Should an
independent Scotland
be part of NATO?
The township of 12 people
which sells four million
cans of beer a year
Scotland
in the
heat
SR anthology
Sit back, decide within five seconds that there’s nothing worth watching on the box, and relax instead with the Scottish Review, the new paperback anthology of pieces from Scotland’s online current affairs magazine.
Among the 42 selected gems:
Eileen Reid
My journey of love and loss
Anthony Silkoff
Kicked out of the mosque
Mike MacKenzie
The night I nearly drowned
Bill Jamieson
Grand Grossartia
Katie Grant
The age of disillusion
Gerry Hassan
The trouble with being a Scottish man
George Chalmers
First day in prison
Walter Humes
Tribal nation
Marian Pallister
The people crushers
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Today’s banner
Spring lambs, Ayrshire
Photograph by
Islay McLeod
Politicians who talk
the lingo, but fail
to be themselves
Alan Fisher
Back when I was keen to get into journalism I was invited to have a chat with the boss of a big radio station. He listened to some tapes of mine (it was that long ago) from hospital radio, sat back in his chair and stroked his beard.
I tensed, expecting to be told clearly what was wrong, but he leaned forward and told me: ‘No bad, but you’d be better off in England for a couple of years to smooth out that accent’. He had a point. I sounded like what I was: a son of Lanarkshire.
Over the years, my accent has lost some of the edge. I’m not as broad as I was. It hasn’t been a conscious effort to change, but living in various parts of the UK, travelling around the world and making my living from broadcasting has all had an impact. Even now though, most people would identify me as Scottish, and probably from the west coast (though Americans pick Irish as a default when they try to identify where I’m from).
When I get back to Scotland to visit friends and family, I don’t suddenly ‘Jock it up’. I don’t consciously make myself sound more like my less-travelled family as a way to compensate for my 20 years away. Unlike Lulu, I don’t have an accent I can switch on and off depending on the audience.
Now politicians want to be loved, and if not that, then certainly elected. And they’ll do what they can to build a connection with the people who vote. Unfortunately, when US politicians wander into the south, something seems to sweep across them. They all start talking about enjoying ‘grits’, a corn-based food normally served at breakfast, which can be sweet or savoury.
That would be almost acceptable pandering, but then they seem afflicted by some sort of southern tourettes – peppering conversations with affectations they have never produced in public over the first three months of the campaign.
Republicans campaigning in Mississippi and Alabama last week were at it again. Newt Gingrich talked about his love of grits through gritted teeth. Rick Santorum’s victory speech seemed a touch more southern than normal. And then there was Mitt Romney. He arrived at a morning meeting calling out ‘morning y’all’, declaring he had started his day off right with ‘a biscuit and some cheesy grits’, flashing a cheesy smile to match. The people applauded and smiled but the Washington Post reported that some of those there felt they were being made fun off – as if politicians thought they had to pander and be condescending to get a vote. So it backfired. Can you imagine the row there would be if a candidate met a Jewish group by declaring ‘Oy vey – what a day I’m having’?
The Republicans aren’t the only ones who do it. Barack Obama on the campaign trail in 2008 expressed his love of biscuits and grits – even though he confusingly did it in Indiana. He also seems to lose the last syllable when he is in the south. Somehow the politicians believe this makes them more likeable but it underestimates the intelligence of an audience which can see through a condescending stereotype.
Louisiana votes in its primary on 24 March, so we can expect some more of the same – only with gumbo replacing grits and candidates talking of their love of jazz.
Perhaps the politicians would do well to heed the words of the head of the radio station: ‘In the end the audience will forgive the accent son, but you really need to be yourself’.
