Xref: utzoo comp.ai:1150 sci.lang:1671 Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!cbosgd!cblpf!cblpe!ddm From: ddm@cblpe.ATT.COM (Douglas Moreland) Newsgroups: comp.ai,sci.lang Subject: Re: Language Learning (anecdotes) Summary: Standard dialect is that spoken by news announcers. Message-ID: <709@cblpe.ATT.COM> Date: 11 Dec 87 13:03:55 GMT References: <1966@uwmacc.UUCP> <12400009@iuvax> <1117@uhccux.UUCP> <2053@uwmacc.UUCP> Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories - Columbus, Ohio Lines: 11 Though news announcers are subject to the firing and hiring whims of their bosses, their bosses are trying to capture an audience by hiring news announcers that are friendly-acting, familiar, and comfortable to the people who watch. You don't do that by hiring people who speak regional dialects (unless it's a regional tv show). The language of news announcers thus becomes a standard dialect, understandable to listeners across the country as "their language." So, this "hiring and firing at the whim of the bosses" will serve to accurately mirror the speech of the people who listen. The announcers who don't get enough viewers (for whatever reasons, among them non-standard dialect) get canned.