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.