To ask what has happened to BBC reporting? Mariah Carey

[Skye109]

Please can someone explain this report to me??
https://www.bbc.com/pidgin/articles/cqxjq7x17qzo

This is addictive: https://www.bbc.com/pidgin/articles/cmlg9gxx3n1o

Hahahahahahaha

talk

Thanks!

"Di band na very big deal back in di day"

Love it.

I also found this hilarious. My autistic partner said something very similar in such a matter of fact way with absolutely no humour to it. It creased me up.

Just when you think there is nothing new to learn in this world, up pops a BBC article in pidgin English. Mind blown!

The government don't do this out of the kindness of their heart, or to annoy people like you; market research shows that the BBC overseas services earn us a great deal more than they cost in overseas influence and awareness, and thus in sales and services income. If advertising wasn't profitable there wouldn't be such a lot of it about!

It's been popping up in my feed over the last few weeks too. The headline is interesting so I click on it. And the more I click , the more I get shown it by the algorithm!
And I can't say I am not interested - that seems to be at the BBC level and not the language, iyswim!

I have got quite good at reading it now 😀

Am I the only person that finds this thread uncomfortable? There's an awful lot of "See how funny the African people talk!" posts.

@KrisAkabusi I just wanted to say I love your name. I worked with him once and he Was just the nicest man. I wish he were on tv more often now.

And yes, I know what you mean.

You are not the only one. I'm not finding it very funny either.

It means “said”.

Sorry OP but you've made me laugh a lot 🙈

No you're not. I am too. I imagine that many of the black women here are too.

To be fair, it is funny that the OP made an innocent mistake

And I think part of what is funny is that the BBC is renowned for a very particular kind of English.

But… fine line

Tiny drop in the BBC budget. And would you rather West Africa received their news from the BBC with local journalists or Rupert Murdoch?

I always find humour in accents and the way different words are used for things up and down the country. My northern friends take the mick out of how I speak, as I do them.

I've never seen something like this written before on a news report or whatever. I actually find it really interesting and some of the bits people have posted do sound funny as they're obviously said in a way we're not familiar with. Nothing derogatory about that, not from me anyway.

Exactly. Soft power is very important.

Does it mean I'm racist if I can't read it without an accent? It just doesn't work without an accent for me😬

I like to think that most find it fascinating and funny in a ‘isn’t it funny how big and varied the world is and there’s always new stuff to learn’ kind of way rather than ‘haha them Africans talk weird’. But yes it’s a fine line.

This thread has sent me down a rabbit hole of pidgin English tutorial videos and online dictionaries. It's a fascinating language.

Pidgin is a language, and it's not funny. What IS funny is that so many posters are quite happy to admit that they've never heard of a language that is spoken by millions of people.
Portuguese? Is that a thing? Don't tell me there's actually a language called 'Mandarin'! Have you seen how Russians writes Rs back to front? And did you know that some people write from right to left? So funny..

I'm usually tickled pink by the fun and games on FWR, we are a bunch of comic geniuses lots of timesbut not this time.

Actually this news article is came up on my recommended feed about an hour ago in pidgin and I absolutely do not have the site set up as pidgin!

There must've been a blip OP.

That's amazing!

.