The Effect of the Broadcast Medium on the Language of Radio and Television Sports Commentary Genres: The Rugby Union Lineout

Abstract

This study provides provisional answers to the question, What influence does the broadcast medium have on the speech of sports commentators? It answers the question through a comparison of the influence of two media on the way in which rugby football commentaries of lineouts are given. Previous linguistic research has examined sports commentary speech largely independent of the effects of the medium in which commentary is broadcast. However it is clear that sports commentaries serve somewhat different purposes in the case that someone can see what is happening and where they cannot. We show that the differences are manifested, for instance, in whether an episode in the game is given commentary at all, the amount of commentary the episode receives, commentators' priorities recounting the various subepisodes of the game they are viewing, and the weight given to color versus play-by-play commentary. In all these cases, radio commentators provide more detailed commentary. It may be, therefore, that as far as the induction into the oral traditions of commentary are concerned, radio is a more demanding apprenticeship and that recruiting television commentators from among radio commentators will lead to a more fluent television commentary.

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