Press Reporting and Broadcasting

It has already been stated above that press reporting and broadcasting is a rather complicated non-homogeneous phenom­enon and may be very eclectic from the stylistic point of view. It is common knowledge that press reporting and broadcasting is a strong ideological weapon and is surely socially and politically marked. The same text addressed to a foreign listener sounds more imposing and edifying.

The events of political importance can be presented to the public in different lights by using similar techniques, by chang­ing the voice timbre. This only proves the statement that a jour­nalist, a reporter cannot be completely independent in his politi­cal views of his class, party, country and so on.

The central function of a newspaper and news bulletin is to inform, to present a certain number of facts to a reader, listener, or a viewer with the effect of giving the impression of neutral, objective, factual reporting. So all types of discourse in that style share some important prosodical features and putting them to­gether in this chapter may not be too misleading.

It should be noted, however, that the speech of radio and tel­evision announcers is somewhat different though they use simi­lar techniques in the presentation, the ability to be seen on the screen helps a TV news reader to guide the understanding to the viewer by means of facial expressions and gestures. On the con­trary the radio announcer, being isolated in a studio, tends to ex­

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aggerate certain prosodic features to be better understood by a listener.

The speech of a radio announcer is very close to the "ideal model" and especially during news coverage when he elegantly enunciates the news in rather chilly distant tones adopted spe­cially for this occasion.

Here is the example of a radio news coverage. The text con­sists of two items in which national news of a rather neutral character is described:

^→ Thirty-five _vvehicles ⌇ 'were in^↘volved in a ↑ multiple col'lision \ on the ^↘M '1 ˋmotorway this _omorning. || The →acci­dent oc>curred | about ^↘three miles 'south of the 'Newsport 'Pag-nell _vservice area | when an ar→ ticulated _vlorry | ^↘carrying a load of _vSteel bars | ˋjackknifed and overturned. || A ^↘number of 'lorry drivers and _vmotorists || were unˎable to pull up in time | and ran ˋinto the overturned _vvehicle | → causing a ↑major >pile up.

Some of the 'steel bars from the >load | were → flung by the ˎimpact | across the ˋcentral re'serve into the 'southbound vcarriageway | which was re→ stricted to 'single-lane 'working be­cause of re'pairs and revsurfacing | >causing ⌇ ↘several ˋminor ˎaccidents.

With ↘both 'carriageways vblocked | police ˋclosed the motorway for a ˌtime | and diversion signs were 'posted at the 'nearest ˎslip roads. ↘Breakdown 'vehicles and vambulances | had con→siderable >diffıculty ⌇ in ↘ reaching the 'scene of the ˌaccident | because of ˋfog. || This was ˎdense in ˎplaces, | and the ˋflashing 'amber ˎlight signals | had been → switched ˎon ⌇ for → most of the ˎniqht. || So ˌfar | there are → no re>ports | of ↘anyone 'seriously ˎinjured ⌇ in the ˎaccident... At the ↘ opening 'meeting in ˎLondon olast ˌnight | Sir → John vStone | ... ˋcriticised | the ↘standard of 'motorway 'driving in this ˎcountry.

He ˌsaid | that there was ˌevidence | that ↘many of the 'basic 'disciplines of ˎmotorway use | had yet to be vlearned | by British ˎdrivers. →Lane ˌdiscipline | was → much worse in this ˎcountry | than 210 in Aˋmerica || and the ↘habits of 'drivers when ˎovertakinq | were par`ticularly bad. || ↗One 'saw ↑far too much 'dangerous ʌpulling cut | without an → adequate >siqnal ⌇ having been ˎgiven... || ... The ↘conference 'is conˎtinuinq. →Now to Common ˎMarket negotiations... Before going into the detailed description of phonostylistic characteristics of the text we would like to say here that it is de­limited in the same way as any monological oral text: phonopassages — phrases — intonation groups. Delimitation is different only in the dichotomy monologue — dialogue. It is also true for the role of contrast between accented and unaccented segments in the accentuation of semantic centres. Timbre may be characterized as unemotional, dispassionate, reserved, but very resolute and assured, a typical case of a news­reader's "neutral position", deliberately underlying the effect of objectiveness on the part of the newsreader. Loudness ranges from normal to forte; it is especially varied at passage boundaries. As this bulletin is split into two major items, the transfer from one to the other is very important and is strongly identified by the splash of loudness: 1. ...The conference is continuing, (piano) 2. (forte) Now to Common Market negotiations. Levels and ranges are usually normal, but contrasted when each news item is introduced and also at the semantic emphatic centres. Pauses tend to be rather long, especially when they occur be­tween passages, longer still between the bulletin items. The loca­tion of pauses is commonly predictable, syntactically or semantically determined. Rate is not remarkably varied. It is normally slow, rarely alle­gro; deliberately slow (lento) on communicatively important centres, e.g. A number of lorry drivers and motorists were unable to pull up in time and ran into the overturned vehicle causing a majo-pile up. (lento) The conference is continuing, (very slow - lentis-simo) Rhythm exhibits a stable pattern. 211 Types of heads vary, the most common being descending (falling and stepping), very often broken by accidental rises, e.g. → Thirty-five vvehicles ⌇ were in↘volved in a ↑ multiple collision ⌇ on the ↘M '1 ˋmotorway this omorning. || Another very common for the reading of news coverage phe­nomenon is the variation of descending and ascending heads of different levels to convey the information in a really interesting way, especially in the enumeration of the events, e.g. → Lane ˌdiscipline | was → much worse in this ˎcountry | than in Aˋmerica || and the ↘habits of 'drivers when ˎover-taking | were par`ticularly bad. || ˌOne 'saw ↑ far too much 'dangerous ʌpulling out | without an → adequate >signal ⌇ having been ˎgiven. || Also the semantic centre of the preceding intonation group may be repeated at the beginning of the next utterance. Lexical­ly it may be the same word or word combination or a related one. This is done to chain the phrases tightly into a phonetic whole (phonopassage). On the prosodic level this close connec­tion is expressed by the use of the Low Rising Tone in the initial intonation group: At the ↘opening 'meeting in ˎLondon olast ˌnight | Sir →John vStone... И `criticized | the ↘standard of 'motorway 'driving in this ˎcountry.

He ˌsaid | that there was ˌevidence | that ↘many of the 'basic 'disciplines of ˎmotorway use | had yet to be vlearned | by British ˎdrivers. One can see here that in the text sentences are not excessive­ly long, they tend not to be unduly complicated in their struc­ture. The intonation groups are rather short, otherwise a listener or a viewer will lose the thread of what is being reported. Terminal tones are usually final and very categoric, falls pre­vail on communicative centres. Falling-rising tones (or even Rise-Fall-Rises) are often heard on the initial short intonation groups introduced for deliberate effects in drawing the listener's attention: A ↘number of 'lorry drivers and vmotorists | were unˎable to pull ˋup in time... || 212 With ↘both 'carriageways vblocked | police `closed the mo­torway for a .time...

The phonostylistic analysis of a reading of a number of news coverage over the radio and television and the experimental data of recent investigations of the style (53, 54) allow us to at­tempt to draw the invariant of this information style register de­scribed in Table 7. Table 7

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