SevenSpeak: a Translation Guide
This page last updated: Saturday April 29 2006
SevenSpeak: a Translation Guide
by Steve Cornelius
Visually, the recent Olympic Games were as spectacular as most of their predecessors, and more spectacular than most. This is part of a progression which we now take for granted - records are broken, new heights of achievement climbed, opening and closing ceremonies more pyrotechnic, with every succeeding Olympics.
Audibly, however, our impressions of the Atlanta Olympics have largely been shaped by the television coverage provided by Channel 7. Linguistically, the Olympic experience has been passed through a filter of what Channel 7 decided we should hear. A few recalcitrants, refusing to countenance commercials, may have tuned exclusively to Radio 2BL, but the vast majority of sports enthusiasts will, during the latter half of July, have had their linguistic horizons extended, their semantic boundaries challenged, by the language of Channel 7's commentators: it's called SevenSpeak.
SevenSpeak is a dialect of English, but one which is not commonly spoken in Australia, at least by ordinary people. And as with all unfamiliar dialects, misunderstanding can easily arise among the uninitiated. Listening to SevenSpeak has a lot in common with listening to an Appalachian hillbilly, in that you know it's based on English, and you believe you've understood, but subsequent events prove that your understanding has been imperfect or in some way incomplete.
Glossary
In response to many requests from readers, The Blister has retained a team of qualified linguists and translators to prepare a glossary of SevenSpeak terms. File this article away in a safe place, since it will be an invaluable guide to comprehension of the next major sporting event covered by an Australian commercial TV network (NineSpeak and TenSpeak are dialects closely related to SevenSpeak).
Here we go:
SevenSpeak:
Coming up shortly.
English translation:
Coming up when we feel like it.
SevenSpeak:
The Australian just failed to qualify for the final.
English translation:
We will not be showing the final live.
SevenSpeak:
We'll take a break.
English translation:
The 5,000 metres is coming to a critical point.
SevenSpeak:
Highlights.
English translation:
Lots of Aussie winners gazing mistily up at the flag of their nation.
SevenSpeak:
Next up, the [track event longer than 1500 metres].
English translation:
Next up, bits of the [track event longer than 1500 metres].
SevenSpeak:
The Olympics are all about racing / all about giving it your best shot / all about seizing the moment / all about getting out and giving it a go / all about competing / all about getting it right on the night / all about guts and determination.
English translation:
We're not really sure what the Olympics are all about, but hey, it's great to be here on this junket.
SevenSpeak:
Australia has qualified for the bronze medal match in basketball.
English translation:
Bang goes the live coverage of the athletics finals day.
SevenSpeak:
Tremendous.
English translation:
Hi, I'm Rob de Castella.
SevenSpeak:
"What a fantastic swim! It was soy cloyse!".
English translation:
Hi, I'm Linley Frame. My voice isn't quavering with emotion, it's just Dennis Cometti tickling my bum with a feather. I am attempting a world record for repeating the same two phrases after successive Olympic races. My name will soon be in the Guinness Book of Records.
SevenSpeak:
The Itayyian tahtoo-hoader wiww be thriwwed wiv his briyyiant fith place in the semi-fahnoo of this fiewd event, and he's a ree-oo goad medoo chance in tonaht's fahnoo.
English translation:
[Eds' note: Our linguists almost had to admit defeat with this one, but have produced this attempt at translation]: Hi, I'm Bruce McAvaney. I have great difficulty persuading the tip of my tongue to touch the roof of my mouth.
Seven-Speak:
"When there's an appointment with destiny," (slow-motion footage of athletes leaping and diving, Kathy Freeman gaping skywards) "when the superior being who records history has the book opened and the pen in hand," (footage of Carl Lewis on long jump runway) "amazing, isn't it, how the seconds become years, and the years eternal? When she was a little girl, just beginning," (kiddie photos of KF), "the great man came to Australia" (footage of CL) "to talk to her about will and want, about being a winner. On day 10 at these Olympic Games, so long down the track" (alternating footage of KF in 400m, CL in long jump) "they came to the same theatre, with so much will and want, to thrill the world. Knocking a whole second off your PB" (footage of KF finishing 400m) "is like knocking off at lunchtime, or celebrating Christmas in October. And winning your fourth Olympic long jump, your ninth gold medal" (footage of CL, hands in air) " that's like nothing else, like Christmas on a stick. For some, on this day in history, the Devil danced" (footage of Mike Powell, face down in sandpit). "For others" (footage of Michael Johnson), gold from the very beginning. As Atlanta spins," (footage of diver executing triple back somersault with 4¼ twists) "mesmerised, the book is closed, the pen put down, but only for moments, moments more amazing than time itself".
English translation:
It's dashed bad luck that Carl Lewis upstaged Our Kathy, by winning his 4th consecutive long jump and 9th gold medal on the very day she took silver in the 400m. So we'll create a link between the two of them, portray their achievements as equal in merit, and ask our most macho-sounding voice-over man to deliver the intro in Pretentious Gobshite Mode. After all, only Media Watch will notice it's total twaddle, and no-one watches that, do they? Oh, and we won't be giving up our day jobs. Melodrama was what you wanted, wasn't it?
SevenSpeak:
(to Bruce Barber, father of Kathy Freeman): "Bruce, how does a bloke that (sic) works on the railway in Brisbane know that this little girl had something special, foresee what she might be able to do?"
English translation:
Hi, I'm Garry Wilkinson, and you're Aussie battlers, aren't you? I met some of your sort once, when Seven sent me right out of Balmain to what we used to call the western suburbs but which I've now been trained to call "Sydney's West". God, it was hard to find a decent cappuccino out there. Anyway, you're inarticulate, and not quite in the same class as us cosmopolitan TV journalists. But at least you give us an irresistible opportunity to segue neatly from Pretentious Gobshite Mode into Patronising Gobshite Mode. Thanks for that. Hey, what do you think of my eyebrows? Aren't they wild?
We trust this short guide to SevenSpeak terminology will be of use to Striders when next they encounter a speaker of this mystifying dialect. Which could be as close as the next time you turn on the TV.
