Muzza

Muzza is an Australian English slang word generally used in Melbourne, Victoria to describe the young male subculture that has developed in the city's suburbs. Use of the term muzza came to light in the mid to late 1990's, as an evolution of the 1980's Mario culture.
History
The muzza began to emerge as a distinct subculture in Australian society in the mid 1990s. Coinciding with the increased popularity of electronic music, as well as the large influx of Japanese imported vehicles into Australia, the muzza represented the generational evolution of the 1980s.

Widespread awareness of the subculture was subsequently boosted by films such as Nick Giannopoulos's The Wog Boy, while the Sydney-based television program Fat Pizza brought the current stereotype to the attention of a more mainstream audience.

===As an offshoot of "Wog"===
Wog is a racist term in Australian English, denoting Australians of Eastern and Southern European ancestry. This meaning came into popular use in the 1950s when Australia accepted large numbers of immigrants from Southern Europe. Although originally used pejoratively, the term is increasingly used more affectionately, especially by the individuals the term is used to describe. Wog is a word with definite and widespread currency in contemporary Australian English, although it recently sparked up a dilemma through its use during the Cronulla race riots. It must be noted that the term wog is simply descriptive of ones ethnicity; however the term muzza denotes a type of wog who follows a certain lifestyle. Thus all muzzas are wogs, but not all wogs are muzzas.

Characteristics
The term muzza is usually associated with the male gender (female equivalents are known as Marias or Muzzettes, and 'nerdy' equivalents are usually known as Muzza Mark). They are generally between 12 and 20 years old, and usually of Southern European, Mediterranean or Middle Eastern descent. The muzza is normally from around metropolitan Melbourne mostly Western, Eastern and Northern suburbs, Melbourne, Australia, and is of first to third generation Australian.

It is difficult to pinpoint what characteristics define a muzza, however there are consistencies between muzzas that are common traits, including: a very vocal pride in their heritage, a love of cars, a general distaste for any kind of rules or authority, an obsession with house/dance music, and a strong interest in loitering around local fast food outlets.

The word muzza can also be used as a prefix to indicate if someone is a muzza - for example, Muzza John.

Appearance

Muzzas take obvious pride in their appearance, and maintain utmost efforts to look like they belong in their respective social groups. This generally culminates in all members dressing similarly, usually in outfits comprising:

* Caps tipped up on an extremely steep angle, sitting on top of the hair, rather than over it, often held in place with a bobby pin

* Heavy use of hair product in a mullet hairstyle

* Fluorescent/ bright coloured t-shirt/ tank top or some form of athletic-branded (Everlast, Lonsdale, Champion) shirt

* White shoes with black stripes or lining

* A puffy black or camouflage ski-jacket, preferably with faux fur on the collar

* Black with three white stripes (also inverted white with black stripes), Puma, Adidas tracksuit pants.

Fashion

Generally a muzza wears clothing such as Lonsdale, Champion, Everlast, Adidas, Puma or Kappa during the day, while at night while they cruise they wear designer clothing such as Diesel. Muzzas are also often seen wearing bum bags. The usual hairstyle is a mullet type haircut with a straightened fringe that is put to the side. Generally a muzza has a at the back or just longer hair.

A muzza generally favours athletic apparel as listed above. This is generally used to show off their "muscular physique". More formal or upmarket attire includes Diesel, Dolce & Gabbana (often imported and non-genuine) P.O. Box, Industrie, Cotton On, Box Canyon.

Muzzas usually have a strong scent to attract the ladies. Most use lynx or a common deodorant but the richer types often prefer upmarket scents like Calvin Klein, Versace, and Joop Homme.

Bum bags are also common, to keep mobile phones, MP3 players, smokes, wallets, hair wax, and other personal belongings at hand.

A muzza will generally always be found wearing trackies even if everything else they are wearing is clean and tidy.

Cars

A muzza is also closely associated with cars. The Holden VL Commodores and Nissan Skylines are by far the most commonly associated car in muzza culture. Ex-highway patrol Holden VL Commodores, commonly known as Interceptors, are an especially sought after prize in Muzza culture. These cars are generally easily distinguishable through their canary yellow duco, 5-spoke mag wheels, and rather low rear ends - the result of either the placement of one or more bags of cement into the boot of the vehicle, or through cutting of the suspension springs.
Muzzas also commonly add disproportionately large subwoofers and/or rims to their vehicle. They also decorate their rear view mirror with fuzzy dice, although generational changes have seen the ubiquitous fuzzy dice slowly phased out.

Although the Commodore is the most popular choice of muzzas, it is not an exclusive choice, and muzzas can be seen driving a wide variety of cars. "Hotted up" Nissan Silvias, Ford Falcon XR6 Turbo's, Subaru WRXs and Nissan Skylines are also often associated with muzzas, due to their affordability, and ease of modification. These cars are often branded with personalized number plates advertising (within the limitations of six letters or numbers) the "toughness" of the particular vehicle.

Victoria Police have cracked down in recent years on hooning and street racing, much of which is associated with the muzza subculture.

Vocabulary

Muzzas often adapt words from their culture/nationality, such as "uleh/yuleh" "yulla habib" "kuff" (Lebanese Australians), "re" "malaka"(Greek Australians), "bro", "fully sick", "ciccio" or its shortened version "chich" (in the Italian language), "lan" Turkish Australians) and among Macedonian Australians the terms "chojek", "lele chojek", "chiche", "mochan", "drapach", "sick mate", "sick man" "beh/breh Macedonian, "lesh", "minchia",

As well as developing their own slang words, such as "zomg", "sick", "mad", "hektik","omg", "kouta", "tuff", "crazy", and "that's all", all indicating approval over something. Other completely unique words such as "dose", (the sound of on a turbo-charged vehicle) have evolved as a result of the muzza culture.

Music

Muzzas are generally known for their love of trance or hardstyle, but their taste is not strictly limited to one genre, with artists such as 2Pac and Bon Jovi proving popular.

Another contributing factor to the increased public awareness of the muzza subculture were the releases of Melbourne DJ Dixie, a self professed muzza, who combined the sounds of hardstyle music, with the compressor surge "dose" noise of a VL Commodore Turbo.

Beginning in 2004 with Release The Muzzas, Return Of The Muzzas, and Unleash The Muzzas, culminating with a full mixtape release in 2006 entitled Bringing Muzza Back, these remixes proved popular with muzzas, and non-muzzas alike, thus putting a positive spin on the long standing negative perception of muzzas, as self-obsessed, Commodore driving hooligans.

Another driving force in the mainstream emergence of muzza culture has been the releases of Weapon X & Ken Hell's Scar Non Mixtapes, featuring various muzza versions of well known songs, including Snoop Dogg's Drop It Like Its Hot - (Drive It Like Its Hot), Dr Dre's Still D.R.E - (Still HSV), the Black Eyed Peas My Humps - (My Subs), and the newly released muzza version of Fergie's Fergalicious, entitled Wogolicious.

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See Also

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