kirribilli kim: quicko: the pledge

Tuesday, June 14, 2011

quicko: the pledge

As far as I know, Australians don't have a pledge of allegiance. Or if they do, I don't think the kids recite it at school every day.

6 comments:

Crazyjedidiah said...: No we don't have a pledge of allegiance.; June 18, 2011 at 4:25 PM
Laetitia :-) said...: No, we don't; that's seems to be just you and Filipinos. Nor do we fully understand the idea of allegiance to a piece of material - people yes, textiles no (besides, half of us want to change our flag but can't agree on what to change it to). :-); June 18, 2011 at 8:15 PM
KIM said...: Synecdoche! Synecdoche! Or possibly metonymy if we're quibbling semantics!; June 18, 2011 at 11:01 PM
Laetitia :-) said...: I like it - I've been forced to expand my vocabulary (although I can't see myself using either word in cold blood unless I want to shock my English lit. friend). :-)

Since the original allegiance idea comes from pledging to be loyal to a liege (a ruler / sovereign), it doesn't make definitional sense to pledge loyalty to a piece of material that literally cannot rule. Your allegiance's wording is "...to the flag of the United States of America, and to the republic for which it stands..."; why not just "...to the republic of the United States of America..."?

I'm not intending to be 'nasty Australian making fun of USA oddities' (although I appreciate that in the imperfect medium of blog comments that may be how it comes over); I do understand some of the reasons why you do it - it builds national unity - it's just the wording that puzzles me.; June 19, 2011 at 12:29 AM
Unknown said...: I'm pretty sure there's an oath you take if you take on Australian citizenship, something to do with respecting our laws and customs. Don't ask me how it goes though.; June 20, 2011 at 10:07 PM
Mom said...: Even though the Pledge of Allegiance begins, "I pledge allegiance to the flag..." we are actually referring to what the flag stands for, namely, our country and the freedoms we enjoy here.; June 21, 2011 at 12:16 PM

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)