Nude scientist in bathtub sensation

These headlines were written in a pretend tabloid newspaper about Ancient Greece. Match them with the subjects of their stories (a) to (e) below and comment on the features of headline language they contain.

Playing with words

Violent words

EXPERT REVEALS NEW MOBILE DANGERS

• Articles, prepositions and auxiliary verbs are often omitted from headlines.

• This use of the present simple instead of the past tense makes the story sound more immediate.

• The use of language is often ambiguous. It is not entirely clear, for example, what
mobile refers to here. It is actually about the dangers of mobile phone use but it could have referred to dangers that can move in some way. Readers have to look at the story in order to find out.

• Words with dramatic associations such as danger are often used.

TV STAR TRAGIC TARGET FOR MYSTERY GUNMAN

This story is about how a well-known television actor was shot by an unknown killer.

• Tabloid newspapers like to use references to royalty or popular figures like film or pop stars or sports personalities in order to attract readers' attention.

• Alliteration such as TV Star Tragic Target is often used to attract the eye in headlines and to make them sound more memorable.

• Newspapers sometimes use 'shorthand' words such as 'gunman' in order to express an idea or image as briefly and as vividly as possible.

Violent and militaristic words are often used in newspaper headlines, especially in tabloid newspapers, in order to make stories seem more dramatic.

EU acts to crush terror of the thugs Palace besieged by journalists

Crackdown on soccer louts Typhoon rips through town

Many newspaper headlines in English attract readers' attention by playing on words in an entertaining way. For example, a story about the theft of traffic signs erected to help tourists coming to see a solar eclipse in the area was headlined Dark deeds. In this collocation dark usually carries the meaning of wicked, but the headline is cleverly playing with the word dark because at the time of an eclipse the sky goes dark.

Another example is the use of the headline Ruffled feathers to describe an incident where a wife was angry with her husband, a wildlife expert, for allowing a Russian steppe eagle to sleep in their bedroom. We use the idiom to smooth someone's ruffled feathers, meaning to pacify someone after an argument. It is apt to use it here as the story is about a bird (although, of course, it was the woman's feathers which were ruffled).

1. KING PHIL'S MACEDONIAN MASH-UP

2. MARATHON MAN IN DROP-DEAD DASH

3. QUADRUPLE ROYAL MURDER SENSATION

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