I am essentially wondering if anyone knows where "the" stereotypical voice, and manner of inflecting one's speech in a specific way to emphasize the dramatic or poignant points of a story, that most reporters and newscasters seem to have nowadays. It is a very specific way of enunciating and pronouncing words, and it is immensely pervasive in televised mainstream media reporting nowadays. How did this trend become so overwhelmingly pervasive? When did it begin, and why?
I would attempt to find an example to post but I'm on my mobile- if this isn't clear enough I can do so once I'm home.
Edit: More detail upon arriving home. I hope that the (somewhat) vague allusions I employed to describe this manner of speaking will suffice. Again, if not, please let me know. I'm genuinely curious about this.
James Fallows recently wrote a four-part series on a similar question, although he was more concerned with a faux-British style of speech that largely disappeared after WWII.
Not a simple answer, but it seems to be a combination of things: a generic mid-Atlantic accent, a style of speech suited to 19th-century stump speeches and faulty 20th-century microphones, a reflection of the class politics of speech.
Here are the links to his series:
Not sure if you've seen this, but I thought it was a good read on the subject:
the crappiness of electronic recording and broadcasting technology required that a clear, easy-to-understand style of speech be used, otherwise nobody would be able to understand what the broadcaster was saying. try listening to someone mumble on CB radio, or just about any short-wave transmissions these days. you can't understand squat. BBC English needs to return.