Linguistic features and sentence structures of sports commentary in basketball

Abstract

This thesis takes a closer look at the linguistic features which are used in sports commentary. The paper was written out of personal interest to provide a brief overview of the characteristics of sports commentary and how it could be classified as an individual linguistic register. Sports commentary is a widely used practise and should be classified under a specific linguistic register. The purpose of this thesis is to analyse linguistic features used in sports commentary. The study first covers a variety of aspects that define sports commentary overall, which is then followed by an analysis of specific features of the English language used in sports commentary. In order to study the linguistic features, four separate transcripts were made from different basketball games. The analytical section of this study was mainly supported by those transcripts as well as a few articles and books related to sports commentary.