When the words are inadequate to the describe the man

Date Published: {J}

When I started out in this business of journalism, one of the rules in writing stories was that the only time you used the ‘surname-only’ in a story was when someone had been charged and was appearing in the newspaper as the defendant at a court hearing.

So, you might read in The Tribune that ‘Cunningham was charged’, and so on. However, if Cunningham happened to be anything else in that selfsame story, for instance the complainant, a witness, a solicitor, or whatever, then he was given his full name at first mention, and after that he was called respectfully, ‘Mr Cunningham’.

The only other time a surname-only might be used – but you had to be careful about its possible connotations or how it sounded – was in a heading where a surname-only like, for instance, ‘Haughey,’ might be used.

However, some newspapers were very hesitant about such usage . . . and, for instance, The Irish Times might well be expected in those days to back-off from a style point of view and call him ‘Taoiseach’.

Indeed, the surname-only formula was a powerful instrument at the time and might well be intended to denote the respect one had for one of ‘Haughey’s’ denials that he was into the banks for millions and was a well-known debtor to many whom journalists couldn’t quite tie-down for fear of the libel laws and the wrath of a man who was very powerful. You might slip the surname-only style into a heading on such a piece and people nodded sagely as to their perceived implications.

In other words, ‘surname-only’ was a somewhat derogatory use of the person; it was slightly disapproving. For my money, it still has that feeling about it even today, so that when I read the name ‘Cowen’ in a heading, or later in a story, I still have that feeling of a writer showing an edge of disapproval, of adverse judgement. In fact, in modern journalism, no such implication may be intended, or given.

Of course, in newspapers and journalism generally, there is a tendency to personalise most things nowadays. Taoiseach Brian Cowen last week, for instance, said that he could not rule out the possibility of the introduction of a property tax. Put in terms of ‘Taoiseach cannot rule out new tax’, it sounds quite neutral . . . but compare it to a headline line ‘Cowen won’t rule out new tax’, and I think you get my meaning. A certain ‘edge’ has crept into the reportage.

My difficulty is that, even these days, I find it hard to allow for the fact that it has become the fashion in modern journalism once you have mentioned a name such as ‘John Cunningham’ – in whatever context or whatever story – you can refer to him as ‘Cunningham’ from then on. I still find it as sounding potentially as a bit of a put-down, and with connotations which are quite distinguishable.

For more, read this week’s Galway City Tribune.