BROADCAST WRITING Grammar and Style Guide Guidelines for television news writers. Lessons on making writing short, simple, understandable, and ready to be heard.
Laura Hoover EXAMPLES and EXERCISES included
Contents Introduction
2
Grammar Philosophy
3
Part One: Grammar and Punctuation
4
Creating Readability and Understanding for Anchors LESSON 1 Capitalization 5 LESSON 2 Punctuation 6 LESSON 3 Script Layout 7 LESSON 4 Active Voice 8 LESSON 5 Subject-Verb Agreement 9
Part Two: Stylistic Choices
Creating Writing that is Meant to be Heard
10
LESSON 6 New, Now, Next 11 LESSON 7 Simplicity 12 LESSON 8 Word Choice 13
Bibliography
14
Reflection Letter
15
1 Broadcast Writing Grammar and Style Guide
Introduction Unlike most writing, broadcast writing is designed to be heard instead of read by its audience. While readability is still essential for the television anchor to present the material clearly, the most important thing is how the words come across out loud. For this reason, broadcast writing must be approached differently than writing a research paper, a technical document, or anything meant to be read directly by its audience.
Journalism is changing. Technology has evolved, and along with it, people are consuming news differently. In order to keep audiences interested, news providers must adapt their methods. As printed news mediums such as newspapers are slowly dying, on-line and broadcast writing have become the front-runner news resources. People want to receive news faster and want providers to deliver stories that get right to the point. In print, layout techniques and text tools can enlarge, bold, or italicize information that the audience is supposed to see first or pay attention to. Broadcast journalism must have its own approach. They must connect with their audience in a way that creates clarity, simplicity, and importance.
This guide will give instruction on grammatical and stylistic choices when writing for broadcast news. Following this guide will help you write in a way that best informs the public. Take the time to work through the exercises and think about how you can use these guidelines to improve your broadcast writing.
Broadcast Writing Grammar and Style Guide 2
Grammar Philisophy “Without ado or adornment, go ahead and tell the news” - MERVIN BLOCK
Grammar and style have been long debated topics when it comes to the English language. Are grammar “rules” actually rules? Or are they more like guidelines? Well, people are still debating that to this day, and I predict that they will for many years to come. What I can do to help is give you my simple philosophy on grammar and style when it comes to broadcast writing. Prescriptivists will tell you that grammar is comprised of a strict set of rules that, in most cases, apply no matter what topic or audience you are writing for. Descriptivists might say, hey as long as it makes sense, who cares? I lie somewhere in between the two. I think the most important quality of writing is that it can be easily understood by the intended audience. When it comes to broadcast writing, your audience is massive. Your viewers (or listeners) range in age, ethnicity, economic status, and education levels. This makes your job a little bit tricky. You need to create the perfect combination of clarity and correctness. You don’t want to offend part of your audience by dumbing down the script too much, but being too focused on grammar rules can overwhelm or confuse others. Broadcast writers should avoid lengthy, overly-descriptive writing. This style not only hides the point of each story under a blanket of flowery language, but loses your listeners who cannot re-read your script to figure it out. If you need to break some grammar rules to get your point across to the majority of your audience, I say go for it. But don’t go too crazy, or you will lose the grammar sticklers among your viewers. Most of the time, each news station will have rules that writers must meet. While these rules can vary, they usually include capitalization, punctuation, sentence structure, and active voice. Of course, English could not exist without a few rules that everyone must adhere to, no matter their profession. For example, articles must precede nouns (my house, not house my), subjects must agree with their verbs (they go to school, not they goes to school), and basic capitalization and punctuation must be used to determine the start and end of sentences. These types of rules are second-nature to people who grew up speaking English, and we may not even think twice when we use them correctly in our writing. However, to achieve this coveted happy medium between clarity and correctness, there must be some guidelines in addition to the basic rules that make English English. Following these guidelines (outlined in this style guide) is technically up to you, but make sure you are not sacrificing viewers if you choose to ignore them.
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Part One Grammar and Punctuation Creating Readability and Understanding for Anchors Anchoring a newscast is a high-pressure job. All eyes are on you and all ears are eagerly awaiting what you have to say. Heaven forbid you misread a sentence, dictate a statistic incorrectly, or pronounce a name wrong. Your reputation is constantly on the line. What you need is for your script to be readable, easily understood, and accurate. You need a writer who knows how to use grammar and punctuation to make your job as stress-free as possible.
Broadcast script writers must follow a set of guidelines in order to create the script of their anchor’s dreams. This section will provide information on how to accomplish this. Following these capitalization, punctuation, labeling, active voice, and subject-verb agreement principles will help your anchor report the news in the best way.
Broadcast Writing Grammar and Style Guide 4
LESSON 1: Capitalization Standard English lessons in grade school have taught you the basics of capitalization. I am here to tell you that these may or may not apply to broadcast script writing. Of course, they do in some places, but in a few instances you must allow yourself to ignore those rules for the sake of your anchors. If you are not familiar with script writing, it may come as a surprise to you that some news stations require almost the entire script to be written in all-caps. Because this is the style that I prefer, I will state the guidelines for that style.
Your anchors need to know when to read and when to be quiet, especially if they are unfamiliar with the script or the story. Here are a few standard capitalization rules to ensure your anchors read your script correctly: 1. Capitalize everything the anchor needs to read aloud. 2. Capitalize all anchor tags (which anchor is reading) 3. Use normal capitalization (upper case and lower case) for sound bites (when a pre-recorded person on camera is talking). 4. In the rundown, capitalize script directions (ONCAM, VO, SOTVO, etc.), story titles, and playback indicators (which source the pre-record-
EXERCISE 1
ed video is played from).
Correct the capitalization of the following parts of a rundown Story Slug Segment
Playback
Teacher Shortage Bill VO a Algae problem SOTvo b Tenure Laws oncam --
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LESSON 2: Punctuation Punctuation acts as the cues for anchors to distinguish between pauses, abbreviations, sentence endings, and script commands that are not meant to be read aloud. Using punctuation correctly is vital to the outcome of the newscast. With that being said, the requirements are fairly simple and straightforward.
Ellipses Ellipses will become your best friend, whether you want them to or not. Instead of commas, semicolons, or colons, whenever you want your anchor to pause, you use ellipses. This includes pauses for emphasis when a comma or other form of punctuation would not normally be used. Be careful though, if you forget to put a space after the ellipses, they will run into the next word. This can mess with the visual layout and make the prompter harder to read.
Quotation Marks
EXERCISE 2
Quotes are optional in broadcast writing for the most part. Some writers use them to put around sound bytes, even though these are also signaled by segment commands and the speaker’s name. I personally like using them as an extra precaution that the anchor does not read a pre-recorded sound byte.
Brackets Brackets, [ ] or { }, are used to set apart script commands that are not meant to be read aloud. Anchor tags, segment commands (VO, SOTVO, ONCAM), and sometimes computer graphic (CG) templates. These tell the anchor when they need to read, when a video will play, who is speaking, and what is coming up next.
Dashes FBI, PETA, NASA, and IRS: these are all well-known organization abbreviations that the average American knows how to pronounce. But what if your anchor doesn’t know the abbreviation you are referring to? Do they say each letter like you do for F-B-I? Do they read it as a word like NASA? Dashes tell your anchor how to read abbreviations. Put dashes between letters if they are meant to be read letter by letter. Dashes are also useful in connecting words. To avoid mess-ups, broadcast scripts spell out numbers. For example, your script would read four-hundred and fifty people not 450 people.
Correct the punctuation errors in this broadcast script. {VO} ANCHOR OVER 2 HUNDRED CALIFORNIA COLLEGE STUDENTS REQUESTED TUITION DECREASES FROM THE CSU SYSTEM, WHO HAVE YET TO COMMENT. Broadcast Writing Grammar and Style Guide 6
LESSON 3: Script Layout While script labeling is not necessarily considered grammar or punctuation, it is an important factor in the anchor’s ability to read and understand your script. Here are some basic command abbreviations included in most scripts: • ONCAM: On Camera- the anchor (who’s name is put underneath) will be on camera while reading the following text. • VO: Voice Over- the anchor (listed beneath) will be reading while video is being shown on screen. • SOT: Sound on Tape- a sound byte (usually a quote) from a video that the anchor does not talk during. • SOTVO: Sound on Tape with continued Voice Over- a sound byte finishes and leads straight into a VO, the anchor must be ready to read after the SOT is over. • CG: Computer Graphic- the text that appears as a banner, usually at the bottom of the screen. It says the name of who is talking or has a short explanation of what video is playing. The CG template will vary depending on the news station you work for. The example is using the template for Cal Poly’s Mustang News. Other aspects that add readability to a script: • White Space/Spacing: It is important that your anchor does not get lost in a big block of text. White space is just as important as filled space. Include a blank line in between each sentence, major script command, and each story. • Indenting: Indent the beginning of each line so the anchor knows it is a new thought.
SAMPLE SCRIPT {ONCAM} {JULIA} <cg id=”” template=”Generic_1Line” Title=”JULIA JOHNSON”> CALIFORNIA IS SEEING A SPIKE IN VIOLENT AND PROPERTY CRIMES ACCORDING TO NEW DATA FROM THE F-B-I.
SOME LAWMAKERS SAY IT COULD BE RELATED TO A VOTER-APPROVED LAW.
{TAKE VO} {JULIA} <cg id=”2162” template=”MN_2Line” line1=”RISE IN VIOLENT CRIME” line2=”CALIFORNIA”> PROPOSITION 47 IS A LAW THAT AIMS TO REDUCE PRISON OVERCROWDING BY REDUCING NONVIOLENT CRIMES LIKE DRUG POSSESSION AND BURGLARY FROM FELONIES TO MISDEMEANORS. 7 Broadcast Writing Grammar and Style Guide
LESSON 4: Active Voice As you will read in Lesson 6, your audience is watching for the New and the Now. Your script will come across to your viewers as old news or unimportant if you use passive voice. Make your newscast feel relevant, up-to-date, and newsworthy by using active voice. PASSIVE VOICE EXAMPLES: TWO PEOPLE WERE KILLED TODAY WHEN AN AIRPLANE CRASHED ON A RUNWAY IN SAN ANTONIO TEXAS.
Ï
THE POWER PLANT WAS EVALUATED AND FOUND SAFE BY AUTHORITIES AFTER THE EARTHQUAKE. OBAMA WAS THREATENED BY A MAN WHEN HE GAVE A SPEECH IN CONCORD CALIFORNIA TUESDAY. FIVE SHOPS ARE BEING BURNED FROM A FIRE IN DOWNTOWN SAN LUIS OBISPO THAT IS STILL BURNING.
ACTIVE VOICE CORRECTIONS: AN AIRPLANE CRASH KILLED TWO PEOPLE TODAY IN SAN ANTONIO TEXAS.
P
AUTHORITIES EVALUATED AND CLEARED A POWER PLANT FOR DAMAGES AFTER THE EARTHQUAKE. A MAN THREATENED OBAMA TUESDAY DURING A SPEECH IN CONCORD CALIFORNIA.
EXERCISE 3
A FIRE IS BURNING IN DOWNTOWN SAN LUIS OBISPO. FIVE SHOPS HAVE BEEN DAMAGED. THE FIRE IS NOT YET CONTAINED.
Rewrite the following sentences in active voice. You may change some wording if necessary. 1. A CONCERT ON CAL POLY’S CAMPUS YESTERDAY HAD THREE-HUNDRED STUDENTS IN ATTENDANCE. 2. FINAL EXAMS ARE OCCUPYING STUDENTS THIS WEEK. 3. SPRING BREAK WILL LEAVE CAL POLY’S CAMPUS PARTIALLY EMPTY NEXT WEEK. Broadcast Writing Grammar and Style Guide 8
LESSON 5: Subject-Verb Agreement Think back to your middle school and high school English classes. Your teacher would surely mark you down for incorrectly combining a singular subject with a plural verb. Doing this in your broadcast script may not get you marked down, but it may get you fired or reprimanded. Following the rules of subject-verb agreement is not just a way to keep your boss happy, but it will make the difference between your audience understanding your stories and being completely lost.
General Rules Singular subjects go with singular verbs and plural subjects go with plural verbs. • • • • • •
HE WENT to the store. SHE LIKES candy. The GIRL FOUND a lost cat. THEY ATE dinner. The TWINS HAVE the same hair color. The CROWD CLAPPED.
And/Or/Neither/Nor When using AND, the verb agrees with its CLOSEST subject. • The rangers (P) AND the camper (S) SEES the bear • The ranger (S) AND the campers (P) SEE the bear Always use a plural verb when two subjects are joined with OR, whether or not the subjects themselves are plural. • The ranger/s OR the camper/s SEE the bear.
EXERCISE 4
Verbs in sentences using NEITHER or NOR are always singular. • NEITHER ranger/s NOR the camper/s SAW the bear. Choose the correct verb for each sentence. 1. 2. 3. 4.
The bag of toys IS/ARE going to the shelter. Neither your shoes nor your backpack BELONG/BELONGS in the kitchen. They HATE/HATES the decision to skip the party. The dogs and the cat IS/ARE chasing the mouse.
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Part Two Stylistic Choices Creating Writing that is Meant to be Heard Broadcast writing is not designed to be read by its audience. It is meant to be real time, live, happening now news. Your audience usually watches or listens to the news live and expects the information they receive to be new and relevant.
To achieve this, writers have to take a stylistic approach to writing their scripts. Ask yourself questions like these: What do the viewers want to hear first? What is the most important part of the story? How do I emphasize key points in the story? Am I keeping the stories simple enough to be understood by my whole audience?
This section will help you get to a place where you can confidently answer those types of questions, and will keep your anchors from asking the same ones.
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LESSON 6: New, Now, Next I am borrowing this catchy phrase from one of my journalism professors at Cal Poly, Patti Piburn. She has worked in broadcast news as a reporter, anchor, and now teaches journalism courses in broadcast. New, Now, Next is essentially a timeline for your script as a whole as well as each individual story.
Your audience always wants to know the latest happenings. That is why they turn on the
NEW
news. They don’t want to hear the same thing you said yesterday, or a recap on something they already know about. Put your newest, most important story first in your script, and present the most pressing details of each story at the beginning.
Your audience wants to know how this new information is affecting them now. This is
NOW
why the active voice is so important in script writing. Your listeners want to know what happened or is happening, who is responsible, and who it will impact.
Now that your script has covered what is new and what is happening now, your audience is going to be waiting to hear what is coming up. For an overall newscast, this can mean
NEXT
including “teases” to the upcoming stories. For an individual story, this means telling the audience how and when the story will progress. For example: The trial will be held this
EXERCISE 5
Tuesday or We will keep you updated as we get new information on this story.
Put the stories in order like they would appear in a script. Use the New, Now, Next format. HILARY WINS FIVE STATES
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FIRE ON CAL POLY’S CAMPUS TAMED
REPUBLICAN DEBATE NEXT TUESDAY
LESSON 7: Simplicity “Our life is frittered away by detail. Simplify, simplify.” - HENRY DAVID THOREAU I cannot emphasize enough the importance of simplicity when your audience is listening to your writing. Over-complication will lead to misunderstanding. It is too difficult for your audience to take a long sentence and break it down when they do not have it printed in front of them. Short sentences that get straight to the point are key.
Ï
CAL POLY IS DEALING WITH A GIGANTIC FIRE THAT MAY HAVE RESULTED FROM A CIGARETTE THAT WAS CARELESSLY THROWN ONTO SOME DRY GRASS TODAY AROUND FOUR P.M. BEHIND THE RED BRICK DORMATORIES ON THE EAST SIDE OF CAMPUS.
This sentence would not be a good idea to include in your newscast. Besides being a run-on sentence, there is just too much information thrown together. In addition, news writers cannot use descriptive adjective that insinuate an opinion. The words “gigantic” and “carelessly” depend on personal opinion and can mean different things to different people. It would be more accurate to say the area that the fire is taking up or simply referring to it as “large” which is much more easily understood than “gigantic”. The information would be better understood if it were split into multiple sentences with a more accurate description. Here is a better way to phrase the information: A LARGE FIRE IS BURNING ON CAL POLY’S CAMPUS. THE FIRE IS LOCATED ON THE
P
EAST SIDE OF CAMPUS BEHIND THE RED BRICK DORMATORIES. THE SAN LUIS OBISPO FIRE DEPARTMENT SPECULATES THE FIRE MAY HAVE RESULTED FROM A CIGA-
EXERCISE 6
RETTE AND SAY IT MOST LIKELY BEGAN AROUND FOUR P.M.
Simplify the following sentences to make them script-ready. TODAY IS A MAJOR DAY FOR DONALD TRUMP AND
ALL TWENTY-THREE C-S-U CAMPUSES’ FACULTY
HIS SUPPORTERS AS MARCO RUBIO SUSPENDS HIS
HAVE BEEN APPROVED TO STRIKE FOR FIVE DAYS IN
CAMPAIGN AFTER LOSING TO TRUMP IN HIS HOME
MID APRIL IN HOPES OF GETTING A FIVE-PERCENT
STATE OF FLORIDA.
RAISE... THREE-PERCENT MORE THAN THE C-S-U ADMINISTRATION HAS OFFERED. Broadcast Writing Grammar and Style Guide 12
LESSON 8: Word Choice You speak differently than you write, for the most part. When you sit down to create that perfect English essay or write an argument on any subject, you usually try to sound as intelligent and use words related to your topic. For broadcast writing, you need to be as simple and straightforward as possible. Because your audience is so broad, you want to avoid sounding like a prude smarty-pants.
Reporting the news is not a chance to show off your creative writing skills. It is also not an opportunity to state your opinion. You must state the facts. The excited woman - wait... is she actually excited? Or is that your interpretation of the situation? Be careful with choosing your words.
Keep your sentences short and your word choice simple. Here are some examples of what to do and what not to do.
EXERCISE 7
Ï
P
THE COLLEGE UNDERGRADUATES PERUSED THEIR TEXTBOOKS FOR VALUABLE INFORMATION.
COLLEGE STUDENTS LOOKED FOR INFORMATION IN THEIR TEXTBOOKS.
THE FIRE BLAZED BRIGHT ACROSS THE GOLDEN WHEAT.
THE FIRE BURNED THE DRY GRASS.
HE WHISPERED QUIETLY IN HIS WIFE’S EAR THAT HE LOVES HER.
HE TOLD HIS WIFE HE LOVED HER.
You’re turn: choose different words to simplify these sentences. Fully rewrite if you find it necessary. 1. THE NERVOUS POLITITION STUTTERED REPEATEDLY AS HE ADDRESSED THE IMPATIENT CROWD. 2. AN ABUNDANCE OF FOOD WAS GENEROUSLY DONATED TO THE FOOD BANK.
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Bibliography TEXTS Kolln, Martha J., and Loretta Gray. Rhetorical Grammar: Gram matical Choices, Rhetorical Effects. 7th ed. Boston: Pearson Education Inc., 2012. Print The Associated Press Stylebook and Briefing in Media Law. New York: Associated Press and Basic Books, 2013. Print. Williams, Joseph M., and Joseph Bizup. Style: Lessons in Clarity and Grace. 11th ed. Boston: Pearson Education Inc., 2014. Print.
Ideas from these texts were used throughout this style guide. Consult The Associated Press Stylebook if you have further questions about broadcast writing or journalistic writing in general. Rhetorical Grammar and Style include in-depth explanations of grammatical and stylistic principles for general writing. Some of the information in these texts are not applicable to broadcast writing. However, these are great resources for most other fields.
Broadcast Writing Grammar and Style Guide 14
Reflection Letter Journalism is my passion. I have envisioned myself writing captivating news stories, interviewing people on the street after a disaster, and producing award-winning newscasts. Broadcast journalism captivated me as soon as I began taking classes at Cal Poly. It is a whole new world, and all eyes are on you. The way you present yourself, what you say, and especially how you write shape the success of your news station. I chose to create this guide based off of what I have learned about writing for broadcast news. Script writing is such a unique and particular way of writing. I find it intriguing and worth understanding. Writing for the ear rather than the eye means incorporating different strategies: both grammatical and stylistic. Part one of this guide focuses on the first question broadcast writers must ask themselves: Can your anchor understand your script? I chose to include what I think are the most important factors of readability: capitalization, punctuation, script layout, active voice, and subject-verb agreement. Script layout does not include actual grammar or punctuation rules, so let me explain why I included this lesson in part one. I wanted part one to be all about how to ensure that anchors correctly read stories. Grammar and punctuation signals to anchors how to say certain things. Script layout explicitly tells anchors who is speaking, when they begin reading, and help them differentiate between stories and script commands. Part two is all about writing for the ear. Your audience does not have the luxury of reading television scripts, they must be able to understand it aloud. This is where simplicity in sentence structure and word choice comes in. I remember sitting in a journalism class when my professor, Patti Piburn, lectured on her New, Now, Next writing style. I thought this perfectly summed up what broadcast writers need to accomplish and what listeners want to hear. When it came to formatting this guide I had one main goal: clarity. I kept explanations short and white space plentiful. I wanted each section to be as simple and correct as possible. I used examples to help explain each lesson and exercises to allow readers to put the lessons to practice. Each lesson began with a brief summary of what was about to be said, while each lesson ended with an example or an exercise. I chose to incorporate ideas from the three texts listed in the bibliography because I believe in their credibility. However, most of the information from this guide comes from broadcast classes I have taken at Cal Poly. Thank you for taking the time to understand the writing style I am passionate about. This guide will go on to help me in the future I am sure. Laura Hoover
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