Why are so many BBC broadcasters going native?

Of the many characters created by the peerless Victoria Wood, one creation in particular lingers in the mind: namely the immaculately polished, but unashamedly snobbish television continuity announcer, who, with an assassin’s smile, treated her audience with utter contempt. ‘We’d like to apologise to viewers in the North. It must be awful for them,’ was one of her more cutting remarks.

Coming from Manchester, Wood was clearly making mischief with counterintuitive comedy. She was taking aim at how crisp, received pronunciation can make anything sound plausible. Had she not died in 2016, at the age of just 62, we can only wonder what a comedy genius like Wood would have made of the way the pendulum has since swung for news presenters and broadcast journalists in terms of enunciation, articulation and inflection. This is not only in their worship of the on-trend glottal stop (Hello, Amol Rajan), but the fashion for literally going native when it comes to pronouncing foreign names and places. When discussing Qatar recently, one reporter made the Arab state sound like the implacable order of a martial arts expert.

This bizarre phenomenon is happening right across UK-based broadcasting services, and, in particular, at the BBC. From the hon hon hon bonhomie of French surnames – step forward President Macrrrrrron – to, more darkly, the plump bluntness of Hezbolll-ahhh. Given the terrorist credentials of this group of Islamic extremists, authentic pronunciation is uncomfortable to listen to. Why are broadcasters trying to describe these evil organisations on their own terms?

There’s another irony in these misguided attempts to bring authenticity to pronouncing foreign names and words; in trying to bring – what? – credibility to bulletins and dispatches, such over embellishment achieve the very opposite; it creates, at times, an almost comedic distraction. It’s hard not to laugh, for instance, when journalists make Friedrich Merz – the politician tipped to be next German chancellor – sound like a baddie in Dad’s Army.

At times, such pronunciations just sounds pretentious; take when Bahrain is gifted an aspirated ‘h’, and becomes BarHrain; or Nicaragua becomes Nee-ka-RAH-gwa, so that it’s closer to the Spanish pronunciation. It’s so showy and ostentatious that it’s the stuff of Our Man in Havana.

We could, of course, applaud respected news anchors reporters for gamely trying to give names and places their native intonation. But since many lack the natural gifts required for such delivery, what can be heard is reduced to the performative.

What irritates more, perhaps, is what’s driving this move: a determination to pander to the politically correct who already frame our situation and rule our lot in so many areas of public life. Certainly it would slot well into the suggested left-wing bias which has infiltrated some quarters of mainstream media. Maybe I’m also just a grumbly nitpicker. But what equally irritates me is the lack of consistency. It’s Paris with one reporter, and Paree with another. Tomato, tomato it’s time to switch the whole thing off. 

Some of this confusion could be put down to old fashioned showing off, not least in the case of BBC European editor Katya Adler, who studied German and Italian at the University of Bristol, and who effortlessly rolls her Rs around Marie or Machee Le Pen, without sounding like an extra from Allo Allo.

External factors also create the dynamic for a change in pronunciation. The movement to avoid referring to the Ukrainian capital Kiev, instead calling it Kyiv, gathered momentum in light of Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine. (Kyiv is derived from the Ukrainian language name, whereas Kiev comes from the Russian language.) On other occasions, it’s simply hard not to laugh at the forced pronunciations, especially when Barcelona is pronounced in an Hispanic, rather than Anglicised way. Is it only me who finds it hard to concentrate when reporters lisp Bar-the-lona? All I can think of is Manuel from Fawlty Towers.

Perhaps I’m being narrow minded. Today’s audiences are diverse, and if they have a direct connection to the story, they may feel well represented if we pronounce place names ‘properly’. It’s also true that high-quality journalism does demand linguistic precision. But so much of our news is already descending into parody with Elon Musk wading into British domestic affairs and Donald Trump slapping on the fake tan in anticipation of his inauguration on 20 January.

That’s why in Britain – dear Britain – we should take pride in cool, crisp delivery, which is all about the story and nothing else. The risks of failing to do so are manifold: insensitivity, distraction, stereotyping and charges of being patronising by trying too hard to showcase cultural awareness. Most of all, it’s about absorbing content not appearing in character. Accents must not speak louder than words. Believe me, as someone from the North, if that does happen it will be awful for all of us. Comprende?