ABSTRACT
News language in English is characterized by the tension between formal registers that communicate institutionalization and expertise, and informal registers that communicate immediacy and authenticity. It details the norms for news language are always changing and evolving with news media. The chapter considers signify language–written, spoken or signed–and the codes within it. Mode has been used informally and formally to refer to a variety of system and presentation choices, most often involving channels such as speech, writing, and the visual. Cross-linguistic and cross-cultural studies might also unpack broader pragmatic, conversational, and discursive patterns. It seems clear that the new attention economy has linguistic consequences that reach beyond hyperlinks and vernacularization. The analysis of news language has both benefited from and contributed to advances in linguistics, as published and broadcast news combine relative ease of data collection with clear ideological significance.
