British broadcasters

Dennis R. Preston preston at PILOT.MSU.EDU
Sun Jan 30 17:00:43 UTC 2000


Read Charles Boberg's excellent piece on British and American handling of
"foreign 'a' spellings" (pizza, Milan, Pakistan, etc...) in The Journal of
Language and Social Psychology, Vol. 18, No. 1, March 1999.

dInIs

>Please reply directly to the inquirer, as well as to the list, if you list. -
>Allan Metcalf
>-----------------------
>. . . . I was reminded of a
>
>question that's been on my mind for some time, not about American
>
>accents, but about the British accents we often hear from BBC
>
>reporters affiliated with NPR and CNN.
>
>
>I've noticed that many American broadcast journalists try their best
>
>to pronounce names of foreign places and people as much like the
>
>native speakers as possible, rolling their r's and so on, sometimes
>
>excessively so.
>
>
>In contrast, I've also noticed that many (though of course not all)
>
>of the British correspondents make no such attempt whatsoever: a
>
>certain Central American capital is "Mannaggwer" while Earth's
>
>largest continent is "Aysher." But even more striking to my ears has
>
>been the fact that many of these reporters stress foreign names in a
>
>manner opposite from every other voice on the air: Bel-GRADE, East Ti-
>
>MOR. And the Prime Minister of Israel is BAR-rack, just like the
>
>buildings where soldiers live but without the final s.
>
>
>When I started noticing that many of the British correspondents end
>
>their sentences with an unusual (to my ears) change in pitch and
>
>tempo I was fairly certain that I'd seen Monty Python skits where
>
>Python "newscasters" used this seemingly unnatural cadence for comic
>
>effect. I began to wonder how much of the speech characteristics of
>
>the British broadcasters were learned conventions (like the
>
>Transatlantic English mentioned on the show) and no more a natural
>
>part of British speech than my own.
>
>
>Obviously, this is not a question of earth-shattering importance, but
>
>if you are able to offer any insights it would be greatly appreciated.
>
>
>Sincerely,
>
>
>Ken Miller
>
>Demorest Georgia
>purplechez at moose-mail.com


Dennis R. Preston
Department of Linguistics and Languages
Michigan State University
East Lansing MI 48824-1027 USA
preston at pilot.msu.edu
Office: (517)353-0740
Fax: (517)432-2736



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