NEWSPAPER LANGUAGE
If the language instructor works with the newspaper at a more advanced
level one of his duties is to draw his/her learners’ attention to the fact that
newspaper reporting has a style and a language of its own. Since newspapers usually report
the news in brief, a journalist has to convey the most essential parts of the news in the
most economical way possible, while attracting and keeping the reader’s attention.
Let’s have a look at some of the features of this style of writing.
The language instructor is recommended, in my view, to show his/her learners some
authentic samples of newspaper headlines, taken from any British or American paper, asking
them to tell him/her what they think the article under the headline in question is about.
Most certainly they will have problems and the language instructor then is expected to
make his/her class know that newspaper headlines, in authentic newspapers especially, have
a language all their own.
First, headlines in English language newspapers (in Russian ones too,
by the way) are usually short and they thus tend to leave out all the inessential words,
such as articles and auxiliary verbs, and to be as generally economical as they can.
Because of that, headlines use short words wherever possible, in preference to long ones.
Certain words are very common in headlines, such as: deal, cost, ban, hit, get, clash.
Then they usually use a compound-noun phrase instead of a longer clause: for example, “Japan
Leadership Struggle” for “The Leadership Struggle in Japan”, “Bridge
Cost” for “The Cost of the Bridge” and “Bank Girl Killer Clues”
for “Clues to the Killer of the Girl who Worked in a Bank”.
Second, newspaper headlines generally use the simple tenses of verbs,
and the present simple tense is very frequent: “Japan Leadership Struggle Hots up”,
“Bridge Cost Soars”, “Miners Ban Overtime”, “Police Get Bank
Girl Killer Clues” and “Action Man Sinatra Dies”. The infinitive form is
often used to express the future: “Agricultural Policy to be Discussed”, “Two
Presidents to Meet in September” and the passive form is employed where the action
is more important than the agent: “25 Charged after Clash”.
Third, inverted commas are inserted to show that a fact or an event is
quoted or reported: “Car Import Curb ‘Would Hit Britain’.”
Sometimes, of course, the very briefness of headlines makes them
ambiguous. What about “Prime Minister Moves to Cut Down Expenditure” – When
the Prime Minister did not change his place of residence but made a move politically.
Here’s what some of the headlines mean:
1. Miners Ban Overtime – Miners are refusing to work overtime.
2. “Car Import Curb ‘Would Hit Britain’ ” – Controls on the import of
cars would make Britain suffer.
3. Japan Leadership Struggle Hots Up – The struggle for leadership in Japan is
becoming more intense.
4. Action Man Sinatra Dies – Sinatra, who was a man of action, has died.
5. Police Get Bank Girl Killer Clues – The police have found clues to the
identity of the man who killed the girl who worked in a bank.
6. Agricultural Policy to be Discussed – The policy of Agriculture will be
discussed.
7. Bridge Cost Soars – The cost of building the bridge has risen rapidly.
8. 25 Charged After Clash – Twenty five people were accused by the police of
criminal behaviour after a fight.
Another important thing about newspaper language is that, depending on
how sure the journalist is of what he is saying, there are different ways of reporting the
source of a story:
It is believed that ...
A report shows that ...
... claims a report ...
It is feared that ...
It is claimed that ...
He alleges that ...
Another feature of newspaper journalism is that adjectives and nouns
are often strung together to make the writing shorter and snappier, so you get expressions
like there:
1. The result of behind-the-scenes policy.
2. Top changes at Treasury.
3. A world-wide burst of anger.
4. Cash cut-back threat.
If you try to re-write these phrases, you will discover just how
economically they are written:
1. The result of the policy which was not obvious and open.
2. New changes in the upper level of the Treasure Dept.
3. A burst of anger from all over the world.
4. A threat to reduce expenditure.
One of the most important features of journalism is the “human
interest” angle. The readers of a newspaper want to have the stories brought to life and
one of the best ways of doing this is to add personal details about the people in the
news.
The journalist can thus provide information about a person’s age: Susan White, aged
29; 51-year-old Mr. Brown. Or appearance: 17-year-old blonde; long-haired
youth. Or their clothes: Mrs. Jones, dressed in a red trouser suit; or
their jobs: Jane Smith, a secretary; or their role in the family: mother-of-four,
Mrs. Sutton; Mrs. Goddard, a young-looking grandmother. Or these points may
be combined: a 41-year-old factory worker, father of six, had an hour-long argument
with his 36-year-old blonde wife.
The language difficulties, grammar and vocabulary problems, of course have to be mastered
when working with the newspaper, but they, in my opinion, though sometimes sophisticated
as well, are to be worked at when this or that concrete article is focused on.
By Natalya Predtechenskaya
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