BBC World News from New Broadcasting House

Does anyone feel that World presenters have a more neutral accent compared to NC presenters? I wonder if accent neutrality plays a part in selecting presenters for World or NC.

No, I would say it's the opposite. The make-up of News Channel presenters is predominantly British and so have a British accent of some sort. BBC World has presenters whose nationalities are all over the world and so they have a lot of distinctive accents, much further removed from each other than accents within Britain. And let's face it, most of the NC presenters have a fairly neutral accent. There aren't any with a distinctly northern accent, for instance.

Indeed, when they did that double headed simulcast a few weeks ago with Chris Rogers and Daniela Ritorto which went out on the NC and World, Daniela's accent was very noticable and seemed a little out of place on the NC (purely because it's not an accent you normally hear on the NC rather than that there's anything wrong with it).

The News Channel (or at least News24) have used presenters with regional accents in the past - David Robertson springs to mind.

I don't think there's a particular bias between channels but there do seem to be more BBC World Presenters with distinctive accents . Those that appear on both BBC News and BBC World however do seem to have neutral accents although i doubt this is intentional.

If given a British and British presenter comparison, an example coming to mind say between say Nik Gowing and Chris Rogers, I'd find it easier to understand Nik. Or maybe there's an RP thing involved or its just a matter of individual differences. However, I do find Gavin Grey's RP pretty easy to understand.


Given the wide array of nationalities on World presenters, I think a lot of them have also somewhat adapted to a more British accent as well over the years, for instance Aaron Heselhurst doesn't come off as overly Australian to me. I've yet to see American accents on BBC presenters. Daniela Ritorto is one of a few with pretty distinctive Australian accent. Lyse Doucet likely Canadian, not much hint of British accent on her.

A while back we have Julie Peacock occasionally popping up on World. Probably due to a lack of Scottish presenters, I find her accent rather odd. Eg. UK pronounced "you key". But she doesn't appear much at all now on World. That was a year ago.

Indeed. CNN International strikes me as far more diverse in terms of accents than BBC World News.



Lyse Doucet's accent must be a hybrid of some sort because no native-born Canadian I've ever heard (either Anglophone or Francophone) has an accent resembling Doucet's.

This is what English natives from New Brunswick, Doucet's home province, tend to sound like:

http://www.dialectsarchive.com/new-brunswick-1

Zeinab Badawi, Lyse Doucet, Daniela Ritorto, Lucy Hockings, Aaron Heslehurst, Rico Hizon, Mariko Oi, Nualla McGovern all have quite distinct accents, yet notably clear.

David Eades, Peter Dobbie, Naga Munchetty, Mike Embley, Adnan Nawaz, Maryam Moshiri and Philippa Thomas all have quite neutral accents and, interestingly, they are the presenters who quite often appear in UK coverage as well via simulcast broadcasts.

I'm sure its a coincidence though.

If you listen closely enough, Kasia Madera and Sharanjit Leyl have quite clear yet particular accents as well.

Fair to say the diverse nationality makeup of World presenters, whether intentional or otherwise, contribute to a wide variety of distinctive accents. Another example I can easily think of is Katya Adler, with a very heavy distinctive accent. I think it's mentioned she has quite some Austrian background/education. Babita Sharma has a unique accent as well. Former staff Martine Dennis I would say she has a neutral accent, but her speaking momentum is rather unique. Stephen Sacker imo joins the group of clear and neutral accents. NC's Jane Hill is neutral and clear. I would think Adnan Nawaz has a bit of accent there.

Here are some articles regarding Rico Hizon and his Filipino accent for anyone who might be interested.
http://globalnation.inquirer.net/viewpoints/viewpoints/view/20110512-336121/Being-proud-of-our-own-Filipino-English-diction

http://filamnation.com/2011/11/news-anchor-rico-hizon-opens-up-on-love-for-philippines-work-in-bbc/

From the second article:
"In fondly recalling how he got hired by BBC, Hizon admitted he initially got stunned, asking his employers, “Are you sure you wanna hire me without the British accent?”"

For me (and possibly for most North Americans based on my experience), nearly all of the presenters in London, aside from those with obvious Australian ones and non-Anglosphere English accents, have the same accent. I'm aware of the regional accents in England (not NI or Scotland) but the differences are barely noticeable except the Cockney accent. For us North Americans, in the UK, there's Scottish, Irish, 'British', and Cockney. To me, Kasia Madera sounds no different from Babita Sharma, Zeinab Badawi, Peter Dobbie, Adnan Nawaz or Sharanjit Leyl.

You're not going to hear any true regional accents on the news though (or regional dialects, for that matter). If you heard people using the accents "on the street", you'd be able to tell the difference between various accents.

The presenters you mention don't exhibit any radically different accents (most, if not all, speak a form of RP).

Interesting to see BBC one on one of the screens, you'd think if they needed to monitor a channel, then BBC News would be more useful.