Writing for Broadcast Journalists

Writing for Broadcast Journalists guides readers through the significant differences between the written and the spoken versions of journalistic English. It will help broadcast journalists at every stage of their careers to avoid such pitfalls as the use of newspaper-English, common linguistic errors, and Americanised phrases, and gives practical advice on accurate terminology and pronunciation, while encouraging writers to capture the immediacy of the spoken word in their scripts. Written in a lively and accessible style by an experienced BBC TV and radio editor, Writing for Broadcast Journalists is the authoritative guide to the techniques of writing for radio and television, and this new edition has a special section about writing online news. Writing for Broadcast Journalists includes: practical tips on how to avoid ‘journalese’, cliches and jargon guidance on tailoring your writing style to suit a particular audience advice on converting agency copy into spoken English writing to television pictures examples of scripts from some of the best in the business an appendix of ‘dangerous’ words and phrases to be avoided in scripts.

Author Biography

Rick Thompson has held senior editorial positions with BBC News at the regional, national and international levels in television and radio. He now trains journalists in central and eastern Europe, and is the Visiting Professor of Broadcast Journalism at Birmingham City University.