.
-
Video
Frightened residents run to higher ground as a 6.9 magnitude aftershock rocks the streets of Chile.
-
Video
A roof fire in a home in Sydney's west has become the latest accident to be blamed on the Federal Government's failed insulation scheme.
The ABC News Online Investigative Unit encourages whistleblowers, and others with access to information they believe should be revealed for the public good, to contact us.
