Focus on form: foregrounding devices in football reporting

Abstract

This article documents some foregrounding devices that the media use to attract readers' attention to linguistic forms, all identified in sports reports relating to the Euro 2004 Football Championship published in various British newspapers. A functional explanation is offered in terms of the poetic and interactive character of such devices and their role in simulating friendship and encouraging `bonding' between the writers and readers (phaticity). Their omnipresence in the British media is linked with structural characteristics of the English language, the readiness of the British to tolerate manipulation of linguistic forms, and the general trend towards `infotainment' in the media.