The Standard on Saturday
Date: 02.07.2016
Page 32
Article size: 151 cm2
ColumnCM: 33.55
AVE: 77177.77
TV and radio presenters
promoters of
bad English
By PHARAOH OCHICHI
A number of teachers of English
often strive to attain high standards
in the use of the language. They edu­
cate their students, for example, that
there's no sound representing letter
say, 'In the news tonight...,' instead
of saying, 'On the news tonight....'
Hence they end up popularising the
prepositional phrase 'in the news'.
A prepositional phrase is a noun (pro­
noun) preceded by a preposition; the
'b' in words such as 'bomb', 'climb',
preposition plus the noun (pronoun)
'plumber', 'tomb', and 'thumb'; that
form a unit (a prepositional phrase).
a word like 'conduct' (and contract,
Such a phrase is often introduced by
accent, convert, object, increase, sub­ a wrong preposition as exemplified
ject) is either a verb or noun, depend­ by sentences extracted from leading
ing on how it's pronounced.
local newspapers. Early this year, one
But television and radio an­
of the top local dailies had a page one
nouncers 'bombard' the learners
story with the top line: "Three Ken­
with wrong pronunciations, erasing
yan hotels are among the top 25 in the
whatever little is in their heads. This
continent, according to the American
could be why the standard of English travel website TripAdvisor." (Feb 1).
in Kenya is unlikely to improve any
It shouldn't have been 'in the conti­
time soon.
nent' but 'on the continent'. Further,
Take this, for example: An opinion ar­
whereas the correct phrase is 'on a
ticle ofjune ] (page 15), titled "Like
all public entities, varsities must have bus' and 'on campus,' you'd quite fre­
financial transparency," has this: "Re­ quently hear constructions, 'in a bus'
cently, a number of universities were and 'in campus.'
in the news after the Auditor General
For instance, a daily (Dec 13,
declared them technically insolvent." 2015) carried this caption: "She was
The words in focus here are 'in
shot dead by gunmen in a bus as she
headed to town on Saturday to col­
the news'. But there's nothing wrong
with the words and the sentence as a
whole, because if somebody is in the
news, it means they're talked about
in newspapers and on television and
radio stations. The problem comes,
however, when television presenters
lect her birthday cake." In another
story headlined, "Sponsors are fa­
ther­figures to us ­ uni girls," pub­
lished by a city newspaper (June 10),
there are two sentences, "Asked if she
would get a sponsor, the 22­year­old
said, 'if I get one...why not? After all,
relationships in this campus are just
a waste of time.'"
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