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0:36

You're listening to Luke's English

0:38

podcast. For more information, visit

0:40

teacherluke.co.uk. Hello

0:49

listeners, welcome back to Luke's English

0:51

podcast. Today on the podcast, I'm

0:53

talking to Barbara Serra, the

0:55

Italian journalist who reads the news on

0:57

television in the UK. She's

0:59

a very interesting guest and has lots

1:02

of interesting things to say about the

1:04

way her identity and career have been

1:06

shaped by her relationship to the English

1:08

language. We're going to

1:10

talk about reading the news in the UK when you

1:13

sound like a foreigner. Lots

1:15

of questions around identity and accent and

1:17

all sorts of other things that Barbara

1:19

has experienced in her time as a broadcast

1:21

journalist. I think you'll find it very

1:23

interesting as a learner of English looking to improve your

1:26

English as much as possible

1:28

in different contexts, both personal and

1:30

professional. Now, before we go

1:32

on, I just want to give

1:34

a little announcement about a Lepster meetup,

1:37

which is happening in Vietnam later

1:39

this month. Do you remember Lepster meetups? They

1:41

used to happen quite a lot. I

1:44

think COVID-19 pretty much

1:46

put a stop to them. But there used

1:48

to be Lepster meetups happening in various places.

1:50

Well, there's going to be another one. And

1:53

a Lepster meetup, a Lepster, just in

1:55

case you don't know, this is a listener

1:57

to Luke's English podcast, LEP. That's Luke's English

1:59

podcast. podcast, a Lepster is someone who

2:01

listens to the podcast. So if you're

2:03

a regular listener to this show, then

2:05

you're a Lepster, congratulations. And a Lepster

2:07

meetup is really a chance for listeners

2:10

to this show to get together

2:13

in some location, normally a bar or

2:15

cafe or something, and just chat in

2:17

English, talk about this and that, meet

2:19

like-minded people and socialize in English. It

2:21

can be a really good little way

2:23

to build a community, find

2:26

friends with whom you can practice speaking English.

2:28

You might find people from different places who

2:30

have a different first language, so you'll be

2:33

forced to speak in English. It's basically a

2:35

really good idea to socialize

2:37

in English. And this one is being

2:39

organized by Zdenek Lukas, who you might

2:41

know from Zdenek's English podcast. He's also

2:43

organized lots of meetups in the past

2:47

and Zdenek likes to do things

2:49

like different board games and other

2:51

fun things to practice English. So

2:54

Zdenek is organizing a Lepster meetup

2:56

in Da Nang in Vietnam on

2:59

Friday the 17th of May. Okay,

3:02

it's going to take place at Gordon's Pizza,

3:04

which is in the Anh Thuong area

3:07

of Da Nang Vietnam, right? Friday the

3:09

17th of May from 9 p.m. If

3:12

you're interested in attending the meetup,

3:14

just let Zdenek know, send him

3:16

an email just to say, hi

3:19

Zdenek, I'd like to take part in the

3:21

meetup in Da Nang. Just

3:24

let him know, send him an email.

3:26

His address is teacher [email protected]. Teacher, I

3:28

think you know how to spell that.

3:31

Zdenek is spelled

3:33

Z-D-E-N-E-K. Okay, teacher [email protected].

3:36

Just let him know if you'd

3:38

like to take part in that

3:40

meetup happening in Da Nang in

3:42

Gordon's Pizza, Friday the 17th of May

3:44

from 9 p.m. Right,

3:46

so back to this episode and back to

3:49

my guest today, Barbara Serra. Barbara

3:51

Serra is an award-winning Italian journalist

3:53

who spent much of her career Reading

3:56

the news in the UK on

3:58

various high-profile websites. Well established English

4:01

language news networks including The Baby Seats,

4:03

Channel Five, Al Jazeera, English and Sky

4:05

News. so she's a news reader. You

4:08

know when is like six o'clock or

4:10

ten o'clock or something? Space the news

4:12

and you have a person sitting behind

4:14

a desk reading the news in various

4:17

different sort of ways is also reporters.

4:19

people who are out. On

4:21

location reporting the news as well. So this

4:24

is what Barbara does and she's done it.

4:27

In English in the Uk on

4:29

various news networks. Now.

4:31

Barbara has quite a specific

4:33

relationship with English. It's had

4:35

dominant language but not a

4:37

native language. And she's

4:39

going to explain what that means

4:42

in this conversation. She has a

4:44

a certain accent in English, which

4:46

does place her outside the Uk

4:48

somehow. So how has this affected

4:50

her career as a news reader

4:52

and reporter? Broadcast. Journalism

4:54

is associated with a certain kind

4:57

of model of spoken English in

4:59

the Uk that will be what

5:01

is often called Bbc English, and

5:04

traditionally the role of news readers.

5:07

This. Role has been synonymous with that

5:09

kind of high level, high status form

5:11

of English. So what as Barbara's experience

5:13

been? what is the story of her

5:15

English? How did she get to the

5:17

point where she was ready to actually

5:20

do this job? What? Kind of

5:22

challenges has he faced while reading the

5:24

news in the Uk with a certain

5:26

acts and and what does this tell

5:29

us about learning English. What? It

5:31

means to improve your accent. The

5:33

relationship between accent an identity. The.

5:36

Definition of Macys: a non native speaker,

5:38

a status of different English accents in

5:40

the English speaking world, and more. So

5:42

that's what we're going to be talking

5:44

about. Saw think it's time to get

5:46

started. So and we got. So.

5:53

maybe the a good place to

5:55

begin would be to ask about

5:57

your background and your linguistic background

6:00

Where are you from and how

6:03

does English come into your upbringing?

6:07

Yeah, I mean, thank you for starting with

6:09

that because that sort of what gave me

6:11

the idea to start working on language as

6:13

well. So I'll tell you about

6:15

the linguistic background, but basically I'm a

6:17

broadcast journalist and I have worked over

6:20

the past 20, 25 years for

6:22

the major broadcaster. There was an intern at

6:25

CNN and then BBC, Sky News, Al Jazeera,

6:27

English and now I'm back at Sky News

6:29

and because I sound, I

6:31

mean, I inhabit this weird world where

6:33

native speakers can tell I'm second language

6:35

and second language English speakers sometimes think

6:37

I'm native, but actually they don't really

6:39

and often I sleep, you know, I

6:41

have my moments. So I would

6:43

often get these emails from fellow,

6:46

you know, second language English speakers, you know,

6:48

younger journalists who wanted to get on air

6:50

and they'd ask for advice and I

6:53

realized that for a while that I was

6:55

lying to them because I would get into

6:57

the phase of saying, oh, you know, you've

6:59

got to think lastly outside the box, be

7:01

ambitious, you know, be creative,

7:03

be curious. And then actually I

7:05

realized that the real question I

7:07

have to ask any of them

7:09

before, you know, in the

7:11

first 20 seconds of the conversation was how good

7:14

is your English, first of all? And

7:16

second question, can you kind of pass

7:18

as a native speaker? And

7:20

I realized actually that to all these young journalists

7:23

that were getting in touch, unless I

7:25

asked those two questions and unless I was

7:27

brutally honest about the reality of that, I

7:29

was effectively, you know, leading them down the

7:31

garden path, which is exactly the kind of

7:33

expression that I try not to use on

7:35

a second language English speaker. You

7:37

know, I was giving them false illusions

7:39

or at least not being honest about

7:42

the difficulties. So I am

7:44

a native Italian speaker. My parents were

7:46

both Italian. I was born there.

7:48

I lived there until I was about nine

7:50

years old. And then my family moved to

7:52

Denmark and I went to an

7:54

international school. And, you know, anyone

7:57

who's been to international schools knows it's a bit of

7:59

a mix. And so that kind of

8:01

set the imprint to how I sound. First

8:03

of all, I learned English as

8:05

a child, not a young child. I have

8:08

very, very clear memories of

8:10

not speaking English, actually. And I remember walking into that

8:12

class, you know, when you're nine, you're not that young.

8:15

And I remember walking in that class and

8:18

feeling that strange sense of alienation where you

8:20

literally can't understand a word that's

8:22

being said. And I have to say, without

8:25

trying to make everything fit

8:27

neatly, I do think that that

8:29

sense of alienation always gave me an

8:33

empathy with being

8:36

different and with there being genuine

8:38

barriers to feeling part of something.

8:41

So I think that shaped my career in

8:43

many ways. Apart from the linguistic, I think

8:45

it shaped the sense behind it. And

8:48

then linguistically, I mean, I'll give you all the

8:50

missing bits to the... Because you'll get it and

8:52

the audience will get it when people ask me, where's your

8:54

accent from? So native Italian, but I

8:56

learned it in Denmark. So actually, I

8:58

learned it surrounded by people,

9:01

mainly Danes, who speak it as a

9:03

second language. But the woman

9:05

who taught me, because often in

9:08

international schools, you have someone who follows

9:10

you for the first few months to help

9:12

you with the English specifically, was

9:14

American or Canadian. And

9:16

I think you can hear that. And I think

9:18

that is still there. And then

9:21

it's the retroflexed R, which I can

9:23

bore you about at length. Yeah,

9:26

we like that kind of stuff. Exactly. That's

9:28

why I'm here. I'm so excited

9:31

about having that conversation. And

9:33

so I think it's a mix. I think

9:35

it's international English. And I

9:37

think a lot of people who are second

9:40

language English speakers actually learn

9:42

it in an environment

9:44

that's not an English-speaking country. And it's completely

9:47

different. If I had come to the UK

9:49

age nine, I'm pretty

9:51

confident I would sound almost

9:55

completely British. There might be

9:57

something slightly perceptible of the English.

10:00

Italian, but actually, I think if I'd

10:02

come to the UK age nine, then

10:04

I would have I think I would

10:06

probably sound British now. But I didn't.

10:08

That wasn't what happened in my formative

10:10

years and the years where I learned

10:12

English. So I was in this international

10:15

school from the ages of nine to

10:17

19. You know, and linguistically, that's by

10:19

19, let's face it, it's set,

10:21

you know, what I call the the

10:23

sort of math settings are

10:26

fixed. And so I learned

10:28

it in this weird way where, you know,

10:30

the kind of I had

10:32

this American or Canadian teacher, and then

10:35

I think probably, you know, put that little imprint. But

10:38

then in truth, I also learned English surrounded

10:40

by people that spoke it in all sorts

10:43

of weird and wonderful ways. Sorry, where were

10:45

they from? Were these your friends or classmates?

10:47

I mean, you know, so there were

10:49

quite a lot of Brits, they tended to leave when

10:52

you got to secondary school, because quite a lot

10:54

of them would come back to the UK for

10:56

boarding school. But in the early years, quite a

10:58

lot of Brits, some Americans, but then a lot

11:00

of people that didn't have it as their first

11:02

language, you know, Israelis, Germans, I

11:05

mean, Spaniards, Portuguese, other Italians,

11:07

although we would all speak English

11:10

together, obviously lots of Scandinavians,

11:12

but you know, Chinese, Indian, Pakistani, you know,

11:14

it was an international school of Nigeria, you

11:16

know, you name it, it was it was

11:18

like that. And I think all of us,

11:21

in a way you do conform, don't you

11:24

to a kind of international English? This

11:26

is the 80s and 90s, where

11:29

culturally, I would guess there was an American

11:31

dominance. And so you ended up watching a

11:33

lot of American stuff on TV and sound

11:37

simplistic, but it was cool to be American. So

11:39

it was cool to try to sound American.

11:41

And we're all listening to American bands.

11:43

So that played a part. But

11:45

really, it's a mix. And I

11:47

think what is slightly odd in

11:49

my voice is as

11:52

Danish as it is Italian.

11:54

I don't actually think I have an

11:56

Italian imprint. And I

11:58

think what is all in my, you know,

12:00

you don't want to mean by odd that slightly

12:02

weird thing that people go, where is she from? I

12:06

think that's Danish as much as anything because

12:08

I never spoke English with Italians. When

12:11

you are in the UK, you live

12:13

in the UK, right? I've been here for 30

12:15

years. Not that you'd know, but yes,

12:17

from the way I sound, and

12:20

rubbed off. Well when you meet

12:22

British people, for example, in some situation, you know,

12:24

you just had been a party or something, or

12:26

you know, meeting new people, and they first start

12:29

talking to you and there's that moment where they

12:31

kind of think to themselves, well what's the reaction

12:33

that they have? What are the things they say

12:35

to you about? You know, they say,

12:37

where are you from actually? And they

12:39

ask you that question, where do people think you're from?

12:42

How do people react to your English? It's

12:45

interesting. More than where are you from, which

12:47

I also think has become a little bit

12:49

of a toxic question. And interestingly,

12:51

I think the whole issue of

12:53

accent and language and nationality, and you

12:56

know, the sort of toxicity, not toxicity, not toxic,

12:58

but asking where you're from, it depends how you

13:01

ask and why, right? So

13:04

interesting people will say, where is your accent

13:06

from, right? So

13:09

I can mock it up if I have

13:11

to, and I used to have to. So I

13:13

can say, I'm driving my car instead of driving

13:15

my car, right? And

13:18

for a while I was forced to, when

13:20

I worked in British broadcasting, to be honest.

13:23

I've stopped doing it because actually I

13:25

like to signal to people that

13:27

I am slightly different, that there is something,

13:29

you know, that I am what I am, that I'm

13:31

someone of a different heritage. So they

13:34

will ask, you know, where's your accent

13:36

from? And then I launch into the slightly

13:38

boring and lengthy making them wish they'd

13:40

never asked about Denmark, and

13:43

the Canadian teacher, and send all of that.

13:47

But then when I say, oh, well, I'm from Italy,

13:49

they go, oh, but I know that in a way

13:51

they're lying because it's not at all, right? You know,

13:53

they don't, they, no one has ever

13:56

guessed Italian without knowing that I

13:58

am Italian, which I think is interesting. What

14:00

do they normally guess? Can I ask? If

14:03

they can see me, I will get

14:05

a lot of like Brazilian, Argentinian or

14:07

Canadian, sometimes American but

14:10

Americans know I'm not American. So

14:12

if they can see me, and I know this is a

14:14

podcast, so let me give like the audio

14:16

description, I have a Mediterranean colouring,

14:19

right? All in skin, dark hair,

14:21

dark eyes and a

14:23

mannerism, which I think you could call, I don't know, so

14:27

then they would say that but I think people

14:29

are just genuinely confused. But

14:31

anyone who has an international background

14:34

will know, you know,

14:36

we don't found all of us who have

14:38

learned in different places and will have different

14:40

influences and you can't just put

14:42

us in a box. It just doesn't work.

14:45

Yeah. So you developed this kind

14:47

of international English with the sort

14:49

of imprints of the different influences

14:51

that you had in those formative

14:53

years, nine to 19 that you

14:55

talked about. And so there you

14:57

are, you're fluent to that

14:59

point, right? When you get to about the

15:02

age of 20 and you're looking at what

15:04

to do next, you went to the UK

15:06

and studied there. Was that the

15:09

next step? Yeah, well, I mean, you know,

15:11

all my studies were in English. And I

15:13

mean, this is going to annoy all the

15:15

younger listeners. But back in the day, UK

15:17

universities were free. And

15:19

also London is a very

15:21

instillist and incredibly appealing destination.

15:23

And you know, I left Italy when I was very

15:25

young. I love Italy, I always try to go back,

15:27

but I'm not going to pretend that when

15:29

I go to Italy, I fit in. I mean, I have

15:32

an accent in Italian as well. So Oh,

15:36

gosh, a regional Italian accent

15:38

or a sort of a foreign Italian accent?

15:40

A sort of foreign. Well, first of all,

15:42

I have linguistic issues with Italian in the

15:44

sense that I am much

15:46

more I have much more linguistic dexterity

15:48

in English because I've always used it

15:50

for work. So from the age of

15:52

nine, all my academic studies were

15:54

in English. I've seen the books I read

15:57

the friends I had, then obviously I did

15:59

uni in English. Then I started working as

16:01

a journalist. I also work in Italian as

16:03

a journalist. I actually write books and articles

16:06

in Italian as well as English. But

16:09

I could put it this way. I

16:11

could never write in Italian without having

16:13

an online Italian English dictionary open in

16:15

front of me. But I can write

16:17

in English without having the Italian English dictionary.

16:19

Just because that's fixed. So

16:25

what's your first language and are you

16:27

a native English speaker or non-native English

16:30

speaker and what does that term even

16:32

mean, native English speaker? So

16:34

I think second language English speaker and

16:36

native English speakers are almost, there's

16:39

almost a difference there as well. To me

16:41

native English speaker is, was

16:43

it either your mother tongue or

16:46

did you learn it as a child? So,

16:48

and to me really

16:50

is, do you remember a time when

16:52

you didn't speak English? And

16:54

to me, if you can't remember a time

16:56

when you couldn't speak English, as far as

16:58

I'm concerned you're a native speaker. He's like

17:01

my son for example. I'm raising him in

17:03

two languages, right? So you could argue first

17:05

six months of his life I tried to

17:07

only speak to him in Italian. Does that make

17:09

him a native Italian speaker? Of course not because

17:11

he was growing up in the UK and it's

17:14

his language. But he would be truly

17:16

native in two languages in a way

17:18

that I wasn't because he will never

17:20

remember not speaking Italian and

17:22

he will never remember not speaking English.

17:25

He will never remember having to learn how

17:28

to pronounce the th sound. But

17:30

I am very proud of my verse. Thank

17:33

you. I'm glad you're not. Thank you.

17:35

Thank you. I feel the ovation.

17:40

And so to me it's

17:42

native, but second language is

17:44

trickier because I mean certainly

17:46

English is my dominant language.

17:50

And has been for decades. And

17:53

it is it would be unfair

17:55

of me to pretend otherwise

17:58

also because. forgive the

18:00

arrogance, but I do get a lot of messages of

18:02

people saying, you know, their ambition is

18:04

to have an English like mine because they see me reading

18:06

the news and I have to be honest, you know, it's

18:09

been my dominant language since age

18:12

nine. Yeah. And

18:14

so, so it's my

18:16

second language, I'm not a native

18:18

speaker, but it is my dominant

18:20

language. And I use it for

18:22

work in a job where language

18:24

is everything. So you

18:26

know, it's sort of in between the kind

18:28

of the broad definitions

18:30

of the two things, native speaker

18:32

and non-native speaker, you sort of

18:35

don't quite fit into those basic

18:37

broad definitions. You're kind of somewhere in between

18:39

almost, although you have said that you don't

18:42

consider yourself to be a native speaker. But

18:45

yeah, it is your dominant language. You've worked on

18:47

your English though, as well as just sort of

18:49

learning it as part of your upbringing. You

18:52

have since actually had to work on

18:54

it in a focused and considered way,

18:56

right? Absolutely. In fact,

18:59

I've just remembered I should bring my

19:01

bone prop to show you, you know what a

19:03

bone prop is? A bone prop? Have you

19:05

ever heard of it? A bone prop is

19:07

something that you put between its

19:10

mouth exercises to sharpen your

19:12

diction. Right. Well, I've never heard

19:14

of it called a bone prop before. For me,

19:17

it was always just called a pen. Oh,

19:20

my goodness. Because

19:23

yes, every now and then I do get my learners

19:25

of English to put a pen between their teeth or

19:27

in their mouth or something like that to help

19:30

them practice their pronunciation. So yeah, tell us about it.

19:32

Tell us about it. It's called a bone prop. It's

19:35

a bone prop. I mean, it can be a pen. It can

19:37

be anything that's just, I don't know, an inch long that

19:39

you put between your teeth, right? Put

19:42

it here. And then you speak. And

19:44

because it makes it harder to speak, because

19:46

obviously your mouth is in a natural position, it

19:49

works out your tongue and it's meant to help with your

19:51

diction. I hope it does because I've been doing it for

19:53

years and I'll always try to do it. You

19:56

know, if I have time, I'll do when I read my

19:58

script before going on air. I

20:00

will read my scripts with a bone

20:02

propping. I'm sure a lot

20:04

of it is psychological at this point, but

20:07

I'll do that. So let me just go back

20:09

to how that came about. So look, I started

20:11

working, I came to the UK, did uni, then

20:14

I did a post-grad and journalism, and then I tried to get

20:17

jobs. And actually it went okay.

20:19

So whenever I talk about

20:21

language and some of the difficulties, I

20:23

just wanna make it very clear that

20:25

I don't put this in the discrimination

20:28

box. I don't think that I was treated

20:30

badly. I don't think it was because I'm foreign.

20:32

I mean, it was because I'm

20:34

foreign, but not because like, oh, we don't want

20:36

foreigners on air. I think

20:38

language, if you are a

20:41

broadcast journalist, I mean, it's your everything. And

20:44

you cannot compromise on

20:46

the clarity and the message. And

20:48

then if you become a TV presenter, because I

20:50

never had issues when I was a reporter, but

20:53

when you become a TV presenter, there's

20:56

so many different things that make audiences relate

20:58

to you. Language

21:00

is one of them, accent, it's

21:02

elements of trust, it's elements of feeling that

21:05

you're one of them, that you're their voice,

21:07

that you understand their problems. So I

21:09

just wanna make it very clear that this isn't

21:11

some woe is me, I was

21:13

treated so badly story. It's

21:16

just the reality, I think, of when you use language.

21:18

So anyway, so I was lucky. I started

21:20

getting jobs at the BBC and obviously before

21:22

or fair, but then I really wanted to

21:25

be on air. So I started doing, can

21:27

I do the weekend reporting shift and all

21:29

of that? And then

21:31

I started presenting, one

21:34

of the bosses said, look, it could work. And this

21:36

was BBC London. So for

21:38

people who don't know, BBC London is like, there's

21:41

the main six o'clock news in the UK

21:43

that the whole country tunes into, back

21:45

in the day when people would tune into a

21:47

TV program at 6pm. And

21:50

then, so 6 to 6.30 was

21:53

the national program, 6.30

21:55

to 7 was the regional program. So if

21:57

you're in Yorkshire, BBC Yorkshire, wherever you

21:59

want. and in London, it's BBC

22:01

London. And I started doing

22:03

that. Not the main 630 programme, but

22:05

I would do the other inject, either

22:08

during the day or actually the evening one

22:10

after the 10 o'clock news, which bizarrely gets

22:12

even more viewers. And

22:14

I think that's where the problems started.

22:16

Now look, I obviously wasn't, this is

22:18

a long time ago, I wasn't as polished, I think

22:20

I must have had that, you know, rabbit in the

22:22

headlights kind of look, cause you know, you always do

22:24

when you start. But

22:26

looking back, you know, you could

22:28

see, so I don't think I was

22:31

taken off air because they thought she's terrible. I

22:33

was taken off air because viewers started complaining.

22:37

And I

22:39

remember this one email that came into the BBC

22:41

Newsroom, cause you remember, this is like 2003, this

22:44

is before Facebook, right? So just

22:46

bear that in mind. So

22:48

people used to email in, and I'll never forget this

22:50

email that came in, and it said,

22:52

I don't pay my license fee to

22:55

have the news read by a foreigner. And

22:58

again, for those, oh, I know. You

23:01

know, now I laugh at the time, it was a

23:04

bit like, cause it tied in a lot

23:06

of insecurities. But you know, I get

23:09

what that person meant, and

23:12

I don't think that person was wrong, right?

23:16

I just, I don't think that

23:18

person was wrong. Because? Because

23:21

news is

23:23

about trust, and trust is

23:25

tribal. And what my

23:27

voice will tell you, specifically in the

23:29

UK, right? That

23:32

I am not of the tribe. My voice

23:34

will tell you, I mean, the one thing my

23:36

voice will tell you straight away, I was not

23:38

born in the UK. You

23:40

know that. That's the one thing that any

23:43

Brit can deduce the second they hear me.

23:46

And if you're doing something like a

23:48

news program, if you're presenting the news,

23:50

and you're talking about, you know, like

23:52

the probation and poverty, or, you know,

23:54

A&E waiting times, or not

23:56

being able to get an appointment with your

23:58

doctor, you know, these are all. schools

24:01

or old people's homes, these

24:03

are all really local issues actually.

24:06

And you need to feel, I think when

24:08

you're watching the news, that that person understands

24:10

you. It may be a lie because maybe the person reading

24:12

the news is quite cushy in their cushy,

24:14

well-paid job and actually has no idea what it's like

24:17

to be homeless. But

24:20

there has to be a sort of idea that they

24:22

can have the empathy with

24:24

certain situations. And

24:27

I think, you know, sounding foreign is

24:29

a barrier and it's not anybody's fault.

24:32

I don't think, look, that comment really hurts. I'm not going

24:34

to sit here and pretend it was like, you know, the

24:36

best time of my life ever. But

24:41

nor do I think, you know, I don't think that

24:43

person was racist or anything like that. I think that

24:46

person had a point, maybe put

24:48

it in quite a brutal way, that had

24:50

a point. So anyway, so the BBC take

24:52

me off there, quite unceremoniously. The one thing

24:54

that annoys me is that it's London. I

24:57

do think London has a different dynamic, but

24:59

we're just going to gloss over that.

25:01

Yeah, because you would maybe hope that

25:03

London was a bit more metropolitan and

25:06

cosmopolitan and that people wouldn't have that

25:08

kind of view. But

25:12

then London, it includes many other areas

25:14

around London. It's not just sort of

25:17

like central London, which is

25:19

probably the really chorus

25:21

cosmopolitan place. It's also

25:23

lots of other sort of more suburban

25:26

areas too. And

25:28

bear in mind, this is 2003, right? I

25:33

think now the recent the

25:36

recent recent census has

25:38

London at 40% foreign

25:40

born for zero. Wow. And

25:43

again, foreign born, not ethnic

25:45

minorities, not minority religions, you

25:47

know, we have to be careful, you know,

25:49

we can't just mix everything in one. There's

25:51

a lot of overlap, but this is

25:53

foreign born. Now many of them will have come

25:56

as children. So they will sound British, but you

25:58

know, it's kind of funny. So that

26:00

happens and I'm like, oh, boo. So I started looking

26:02

for jobs elsewhere. And I actually blessed

26:04

them Skye, well not blessed them to me,

26:06

thank you. But Skye hired me as a

26:09

junior reporter. And they

26:11

were very clear, they're like, look, we

26:13

wanna train you up, but we

26:15

see you in foreign positions, which

26:17

is great. I mean, I did,

26:19

I did the desk of Pope John Paul II, then

26:22

from that to the Michael Jackson trial, which

26:24

was a very funny juxtaposition of stories

26:26

from the Vatican to Hollywood.

26:30

And then from there, I get spotted by the

26:33

then head of Channel Five, and

26:35

they were looking for a presenter and he said, look, I've seen

26:37

some of your stuff. I think you are a

26:39

presenter. Why don't you come and present on

26:41

Channel Five News? I'm like,

26:44

amazing. And I do that.

26:46

And then at that point, we're national, right?

26:48

Channel Five is national. So listeners, at

26:50

this point in the story,

26:53

Channel Five, 2003, 2004,

26:55

right? So

26:58

this is, by this point, because I've done a couple of years as a

27:00

reporter at Skye, so this is 2005. Okay,

27:03

so we're in the region, in the

27:05

period when there were quite a lot

27:08

of channels, if you had a free view box,

27:10

which was like a kind of a digital box,

27:12

I think, that you could, that you would connect

27:15

to your TV, but still many

27:17

homes around the country still basically

27:19

had just five channels, five

27:23

well-established TV channels, and a bunch of extras, if you

27:25

could sort of like connect a box to your TV,

27:28

or if you had a fancy new TV that had

27:30

it in built. So five

27:33

channels, BBC One, BBC Two, then

27:35

ITV and Channel Four, those

27:40

two were the commercial channels, but still sort of

27:42

part of the sort

27:44

of national broadcasting sort of network, still

27:46

kind of- Public service.

27:49

Still part of the public service broadcasting system.

27:52

And then a fifth channel, Channel Five, which

27:54

at that time, when you were contacted by

27:57

them, was still fairly new. That was about

27:59

a year old. old. Yeah, it's not,

28:01

you're not 10 years old nearly, because

28:03

they launched in 97, you know, famously

28:06

in front of the desk. Yeah,

28:08

sit down, we stood up. Yeah,

28:11

okay. Just that little bit more

28:13

informal. But but the

28:15

point is, yeah, it was a national

28:17

TV channel, and their news was national

28:19

news. So it was broadcast around the

28:22

whole country. Yeah. And at

28:24

Pee-Pine, it was the six o'clock, well, a

28:26

channel five, it was five. But so the

28:28

evening news, you know, the one that you'd

28:31

watch when you came home from work, was

28:33

BBC one at six, ITV

28:36

channel four, channel five. So actually,

28:38

there were four, you know,

28:40

primetime news programs in

28:43

the early evening, and I would present one

28:45

of them. So actually, it was, you

28:47

know, when I look back, it

28:49

was it was quite a big deal. And it

28:52

didn't work there either. So after

28:55

about three months, I get called in by the

28:57

boss. And again, I like it when people are

28:59

honest. And he said, Look, Barbara, you know, a

29:02

third of the viewers don't really care about your

29:04

accent. A third of the viewers think

29:06

you know, it's kind of like cool and different,

29:08

or maybe you know, cosmopolitan, whatever, and he said,

29:10

but a third of viewers really

29:12

object to it. And they and it's

29:14

a barrier. And he was honest, and he said, I cannot

29:17

have a primetime

29:19

presenter that assertive the

29:21

that assertive the viewers feel

29:23

alienated by. I mean, ultimately, that's

29:25

what it is. He was kind enough not to

29:28

use those words for which I'm grateful. But

29:30

that's what it was. Yeah. And so this is

29:32

just, and at this point, I'm like, Oh, you

29:34

know, I kind of like I've seen the pattern,

29:36

you can only bang your head against the wall

29:39

so many times. And by the way, in the

29:41

middle of all of this, at Sky News, when

29:43

I was reporting, that's when I started the voice

29:45

training. Because even with reporting, in

29:48

the first three months, at one point, again, I

29:50

was called into an office and said, Look, I

29:52

listen to you, I hear CNN, I

29:54

don't hear Sky News. And that was the boss. And

29:57

I said, Well, no one ever said anything. And I can

30:00

and change it and he said, I don't think

30:02

people can change their accents and I did the

30:04

whole like, let me try and he did let

30:06

me try. He gave in a lot of drama

30:08

in all of this and he

30:10

did let me try and they sent

30:12

me to a voice coach, a wonderful woman

30:14

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30:17

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31:29

And so we did a lot of voice coaching and

31:33

she did two things. She made me

31:36

sound clearer. She gave

31:38

me better tempo, better use

31:40

of my diaphragm, so I don't

31:42

run out of breath. Also

31:45

knowing how to control. Because when you're on

31:47

air, you get a lot of adrenaline, which

31:49

is the worst thing that should happen when

31:51

actually you just need to sit there and feel

31:54

really relaxed and chill.

31:56

Then, oh, let me bring you the news.

31:58

But actually the adrenaline It's often,

32:00

you know, makes your vocal cord shrink,

32:03

just all sorts of things. And so she taught

32:05

me a lot of that, which is just basic

32:08

broadcasting, basic speaking,

32:10

actually. So she's the one that taught me

32:12

how to use the bone prop. We did

32:14

a lot of tongue twisters. I

32:16

mean, I still do them now. I

32:19

like Lily, little Lily Lee. I

32:21

like Lily, Lily likes me. Lily

32:23

likes lollipops, lemonade and lime drops.

32:26

Or what to do to die today

32:28

at a minute or two to

32:30

two. I think distinctly harder to

32:32

say, ah, yes, I messed it up there

32:35

and harder to do. So the Ls,

32:37

the Ts, she really listened to what

32:40

was, she used to call

32:42

it flabby in my voice. And she

32:44

sharpened all of that. And

32:46

then she also tried to knock the

32:48

dreaded retroflexes R. What

32:51

is that then? So I'm

32:54

driving my car. Car.

32:58

I'm driving my car. You

33:00

know, car, car, car.

33:05

Yeah, it's that it and I mean,

33:07

listen, it's the bending of the R backwards.

33:09

So my name is in Italian,

33:12

Barbara Serra, or

33:14

Barbara Serra, or Barbara

33:17

Serra. The

33:19

Italian one first. Yeah.

33:23

Yeah. Yeah. And the American was like

33:25

Barbara. Right. But you

33:27

say American, but a lot of people think

33:29

I'm Scottish, because the Scots

33:31

said the R. The West of

33:33

England has the R. I mean, Crikey,

33:35

Devon, Cornwall. Right. You're a Donian,

33:37

Devon, oh, Barbara. So I speak to that Barbara

33:40

Serra again. A little

33:42

bit. The Irish. Yeah.

33:44

Yeah, of course. Yeah. Most people, to be honest, most people

33:46

in the world, it's just, you know,

33:49

it's just the English who were like, no, we will

33:51

not pronounce our R's. Don't care how many other people

33:53

are doing it. But

33:55

it is actually the thing that I

33:58

think the rest of my speech. speech pattern actually

34:00

is quite British. I mean, I

34:03

joke about the UK not having had any imprint

34:05

on my voice, but that's not true. I think

34:07

the speech patterns I use, the expressions I

34:09

use, often

34:12

it depends, but the vowels, the

34:14

way that I use, I don't

34:16

Americanise that much. But the

34:19

R was so difficult for

34:21

me. That's the one thing

34:23

that just made me sound unnatural

34:25

and unauthentic. And they sort

34:27

of really wanted me to do that at Sky.

34:30

And again, this is Sky a long time ago.

34:32

I'm back at Sky now. I mean, they seem

34:34

happy. So they seem happy with the way

34:37

I sound, but at the time there was a problem. So

34:40

it was going from saying car

34:43

to saying car. It

34:46

was that change, right? So you didn't

34:48

have the Rotic Italian R

34:51

at all. It was just

34:53

a slightly, as you said,

34:55

retroflexive R. So R,

34:57

teacher. Yeah, teacher.

34:59

I'm a broadcaster. I'm a

35:01

broadcaster. And I

35:07

can do it. It

35:10

just feels fake. It

35:12

feels fake to me. It's also a lot of

35:14

work. And actors

35:16

change their accents all the time. Greater

35:20

or lesser, extensive success, but they do.

35:22

But I think it's different if you

35:24

are either on stage, playing the same

35:26

lines night after night, or

35:29

if you are on a film

35:31

where you can do it a million times,

35:33

you can have different takes. I do live

35:35

TV news. Very

35:38

often, if there's any breaking news, forget

35:40

the author queue. It's just me. And

35:43

I'm often talking about things that I don't know anything

35:45

about. I mean, not being funny, but when COVID broke,

35:47

I didn't know the difference. You have pandemic and an

35:49

epidemic, you know, so you're just being unleashed

35:51

on things you don't really, you know,

35:53

the you're kind of briefing yourself on.

35:57

And I do everything in a second language. And I do

35:59

think that by lingua brain is different to

36:01

the monolingual brain. To add

36:03

that are, and so what, Luke, am

36:05

I going to pretend to be what from the

36:07

home counties? Is anyone going to go, Oh, Babs,

36:09

if she asks for Cambridge, I can't quite tell.

36:12

I mean, you know, who am

36:14

I schooling? And so when

36:17

I then left British broadcasting, because

36:20

when when Channel 5 also didn't work, I could have

36:22

gone back to Sky as a reporter. And they, you

36:24

know, they've always been great. I'm gonna say, if

36:27

there was one network that really invested

36:29

in me, and understood the diversity of

36:31

this issue, way back then, it was

36:33

Sky News. I have to say that, you

36:36

know, it's interesting. Yeah, I mean,

36:38

and then they couldn't they couldn't pretend there weren't

36:40

issues, and they didn't do that. But

36:42

they gave me a chance. But

36:44

then I decided to kind of go into

36:46

international news, and went to Al Jazeera.

36:50

Al Jazeera English Office, they speak

36:52

Arabic, and there I slowly reclaimed

36:54

my my R. And then I think

36:56

it took me about a year and a half. And

36:58

one day I just woke up like, Why am I

37:00

bothering? I'm on an international Arab channel, like no

37:02

one's gonna go, Oh, wait. But

37:05

internationally, the British accent still has

37:07

an extra cloud. So there were

37:09

reasons. What's interesting about there's

37:11

many things interesting about this. But one of the

37:13

things that's interesting about this is the let's say

37:16

the context in which you were

37:18

trying to use English,

37:21

right? What was it that that

37:23

context defined what

37:27

you were trying to do with your accent? Right,

37:29

so the

37:32

context is everything. So I'm just thinking of my listeners

37:34

who are just sort of on

37:36

a similar journey, you know, they're on a

37:38

journey to improve their English as far as

37:40

they can get it. And they might be

37:42

facing decisions about what they should be doing

37:45

about their accent, you know,

37:47

and what, to what extent

37:49

should they be emulating

37:51

a British accent? To what extent should

37:53

they be trying to remove the influence

37:55

of their first language on on English?

37:57

And what is their target accent? Now

38:00

for you, in that period,

38:03

it was trying to sound British in

38:05

order to be accepted by a British

38:08

audience. Accepted by a British audience, exactly,

38:10

because as you said, it's a tribal

38:12

thing. They want to hear their news

38:14

being given to them in their voice.

38:18

So it was that context that really made

38:20

you push your English into a British

38:22

direction. But then when you move

38:25

into international news, that wasn't

38:27

really necessary anymore. And

38:29

you could speak with that retroflexive R,

38:32

because it's international news and global English

38:34

is less important. That specific

38:36

British accent is less important, even though,

38:39

as you say, having a British accent

38:41

does give you that extra bit of

38:43

clout, that extra bit of status or

38:46

something. But that's just

38:48

interesting, that context and the purpose that

38:51

you're using English for is a

38:53

big factor in the

38:56

decision that you take about how

38:58

to develop your accent, right? Yeah,

39:02

I'm going to, I mean, it's interesting to

39:04

use status. I think the word used was

39:06

status just now. I call it privilege. Like

39:08

to me, speaking English in

39:10

whichever way is a

39:12

privilege. It's about one and a half billion people in

39:14

the world that speak it. I think a billion speak

39:17

it as a second, third or whatever language. There's a

39:19

reason why we all learn it. I

39:21

would not have my career if I

39:23

didn't speak English. Speaking English is like

39:26

having the key to the interconnected global

39:28

world. But then there's a hierarchy.

39:31

Not all accents are created equal. And

39:33

even to the British or American era,

39:35

there's certain accents, foreign accents. I hate

39:38

to say this, that are more comical

39:40

than others, that

39:42

are often ridiculed more. And

39:45

I think even in the hierarchy of native

39:48

English accents, the

39:50

sort of posh, but not too

39:52

posh, southern England accent is at

39:54

the very top. The way that

39:56

you speak, Luke, and I mean,

39:58

I don't know. I think you sound

40:01

strange to say, I think you have a

40:03

beautiful voice, but you do. Because

40:05

it's clear and because it's almost like

40:08

the template, you know, that is the

40:10

clear. Look at it this way. British

40:13

accents are accepted in

40:15

the States in news, but

40:18

actually American accents are very,

40:21

very rarely accepted in news

40:23

in the UK. There's something

40:25

about the British accent that to me is

40:28

the one that has the most authority. I'm

40:30

not getting into the historical reasons or, you

40:32

know, is it right? Is it wrong? You

40:35

know, I could never deal with those issues. I have to

40:37

be practical in my career. So

40:39

to me, that context still

40:43

exists. But the advice that I

40:45

would give to people is, you know,

40:47

all these people go, I want to sound English, I want to

40:49

sound British. I hate to be

40:51

the one to tell you this, but chances

40:53

are you will never sound British or American

40:55

or Australian or Canadian. You're going to sound like

40:57

a version of what you are. And

41:00

you're going to keep the accent

41:02

that makes you you. And in

41:04

these days of diversity, of authenticity,

41:06

of be yourself, why are any

41:09

of us trying to

41:11

be something that we are not?

41:14

No, clarity. That's

41:16

a non-negotiable. So I

41:18

think it's a tricky balance between sounding

41:20

like yourself. But the bottom line is

41:22

there is a correct way of pronouncing

41:24

English, right? Which I suspect is why

41:27

so many listeners

41:29

tune into you because they know

41:31

they'll get that. So

41:34

I think it's great to get

41:37

the correct pronunciation and maybe try and get

41:39

the flow and the expressions. But

41:42

don't drive yourself nuts trying to sound

41:44

like something that you will never be

41:46

because it's not what you are. Sorry,

41:49

I'm going to... It's all

41:52

about having an international conversation. I work

41:54

in news. We need

41:56

a variety of voices. Don't

41:58

talk to me about diversity. everybody sounds

42:00

the same. You know, and the way

42:03

that you know, I found the way I sound, yeah, it's mixed

42:05

up. But you can tell that I

42:07

started studying in English young. So what

42:09

does that mean? That the literature I

42:11

studied was from the anglophone world, that

42:14

the history I studied was from an

42:16

anglophone lens, you know, everything, even geography

42:18

was and it sounds crazy, but actually, there's still

42:20

a point of view that you can take and

42:23

study in geography, history of art,

42:25

history of music, everything was

42:27

done from the cultural anglophone lens.

42:30

Nothing wrong with it, but there's more ways

42:32

to look at the world. And so diverse

42:34

voices are, I think, essential.

42:37

So accept your accent for what it

42:40

is and let it, you know, just

42:42

let it tell the story of who

42:44

you are. But working on

42:46

clarity is a very

42:48

important thing because, I mean,

42:50

you know, it always comes down to

42:53

intelligibility and identity, right? So these are

42:55

the two factors really in pronunciation. And

42:58

the identity issue is all the things you've

43:00

been talking about. But then

43:02

ultimately, intelligibility has got to be the

43:05

thing to focus on. And so that's probably got to

43:07

be the measure of success

43:09

in terms of accent, if you're

43:11

trying to improve it, just get

43:14

to the point where people understand exactly what

43:16

you're saying when you're saying it. And

43:19

so, I mean, like what you did, you

43:22

were able to work with

43:24

someone who identified the areas

43:27

where perhaps there was some lack of

43:29

clarity. She called it flabby,

43:32

moments where your English was being flabby,

43:34

where it wasn't kind of clear. And

43:38

so identifying those things and then focusing on

43:40

those things can

43:42

be a very important way of improving

43:44

your clarity. But yeah, it's very unrealistic

43:46

to imagine you can completely eradicate any

43:48

trace of your accent. It's

43:51

very unlikely to happen. know,

44:00

I just, there's a lot

44:02

of sort of English courses where people almost

44:04

pretend like I've seen a lot of ads

44:06

where it's like, sound British in six weeks. Oh,

44:09

of course. People are not honest about that. No, there's

44:11

there's a whole level

44:13

of sort of, how

44:16

can I put it without it

44:18

being inappropriate, I suppose. It's

44:21

kind of like exploitative advertising

44:23

and marketing, because

44:26

there's a huge need, a huge demand

44:28

for, you know, people

44:30

learning English know that they need to

44:32

improve their English, they know they need

44:34

to improve their accent, their

44:36

pronunciation. And so they decide, everyone's

44:40

got it in their head that they have

44:42

to speak like a native speaker, be it

44:44

a British person or an American person. You

44:46

know, they think that's the goal, but it's

44:48

actually not that realistic. And yet there is

44:50

a very, very strong demand for it. So

44:53

naturally, people are selling to that demand, you

44:55

know, that's the way that these things work,

44:57

right? So people are selling this idea that,

44:59

you know, speak with a British accent, blah,

45:01

blah, blah, speak with an American accent, take

45:03

my course and so on. But what would

45:05

be more fair would be to sell a

45:08

course that promises to

45:10

help people speak with more clarity.

45:13

This is where I'm gonna say that I have an online course.

45:15

But as far as I don't teach, mine is

45:18

more like the cultural mind is more for people that

45:20

speak English really well, you know, like training journalists. But

45:22

I'll tell you one thing, Luke, and

45:24

with respect that maybe you and

45:26

native speakers like you will never

45:28

understand how embarrassing

45:30

it can be. You know, no, I

45:33

know, I can't, I try and speak French.

45:35

But you like to forgive

45:37

the English people are always forgiven, you

45:39

know, like any English person. So this is it

45:41

when I am on air in Italy, because I

45:43

do a lot of journalism in Italy as well. Yeah,

45:46

when I'm on air in Italy, and

45:48

I make like grammatical errors, or I,

45:50

you know, have very anglicized pronunciation, that's

45:53

almost a plus, you know, because that's

45:56

almost like a seal of like, oh, she is

45:58

so cosmopolitan. at

46:00

Babs, a citizen of the world.

46:02

And it is the total opposite

46:04

when I make mistakes in English,

46:07

right? Because English is the privileged

46:09

language, right? So there

46:11

is an embarrassment to making

46:14

mistakes in English, which can happen

46:16

to you know, incredibly senior accomplished,

46:19

very successful people, you know, CEOs of

46:21

big companies. And so there's

46:23

that insecurity that people have, and

46:25

that frustration where you know that actually

46:27

in your native language, you're amazing, because

46:30

you know, you'll have accomplished whatever. And

46:33

then you're totally penalizing yourself by having,

46:35

you know, for example, giving an interview

46:37

in English, I totally understand why so

46:40

many politicians, not from the anglophone world,

46:43

refuse to give interviews in English, because

46:45

it's like, you know,

46:47

you're doing with your hands pied, unless you

46:49

have a fantastic English. And

46:51

so to me, it's that it's the embarrassment.

46:54

The one advice that I would give, I

46:56

would say, first of all, that it's personal,

46:58

and it depends on your background. So for

47:00

example, I knew going back to the retroflex

47:02

of R, that when I can make the

47:05

sound that is to

47:07

go from to was

47:10

just not something that was necessarily going to

47:13

make my life easier to go from

47:16

to car easier. And

47:19

so I made my life easier, you

47:21

know, it's just easier for me to keep

47:23

the R and if people think I'm

47:25

Scottish, or Irish, or American,

47:28

or Canadian, you know what, so

47:30

be it. So I think for

47:32

everyone, it's different. Look, anyone who

47:34

can afford personalized evolution, it's

47:37

not cheap, but it's great. My

47:39

one advice, though, go in

47:41

and tell the teacher what you want,

47:43

because otherwise they will do a cookie cutter version,

47:45

where they kind of try to make everybody sound

47:48

the same. So you could just go in

47:50

and say, Listen, listen to me speak,

47:53

what are my weaknesses? So my weakness was

47:55

the L it was weird, it was the

47:57

T because I would say I'm getting on

47:59

the shoot. and not I'm getting on the tube,

48:01

right? Chomp, cough, right?

48:04

And actually English people say tube the

48:06

whole time. Yeah, exactly, yeah. It's fine

48:08

for them. But with me, it impaired

48:10

clarity, right? So having

48:13

one-on-one, if you have the kind of

48:15

job where this really matters, and if

48:17

you feel that this is a stumbling block for

48:19

you, then go for a location,

48:22

right? If you can afford it, why not? But

48:24

my advice would be, be clear with

48:26

what you want and what you don't

48:29

want. My advice would be you want to be a

48:31

clearer, more effective, more

48:34

confident communicator. You

48:36

do not necessarily want to try to pretend

48:38

to be something that you're not and never

48:40

will be, and quite frankly, shouldn't really try

48:42

to be, you know? That

48:44

would be my advice, I guess. Mm-hmm,

48:48

very good. Okay, now

48:52

what? I mean. I don't know. Now

48:57

we can get into the, you know,

48:59

I have this newsletter, News of the Fine Accent. Yeah,

49:02

yeah, tell us about your news. Go ahead, tell

49:04

us about your newsletter and your course as well. I'd

49:07

be really interested to know what your

49:09

listeners think of this, because I have

49:11

this theory, or something sort of like

49:13

opinion I formed, that

49:15

there's no such thing as international news. People

49:18

always go, oh, in the international media,

49:21

there's English language news, right? I mean,

49:23

around the world, it's slightly different, but

49:25

certainly in the kind of like West,

49:27

and I mean outside of the UK,

49:29

or even like in the Middle East

49:31

or Africa, if you ask, okay, international

49:33

news. I mean, most people would think

49:35

CNN. I think they'd think the

49:37

BBC with the World Service. I think

49:39

they'd think the New York Times, the

49:41

Guardian, the Economist, DFT,

49:45

right? Now, what do they all have

49:47

in common? Their English

49:49

language, but actually, what do

49:51

they all have in common? Well, they're British

49:53

and American, right? And

49:56

so even a network like CNN will

49:58

have CNN domestic in the US. And then it

50:00

has CNN International. Now, I started as an intern

50:02

at CNN International. So I know I worked

50:04

for other networks, but I mean, I have

50:07

all the respect in the world for, you know, who they

50:09

were, what they've become, you know, they did with the template,

50:11

right? But the

50:13

mothership is American. The

50:16

bosses care about the American channel. Same thing

50:18

with the BBC. I mean, the BBC's world

50:21

service is a powerhouse,

50:23

you know, I mean, it's everywhere

50:25

in the world. Does a

50:27

lot of good. I mean, it's financed in a

50:29

slightly different way to the licensee, but the BBC

50:31

has always had a massive international footprint.

50:34

Ultimately, the BBC is the national

50:37

broadcaster in the UK, financed by

50:39

the licensee. This matters.

50:41

This matters in the people that

50:43

they choose, for example, to be

50:45

their big presenters, because you could

50:48

have someone that presents on

50:50

national BBC, and then also presents

50:53

on the world service. You

50:55

would not have a foreign sounding

50:58

world service presenter, as

51:00

easily just jump into national news, right?

51:03

And because national news is always what's

51:05

important, the bosses, and again,

51:07

this isn't malice, this isn't discriminate, this is

51:10

just the way it is linguistically, are

51:13

going to push and create stars or

51:15

they, you know, create the faces every

51:18

channel needs their faces, right? It

51:20

takes the pool that they can also use

51:23

domestically. And it's

51:25

the same everywhere. And to me, that

51:27

changes the international

51:30

narrative. I mean, the anglophone footprint

51:32

on it is enormous. So I know that people,

51:34

you know, I worked at Al Jazeera for a

51:36

long time. So believe you me, I know about

51:38

I don't want to get

51:40

into that, you know, colonialism in news and different

51:42

narratives, etc, etc. But

51:45

a lot of it is just simply

51:47

linguistic. You

51:50

know what I mean? Like, yeah, yeah, yeah. So you

51:52

mean, the kind of

51:55

perspective of

51:57

these news channels, most of them being

52:00

from the UK or USA,

52:02

that worldview expresses

52:04

itself through an accent

52:07

or a type of language. No,

52:10

I think it's the stories. It's the

52:12

slant. So for example, I

52:14

mean, you know, and look, I think all these organizations

52:17

are also trying to push diversity. But

52:20

again, they look at diversity from a

52:22

national point of view. Right. So in

52:24

the UK, we have, you know, sizable

52:26

ethnic minorities, even those words, you know,

52:28

there's a lot of overlap, you know,

52:30

religion can overlap with ethnicity. There's people

52:33

that are first generation, others that are

52:35

third generation, but you know, in the

52:37

UK, certainly a broadcaster like the BBC

52:39

and all others try to reflect that.

52:42

And so in turn, that would reflect

52:45

their international output, but you are still

52:47

reflecting something that is national. And,

52:50

you know, I mean, I am Italian,

52:52

yes. Am I your average Italian? No.

52:55

Right. And you can say the same for

52:58

anyone who's here, oh, you know, that has

53:00

more than one heritage. Ultimately,

53:02

we've all been brought up, educated

53:05

in and live in the Anglophone world that

53:07

is absurd to think it hasn't affected us.

53:10

And affected us even sounds, you know, again, I

53:12

don't think that this is done on purpose. I

53:14

just think in news,

53:16

in journalism, you cannot negotiate

53:20

or compromise on the linguistic

53:22

level, you cannot hire someone

53:24

who does not have perfect command

53:26

of English, because you know,

53:28

you have to use language, you know,

53:30

writing a headline for the Sun newspaper

53:33

is actually one of the hardest things that you can do. You have

53:35

to take complex story, and you have to

53:38

turn it into simplistic, I don't mean

53:40

in a negative way, I mean, it actually in I admire

53:43

it way, um, simplistic language

53:45

that is correct, and

53:47

you know, hits home and makes people buy the paper. And

53:49

there needs to be a joke in there

53:52

too, if it's the Sun. Upon, upon if

53:54

possible, usually. Yeah. Yeah. So

53:56

what's your newsletter again? Oh, news

53:59

with a foreign accent. I've kept it very

54:01

much like does what it says on the tin. So

54:03

it's on self stack news with a foreign accent.

54:05

I think so a lot of it is linguistic

54:07

and then a lot of it is how

54:09

language affects culture

54:12

and the way we see things. So I do a

54:14

lot of work on neo-fascism and of

54:16

Italian heritage. Obviously Italians have, you

54:18

know, sort of created the word fascism. So

54:20

I look at things, and it's funny that

54:23

you have a different final opinion

54:25

on fashion, that's not it, but

54:27

just the different approaches from

54:29

people's different, you know, national experiences.

54:31

So that's the newsletter. And

54:34

my course though, which is very much, I mean, if

54:36

you go and find me on Instagram, you'll find

54:38

it, but my course launches in April, I sort of

54:40

open it twice a year. This is the second

54:42

time I'll ever open it. It's been

54:45

very interesting. It's aimed at

54:47

people who speak English really well, but it's

54:49

the cultural thing. And it reaffirmed

54:51

how people are really embarrassed because one

54:53

of the things I offered in my

54:55

course, one of the options was

54:58

group sessions. And

55:01

so like individual sessions, group sessions, or

55:03

just the online thing, people went for

55:05

individual sessions, which obviously were more expensive,

55:07

or just yet, no one

55:09

went for the group session because

55:11

I think people feel it's

55:14

embarrassing, you know, and you feel quite

55:16

exposed. So that was quite

55:18

interesting. Okay.

55:20

Well, so people can find you

55:23

on Instagram. Yeah,

55:25

Barbara Sarah Journalist. Barbara

55:29

Sarah Journalist on Instagram. And I'll put links

55:31

in the description as well for the Substack

55:33

newsletter and the course as well. But

55:36

very interesting to talk to you, Barbara,

55:38

and to hear about your story and

55:40

all the sort of kind

55:42

of interesting linguistic and cultural things

55:45

that that makes us think of. So

55:48

great. And you're on Sky News. What is it every

55:50

evening? No, no, not at all on

55:52

freelance because I do a lot of other things. But

55:55

Sky News is sort of my news home, right? So,

55:57

so yeah, so I tend to do the evenings, tend

55:59

to. midnight, often weekends

56:02

with the paper review. So

56:04

if you tune in and you go, where does that woman

56:06

come from, then you'll know it's me.

56:09

So yeah. Okay,

56:13

fantastic. All right. Lovely. Have a

56:15

fantastic day in London. It's

56:18

been a real pleasure, I have to say, to

56:20

be able to get into these issues, which, you

56:23

know, mean a lot to me and, yeah,

56:25

and I think affected me as they do

56:27

so many other people. So thank you. So

56:34

that was Barbara Serra. Thanks again to Barbara for

56:37

being involved in this episode. And what

56:40

an interesting guest, what interesting things she

56:42

was able to talk about relating to

56:44

her experiences and her kind of status

56:47

as an English speaker, not

56:49

quite a native speaker, but also not

56:52

someone who speaks English as a second language.

56:55

She has that sort of distinctive accent,

56:57

which is certainly clear, absolutely,

57:00

but it does place her in certain sort

57:04

of region outside the UK some somehow.

57:06

Just very interesting to hear her talking about the

57:08

pragmatics of what that means in

57:11

her particular industry of

57:13

reading the news and what it was

57:15

like for her to read the news

57:17

on the UK on UK TV in

57:19

front of a British audience and seeing their

57:22

responses and stuff. Very interesting stuff. And as

57:24

I said before, links are in the description

57:26

for Barbara's website and her email list and

57:28

so on. Thanks again to Barbara. That was

57:31

really good. I really enjoyed that. And

57:33

I hope you did too. You can always leave your

57:35

comments in the comment section. What did

57:37

it make you think of? What were some

57:40

of the sort of thoughts, conclusions, realizations

57:42

that you had during this episode? Where

57:44

do you stand on the whole question

57:46

of accent and

57:48

the sort of accent that you should be trying to

57:50

learn? To

57:53

an extent, it depends on the context

57:55

in which you'll be using English. Anyway, leave your

57:57

comments. I'm always interested to know what you have

57:59

to say. about these things. So

58:02

a few other announcements. I announced

58:04

the LEP meetup, which is

58:06

going to happen in Da Nang in

58:08

Vietnam on the when? I can't

58:11

remember now. On the

58:13

17th of May from 9pm at

58:15

Gordon's Pizza in the Anh

58:17

Thuong area of Da Nang with Zdenik, you can

58:19

just email Zdenik if

58:22

you are interested in going, [email protected]. I've

58:24

got a couple of other little announcements

58:27

to make. First of all, so

58:30

my podcast host is called Acast.

58:33

A podcast host is basically the sort

58:35

of the service, the website that you

58:38

use if you are a podcaster. So

58:41

I log into Acast. I upload my

58:43

episodes into Acast and add all the

58:45

details like the show notes and the

58:47

title and so on. And

58:49

then Acast publish my

58:51

podcast on the internet and it's

58:54

captured by all these different pod

58:56

catchers, you know, things like Apple

58:58

Podcasts on your phone or Pocket

59:00

Casts on your phone or Spotify

59:02

or some other service will catch

59:04

the stuff that I publish through

59:07

Acast. But all my files are

59:09

hosted at Acast and they provide

59:11

that publishing service for me. They

59:13

are also responsible for my premium

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content on Acast Plus. If

59:18

you are an Acast Plus member, just

59:20

sign into your account in order to

59:22

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59:25

to my premium podcast on one of

59:27

these other platforms, not Spotify because it's

59:29

not a normal podcasting app. And to

59:31

do that, you just go to teacherluke.co.uk

59:35

slash account to

59:37

sign into your Acast Plus account where

59:39

you can manage your premium subscription. So

59:43

Acast is my host and they've

59:45

actually prepared a global English

59:47

language survey to

59:50

help inform me as a podcaster and

59:52

also Acast as a sort of planning

59:54

publishing entity

59:57

that it is to inform us about

59:59

you. the audience, okay? It's

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a very quick survey done using

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quick type form survey and basically we just

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want to know about your listening habits, how

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you discovered the podcast, other

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bits and pieces, just generally to improve

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our understanding of who my audience really

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are, so to improve

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the service and just to get a better understanding

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of exactly who I'm talking to. The more information

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that we have like this, the more able I

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am to kind of picture who I've got in

1:00:28

sort of listening to me out there in podcast

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land. A

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few minutes of questions, it can really help ACARs, it

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can really help me. It's

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If you're interested in taking the survey, you'll find

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when I say OPP, this is a sort

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people's podcasts, so every now

1:01:14

and then I get invited on other people's

1:01:16

podcasts to talk about, you know,

1:01:19

whatever it is the other podcast hosts would

1:01:21

like to ask me about and I've,

1:01:23

you know, I've been on other

1:01:25

people's podcasts a lot, you know, you may

1:01:27

have heard or noticed my appearances on other

1:01:30

people's shows, I was on Allie as English

1:01:32

not long ago, talking about American

1:01:34

and British English and other

1:01:36

different podcast channels and so

1:01:38

fairly recently I was

1:01:40

interviewed by Alistair Budge on

1:01:43

his show which is called English Learning for

1:01:45

Curious Minds. Actually, I think the

1:01:47

interview wasn't published on the podcast but it

1:01:49

was published on his YouTube channel

1:01:52

where he also publishes episodes

1:01:54

of English Learning for Curious Minds.

1:01:57

That YouTube channel is called Leonardo English.

1:02:00

So I was interviewed by Alistair on

1:02:02

Leonardo English and he asked me all

1:02:05

about living in Paris and what

1:02:07

it's really like to live in Paris and

1:02:09

all of the ins and outs, all the

1:02:11

cultural aspects of that. And

1:02:13

the episode is called An Englishman in Paris. You'll

1:02:16

find a link to it on the page for this episode

1:02:18

on my website. I might

1:02:20

as well just put a link in the description as well in

1:02:22

the episode show notes. So Alistair Budge

1:02:24

interviewing me about being an Englishman in Paris,

1:02:27

you can listen to that on his show.

1:02:30

Also Elena Mutunono, who

1:02:32

was a guest on

1:02:34

this podcast a few episodes ago, talking

1:02:37

about her work as an English teacher and then

1:02:39

a teacher trainer and then a sort of a

1:02:41

kind of guru for

1:02:44

teachers who are looking to bring their

1:02:47

work online and to create courses

1:02:49

and attract clients and

1:02:51

so on. So Elena Mutunono has

1:02:54

her own podcast where she talks

1:02:56

to English teachers about various aspects of

1:02:58

the sort of the work and the

1:03:00

business of being an English teacher, especially

1:03:02

in the online arena. Her

1:03:05

podcast is called Online Bound with

1:03:08

Elena Mutunono and she

1:03:11

interviewed me for an episode of that

1:03:13

and she asked me lots of searching

1:03:15

questions all about the sort of the

1:03:17

trickier business related aspects

1:03:19

of running a podcast and

1:03:22

how I come up with content and the

1:03:24

challenges I faced about sort of marketing the

1:03:26

content and trying to make a living from

1:03:29

what I do. So if you'd

1:03:31

like to hear all of those things, you

1:03:33

can listen to my appearance on Elena Mutunono's

1:03:35

Online Bound podcast. Okay, links in

1:03:38

the description. And there'll be

1:03:40

some more coming up as well, more appearances

1:03:42

on other people's shows. You can basically, if

1:03:44

you want to see other appearances on

1:03:47

other people's shows, you can check a playlist

1:03:50

on my YouTube channel. The

1:03:52

playlist is called Luke on other people's shows

1:03:55

and also check the episode archive

1:03:57

on my website, especially the older.

1:04:00

sort of older days, older previous

1:04:02

years, whenever I

1:04:05

was on someone else's show, I would create

1:04:07

a link to that in

1:04:09

the episode archive. And the

1:04:11

episode archive is just full of everything. It's just

1:04:14

absolutely almost everything I've ever done. I've probably put

1:04:16

into that archive at some point. And

1:04:18

you can find it at

1:04:21

teacherluke.co.uk slash episodes. Okay?

1:04:24

And that's the episode archive. And you'll find

1:04:26

all the episodes of the podcast, but also

1:04:28

other appearances that I've made on other people's

1:04:30

shows over the years. For example, when I

1:04:32

was on the Level Up English podcast with

1:04:34

Michael, or when I was on Rock and

1:04:36

Roll English with Martin, and lots

1:04:38

of other things. Who else? I

1:04:42

can't think off the top of my head right now. Aussie

1:04:44

English, I was on that one. Plenty

1:04:49

of others. You can just check the archive

1:04:51

to find them. Okay. So

1:04:53

that's the end of this episode. Thank you very much

1:04:56

for sticking with me all the way through until this

1:04:58

point. I hope that you found the episode to be

1:05:00

interesting and inspiring

1:05:04

and motivating, stimulating. You

1:05:07

can leave your comments in the comment section. That's

1:05:10

all for me this time. Speak to you

1:05:12

in the next podcast. But for

1:05:14

now, goodbye. Bye. Bye. Bye.

1:05:18

Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye.

1:05:21

Bye. Bye. Bye.

1:05:25

And I'm going to teach you luke.co.uk. Even.

1:05:44

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1:05:46

things. Quince. Is a place

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