How to Understand the NEWS in ENGLISH

I'm reporting live from my living room

where my two year old son has just left a pile of toys on the floor.

I'm currently investigating how these toys are meant to mysteriously

park themselves away.

If you've ever felt we lost and confused by the vocabulary

used in News media, then you'll be happy to know that

in today's lesson, you'll learn 50 useful words and phrases

that will help you so you can understand the news without any problems.

If you've ever felt like this, you're not alone.

one of the reasons people find News media confusing is because it

often contains a lot of jargon, which means special words or expressions

used by people in a particular profession that might be difficult

for others to understand.

Another example of this is when medical professionals use words

like acute illness or comorbidity,

which we don't use in our daily lives, but it's useful to understand.

So our lesson today aims to 1- Help you understand

50 of the most common vocabulary terms used in various types of news media,

as well as some alternative phrases and 2 - Build your confidence

so you feel more comfortable using these words in conversations.

But before we get started with our list, if you are new here and frustrated

with boring methods of learning English that just don't seem to work.

You've come to the right place.

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Let's start our quick fire list

with 21 words that are so common across different types of media.

1-Allegedly, you'll often hear this word used in news about crime.

We say allegedly when we do not have proof

that something happened or that someone is guilty of doing it.

The Justice Department, revealing a Texas man has now been charged for allegedly

making death threats against elections officials in Georgia.

2-Sensationalism. Sensationalism

describes when the media exaggerates details in a news story

to attract viewers. Project lead to the end of the world.

An enormous earthquake or a massive volcano eruption or asteroid

smashing into the Earth... 3-Braking News

The word breaking in this situation means something that has just happened

or just started happening, so breaking news refers

to an unexpected story that has just happened.

This type of news is usually quite serious or exciting.

Breaking local news: the accident that could affect your morning commute?

4-Bias. Have you ever seen

someone make a judgment before all the facts were in?

They may have been biased.

When something is biased, it's unbalanced and favors one side more than the other.

So when a news report is biased,

it makes one side of the story seem more important.

Biased platforms pushing out fake news that endangered our democracy.

5-Bulletin A bulletin is a short news program

on television or radio, or a short newspaper printed by an organization.

We interrupt this program for a special news bulletin

6-Off the record.

You might have heard this one in movies.

When something is said off the record, it means that the reporter can't

consider it as official or publish it with the speaker's name attached to it.

Example, the politician thought the conversation was off the record

when he spoke to a reporter at a dinner party.

7-Reporter. Reporters are a specific type of journalist

who research writes and relayed the story to the public.

A shocking moment on live TV this week when a reporter in West

Virginia was hit by a car, it's a moment you have to see to believe

8-Angle.

This refers to the focus or approach the journalist took

when telling the story.

For example, the angle of the new story was focused on how

the criminal had turned his life around and started helping others.

9-Source A sources where a news story comes from.

For example, a source could be an official report, a tweet or a person. -Reporting

now that, according to our source familiar with the situation, Michael Cohen...

10-First hand. First hand information

or experience is gained directly rather than from other people.

Similarly, second hand information or experience is written by someone

with knowledge of an event or topic, but who did not experience it.

Getting a first hand look at the damage done when Hurricane

Dorian made landfall in the Tar Heel state.

11- An exclusive

also known as a Scoop, an exclusive is an important

and original story a reporter has obtained before others could do so,

which is likely to interest or concern many people.

And welcome to our exclusive interview with Bill Gates, the entrepreneur,

Microsoft co-founder, software developer. 12-Feature.

This refers to a story that emphasizes the human

or entertaining aspects of a situation instead of only serious facts.

For example, the magazine published

a beautiful feature story on a homeless man who helped stray dogs.

13- A puff piece.

This is a story that praises someone or something

too much and ignores the negative information about them.

OK, what do you think about this puff piece?

They seem to be enamored with Hillary.

14-News or press conference.

A press conference is a media event where reporters are together

in one place and gather information about someone in the news,

usually taking turns to ask questions.

15-Correspondent. A correspondent

is a journalist who reports from the location of news events.

For example, a sports correspondent will report from sporting events

while a White House correspondent will report from the White House.

Being able to use the vocabulary you learn is so important.

But in your day-to-day life, you have few,

if any real opportunities to use what you're learning by speaking.

So we decided to solve this problem by creating our RealLife App.

At just the touch of a button, you can start practicing your English

instantly with other English speakers from all around the world.

You can have fascinating conversations about your life,

your passions, different cultures, or even just about the news if you want.

This will take you from feeling like the lost and insecure

English learner to being a confident and natural English speaker.

And that's not all.

You can also listen to our podcast and get a free transcript

and all the vocabulary definitions,

so download it now for free by clicking up here

or the link down in the description below, or you can simply visit

the Google Play or the Apple App Store and search for RealLife English.

16-Speculation. A more

common synonym for speculation is to guess. So

when we talk about speculation, we mean the activity of guessing possible

answers to a question without having enough information to be certain.

But you got to stop there.

You can't build speculation unless there's somebody on the record saying something.

17-Agenda. The news agenda is when the journalist

or organization determines which stories are considered important.

The White House briefing to detail

the Biden administration's ambitious climate agenda

18-Statement. When the news refers to someone statements,

it means the official account of facts, views or plans

concerning a particular issue.

For example, the prime minister made a statement to the House

of Commons on Thursday

19-Human interest. This refers to a new story that focuses on a personality

or individual's story with wide appeal to a general audience.

Example: The magazine did an excellent human interest story

on how the soccer player went from living on the streets to fame and Fortune.

20-Eyewitness. Remember earlier when we spoke about first hand experiences?

Well, an eyewitness is a person who has seen something

happen and can give a first hand description of it.

Example: The woman was the only eyewitness to the crime.

21-Public opinion. The general opinion of the majority of people,

especially as a force in determining social and political action.

With me now is an Anamenon the director of the think tank the UK

in a changing Europe who have come up with this Brexit Term public opinion 2019.

Very good to see you 22-Credible.

We use the word credible to refer to something that is believable

and trustworthy.

While there is often a kernel of truth in rumors about North Korea,

we need to wait for credible sourcing on any reports about his state of health.

23-Libel. It's important to

differentiate libel and slander as they are often mistaken.

Libel is to write and publish something

that contains bad and false information about a person.

24-Slander.

While slander is a false spoken statement

about someone that damages their reputation.

25-Mainstream. We say that something is mainstream

when it's very common, accepted and established in society.

Example, most people get their news from the mainstream media,

such as BBC, CNN or Al-Jazeera.

Now let's look at words specifically related

to broadcast news, such as radio and television.

Let's start with the word live.

When something is live, it's just happening at that moment

as opposed to being prerecorded.

The BBC has today become the first British broadcaster to go

live using a commercial 5G connection.

Segue. In broadcast media

a segue is a smooth transition from one scene or topic to another

Glitch. A glitch is any distortion

or technical distraction in video or audio

Tease is a short description

of an upcoming story designed to keep the viewer watching.

Terry Bolger is here to show us exactly why.

I think we got a little hint of that in the tease, but wow. You can talk about

this guy. Feed. A satellite or microwave

transmission of live or recorded material.

This just in. This is a phrase used by news anchors when they've just received

an important piece of information while broadcasting live.

This just in, breaking news, is breaking out everywhere.

Faith Salie has the very, very latest. On air.

If someone is on the air, they are broadcasting on radio or television.

OK, let's move on to print and online media vocabulary.

Tabloid. Tabloids are a smaller form of newspaper and present

the news in a way that exaggerates crime stories and celebrity gossip.

Hard copy. A hard copy of a document is a printed version

of it, rather than a version that is stored on a computer. Example:

I prefer to read a hard copy of the newspaper instead of reading it online.

Caption. A caption is the words printed underneath a picture

that's explain what it is about. Circulation.

A number of copies of a newspaper that's sold each day or each week.

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Hot off the press. This one's a bit outdated

because when people received newspapers that were hot off the printing press,

it showed that the news was still very recent.

These days, we still use this line to show that the information is current

Soft copy. This refers to the digital document file

or electronic version of a document that is not printed on paper,

such as online news or e-books.

Geotag, a piece of electronic data

that shows where someone or something is and can, for example,

be attached to a photograph or comment on social media. Clickbait. Clickbait

refers to articles, photographs, etc.

on the internet that are intended to attract attention and encourage people

to click on links to particular websites.

And finally, here we have ten overly complicated phrases

commonly used in the news, and their much simpler

alternatives. Fled on foot.

This simply means to run away.

Fled is the past tense to the verb to flee or to run away.

We do know the suspect did flee on foot after crashing into a power pole.

Physical altercation. This means to fight. Physical refers

to our bodies, and altercation means a loud argument of disagreement.

A Los Angeles Police Department source

has confirmed that Kanye West is a named suspect in a battery report

from an alleged physical altercation that occurred in downtown L.A.

on Thursday morning.

Reduce expenditures.

Basically, this means cutting costs. Expenditures literally means an amounts

of money spent. Fatally injured. When we see the word fatal.

We know that someone died or was killed.

So someone who is fatally injured has died.

Controlled substances. Are generally drugs

whose manufacture and use is regulated by a government.

Arrived at a decision.

When someone arrived at a decision, it means they decided something.

At this point in time.

These five words can be summed up in one word. Now.

Incendiary device.

The word incendiary means explosive, so this phrase basically refers to a bomb.

Have you heard anything about this latest incident any more

and what this incendiary device was?

Discharged the weapon.

This means that someone shot or fired a weapon.

Lower extremities or limbs. Our lower limbs or extremity

refers to the parts of the body, from the hip down to the toes.

So basically our legs.

Some say he's also lighter with lower limbs and so potentially faster.

Well, that's the end of this list.

In this lesson, you learned 50 words

and phrases to help you better understand the news.

Do you remember what they were?

Not to worry. We've created a free downloadable PDF worksheet that

you can access by clicking on the link in the description box down below.

This way, you can extend your learning even further.

I hope you enjoyed watching this lesson as much as I to teaching it.

Most importantly, I hope you learned something you didn't know before.

Make sure that you like this video and share it with a friend

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