Anyone Here Been Raped and Speaks English?

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Anyone Here Been Raped and Speaks English?: A Foreign Correspondent's Life Behind the Lines
AuthorEdward Behr
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish
GenreMemoir
PublisherViking Press
Publication date
1978
Media typePrint
Pages316
ISBN0241105293

Anyone Here Been Raped and Speaks English?: A Foreign Correspondent's Life Behind the Lines is a 1978 memoir by the British journalist and war correspondent Edward Behr.

History[edit]

The titular quote is attributed to a television reporter for the BBC who shouted those words out to a group of Belgian nuns who had been airlifted from Stanleyville during the Congo Crisis in 1964.[1][2][3][4] The anecdote is often cited as an example of the callousness of journalists pursuing a story and has been described as "the gold standard of journalistic insensitivity".[5][6][7] The black humour and the shocking title of the book highlights journalists' interest in stories of victims and survivors of violence that carry emotional weight and exemplifies the intrusive and insensitive questions sometimes asked to the subjects of a story to grab the attention and morbid curiosity of their readers and viewers.[8][9][10][11] The line has been widely used in discussions of ethics and journalism and to highlight the underreporting or erasure of events from international media coverage and discourse unless they can be expressed in the English language.[12][13] The book covers Behr's experiences covering conflict in Asia and Africa in the 1960s and 1970s and as part of a group of journalists he called the Maghreb Circus.[14]

Release and reception[edit]

The book was published by Viking Press, New York in 1978 and by Hamish Hamilton in London.[15] The American publisher forced Behr to change the title to Bearings: A Foreign Correspondent's Life Behind the Lines, which led to a decrease in sales. Behr reverted to the original title in subsequent editions, which again saw brisk sales.[16] It has been described by multiple reviewers as one of the best books on journalism.[17][18][19][20]

In popular culture[edit]

Christopher Hitchens in his memoir described the motto of the foreign correspondent's desk at the Daily Express newspaper as being "Anyone here been raped and speaks English?".[21]

References[edit]

  1. ^ "A deadline junkie's rescue package: journalism books for Christmas 4". Retrieved 6 August 2022.
  2. ^ Dickey, Christopher (29 May 2007). "Dickey: Remembering the Legendary Ed Behr". Newsweek. Retrieved 6 August 2022.
  3. ^ Jukes, Stephen (1 June 2020). Journalism and Emotion. SAGE. ISBN 978-1-5297-2969-6. Retrieved 6 August 2022.
  4. ^ Lamb, Christina (22 September 2020). Our Bodies, Their Battlefields: War Through the Lives of Women. Simon and Schuster. p. 76. ISBN 978-1-5011-9917-2. Retrieved 6 August 2022.
  5. ^ "'Is Anyone Here a Muslim, With a Victim Anecdote for My Column?'". The Wire. Retrieved 6 August 2022.
  6. ^ Shafer, Jack (17 April 2007). "In praise of reporters who go too far". Slate Magazine. Retrieved 6 August 2022.
  7. ^ Harcup, T. "A Dictionary of Journalism. : Anyone Here Been Raped and Speaks English?". Oxford University Press. Retrieved 6 August 2022.
  8. ^ Fletcher, Martin (28 September 2010). "Field Stories Without Names | Jewish Book Council". www.jewishbookcouncil.org. Retrieved 6 August 2022.
  9. ^ "Beware the terrorism 'experts'". UnHerd. 18 May 2022. Retrieved 6 August 2022.
  10. ^ Jukes, Stephen (1 June 2020). Journalism and Emotion. SAGE. ISBN 978-1-5297-2969-6. Retrieved 6 August 2022.
  11. ^ Kristof, Nicholas D. (8 November 2006). "Anyone Here Been Raped and Speaks English?". On the Ground. Retrieved 6 August 2022.
  12. ^ Pennycook, Alastair (16 March 2017). The Cultural Politics of English as an International Language. Routledge. ISBN 978-1-351-84735-3. Retrieved 6 August 2022.
  13. ^ "The Suspicious Archive, Part II: Every Word Is a Prejudice - Journal #83 June 2017 - e-flux". www.e-flux.com. Retrieved 6 August 2022.
  14. ^ "Literary love: Recommended reads during self-isolation". The Frontier Post. 18 April 2020. Retrieved 6 August 2022.
  15. ^ "Anyone here been raped and speaks English? : a foreign correspondent's life behind the lines". librarysearch.cardiff.ac.uk. Cardiff University. Retrieved 6 August 2022.
  16. ^ Randal, Jonathan (5 August 2007). "Obituary: Edward Behr". the Guardian. Retrieved 6 August 2022.
  17. ^ "Literary love: Recommended reads during self-isolation". Arab News. 17 April 2020. Retrieved 6 August 2022.
  18. ^ Ehrlich, Richard S. "The best books to read if you want to write like a war correspondent". Shepherd. Retrieved 6 August 2022.
  19. ^ Turner, Camilla (17 December 2012). "Press Gazette's list of the Top 30 journalism books". Press Gazette. Retrieved 6 August 2022.
  20. ^ "Standing chicklit on its head". Hindustan Times. 31 May 2014. Retrieved 6 August 2022.
  21. ^ Cottee, Simon (17 August 2015). "'I Am Strange Here': Conversations With the Syrians in France's Most Famous Migrant Camp". The Atlantic. Retrieved 6 August 2022.
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