Diary of the internship experience at Nanfang Metropolis Daily (4)

08/13/2021 Cantonese Broadcasting Experience:

I’ve always tried working behind the scenes before and I’ve had the opportunity to try my hand at working in front of the scenes during my internship here. Working in front of the scenes is very new to me. As I am a native of Guangzhou, I have a relatively standard Cantonese pronunciation. However, I did not have any standard training in Cantonese broadcasting either. Many of my colleagues here are Cantonese broadcasting majors, and I learnt a lot from them about Cantonese culture and Cantonese broadcasting skills. During the internship, we had some events or videos that required appearances, and I was lucky enough to be involved in reading news articles and appearing on camera. I felt it was a very interesting experience and each of our recordings went well and I tried my best to look as professional as possible in front of the camera, although I still lacked training in this area and I was still less confident than my colleagues. In constantly reading news scripts, I have also acquired the skills that a professional Cantonese journalist and presenter should have. This will enable me to show my professionalism more when doing interviews in Cantonese.

This day was my first time to be involved in a major video recording and I was required to appear as a presenter. Apart from paying attention to the pronunciation of words, I also had to have some dramatic reactions that were designed to be the highlight of the video. I also got to grips with the need to guide the guests through the questions and lead them to speak about interesting topics.