BEING AUSTRALIAN:Sydneysiders belong to 'multiple, highly-motivated global tribes which exert influence, not control'. Like most Australians, they are passionate about being Aussie, without any substantial understanding of what constitutes the national identity (unlike many Americans). Sydneysiders don’t know Australian history; they only know some Australian stories. Traveling brings out some sort of essential Aussie-ness, and so young people travel often and regularly, with families often holidaying overseas.This one is my favourite.
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Pic on Flickr audi_insperation.
11 comments:
What exactly do we mean by highly motivated global tribes?
That was Toby quoting Driscoll, I think. I'll ask him...
I think the influence and not control bit of the main comment was Driscollian...
Hey I just found this article on SMH, the Sydneysiders newspaper...
http://www.smh.com.au/technology/technology-news/slacktivism-can-social-media-actually-cause-social-change-20090930-gcgk.html
I feel like the feeling of being Australian has been on the rise amongst young Australians, especially since the Olympics.
No it was a bit of wisdom i gleaned from Seth Godin's book 'Tribes: we need you to lead us' (http://www.amazon.com/Tribes-We-Need-You-Lead/dp/1591842336%3FSubscriptionId%3D19BAZMZQFZJ6G2QYGCG2%26tag%3Dsquid504575-20%26linkCode%3Dxm2%26camp%3D2025%26creative%3D165953%26creativeASIN%3D1591842336)
See a summary of some of his ideas here: http://careerweb.knocklein.com/WordPress/?p=125
Isn't is 'Stray-yan'? ;)
On a more serious note, I would comment that 'being austalian' has more importance to some than their ethnicity. I've noticed a real divide between citizenship and ethnicity (e.g. people may use racial slurs to describe the neighbouring suburbs, but will join together arm-in-arm to watch the Wallabies beat the 'pohms').
It is interesting that so many Australians don't know or aren't interested in Australian history. A colleague of mine, who has lived here their whole life, asked the other day, what day was Australia day, and what was it for?
I wonder whether this is really true for urbanite Sydneysiders. It may be very true in the suburbs, but my impression is that for many urbanites, it is Sydney 1st, Australia 2nd. I get the impression that there is a similar (and even stronger) trend in Manhattan - to see oneself first as a New Yorker (or even a Manhattanite) and being American comes a distant second. Maybe that has changed after 2001, but there is certainly a social trend of separatism that comes from being in a large urban centre with (possibly) stronger ties to the rest of the world than to the rest of one's country. There is (I think) a similar feeling in some urban areas of London (though I am less familiar than this).
I was thinking about this recently regarding my own attitudes because I noticed that when people ask me where I am from (which I get a lot here, of course), I generally say "Sydney" rather than "Australia". What about you in NYC Justin? Where did you say that you were from when people asked?
NB "less familiar than this" = "less familiar with this"
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