节目资讯
刊物:空中英语教室
日期:2013-01-17
难易度:Medium
关键字:respectful, walk of life, errand, curl, doorstep, Othordox Jew
Hey... welcome to Studio Classroom.
I'm your teacher Gabe.
I'm Carolyn.
And I'm Nathanael.
And you are joining us for day two of our Lesson in Culture.
That's right.
Studio Classroom's Joe Wuertz had an interesting time in New York City.
She went from her city in Texas to New York City.
And it was quite a different culture for her even though it was within the same
country.
Hey, Carolyn, how long have you been in Taipei?
Well, I've been here about two years now.
So you've been here two years.
How are you feeling?
Do you feel adjusted?
Or how long did it take you to feel adjusted here?
Well, you know, it took a little while to kind of get past the culture shock
because the United States and Taipei are pretty different.
They've very different food and language.
But I feel like now I'm very comfortable here in Taipei.
Well, it's good.
It's good to get to a place where you can feel comfortable where you are.
Well, some people learn how to adjust quickly; some, it takes longer.
Let's continue learning about Joe's experience in New York City with our first
reading of today.
(Music).
A Lesson in Culture.
I learned quickly never to assume a New Yorker speaks English and to be
respectful of lifestyles that were new to me.
New York is home to people of all walks of life, from all corners of the world.
My co-workers were Polish, Colombian, Puerto Rican, Greek and Armenian, to name
a few.
I ran errands to a shop where all the male employees were Orthodox Jews and wore
their hair in traditional curls.
I spent hours wandering Canal Street in Chinatown - the closest I'd ever been to
an Asian country.
Right at the beginning, Joe says I learned quickly never to assume a New Yorker
speaks English and to be respectful of lifestyles that were new to me.
We see that Word Bank word there, respectful.
It's very important to be respectful to other people and of other cultures.
How else can you talk about this word "respectful," Carolyn?
Well, a lot of times when I think of being respectful, I think of being
respectful to people who are older than us, so being respectful to your elders.
OK, being respectful to your elders.
Who else are you respectful to, Nathanael?
I'm assuming that you are respectful to people.
Yes, I do try to be respectful to people, especially my parents, also teachers,
or maybe my boss.
All of these are people that I should probably show some respect to.
All right.
Well, of course I think all of us know and are taught that it's important to be
respectful to everybody.
And if you go and visit a new country or a different place, then you need to try
to research,
or maybe figure out how can you be respectful to that new place, and new
lifestyles Joe talks about.
Well, friends, we did see a word there in that sentence "assume." I learned
quickly never to assume something.
Right now Steve and Ken have something that they want to share with us in the
Information Cloud.
Hey, guys.
Hi, teachers.
Steve, the writer of today's article mentions that she should never assume a New
Yorker speaks English.
Why don't we review the difference between assume and presume.
OK.
The words "assume" and "presume" are so close in meaning that even native
English speakers sometimes get confused about when to use which word.
I can see why there would be a problem.
Both "assume" and "presume" mean to believe something is true.
Correct. So let's dissect this a little.
When you assume something, you believe it to be true without any proof.
In other words, you make a decision based on a wild guess.
OK. So as an example, I might say: I assume you knew that person because you
were both from the same school.
Great.
Now in contrast, "presume" is a belief based not on a wild guess but on an
educated guess.
For example, we presume people with a ring on their left ring finger are
married.
Yes, there's still a chance we might be wrong, but we came to that conclusion
based on some evidence.
So presume if you must, but try not to assume.
That's right.
Growing up we're taught never to assume, so.
Before you make a judgment about something or someone, get as much information
and as many facts as you can.
(Chinese).
Thank you, gentlemen.
Well, moving on with our lesson, Joe writes: New York is home to people of all
walks of life.
All walks of life.
We see that phrase, walk of life.
That means a lifestyle or a different background.
Different people have different walks of life.
Do you know lots of people from different walks of life, Carolyn?
Well, going to college, I met people from all over the country and all around
the world.
And they have very different walks of life.
OK, so different walks of life, people that you meet at university.
Do you know people from different walks of life, Nathanael?
Yeah. I mean, I grew up in an international community.
So my high school had a lot of different people from a lot of different
countries.
All right. And I think I've experienced, or I know people from different walks
of life as well,
different lifestyles and backgrounds, people from all corners of the world.
Um... excuse me.
Does the world... does the Earth have corners, Nathanael?
Well, technically, no.
But just like we say the term "the end of the world," the world doesn't exactly
have an end to its shape either.
We just mean the very different places of the world.
"All over the world" is what we really mean.
All right. So this is a good phrase to know - all over the world.
You could say "all corners of the world." Moving on.
Joe says: My co-workers were Polish, Colombian, Puerto Rican, Greek and
Armenian, to name a few.
Well, that really does sound like people from all walks of life.
And we see this phrase "to name a few" right there.
It's a good way to uh, to talk about a series of things you want to say, and you
could list many things,
but of course it's not everything, so then you end with "to name a few." Could
you give us an example of this, Carolyn?
Well, growing up, I had a lot of different kinds of pets.
I had dogs, cats, birds, just to name a few.
Just to name a few.
That means she probably had 20 or 30 other kinds of pets.
That was just to name a few.
What about you, Nathanael?
How do you use this phrase?
Of course, there's a lot of different examples you could use.
I could list my shoes and say: Of all the different shoes I have, I have some
hiking boots, some tennis shoes and some sandals, just to name a few.
Just to name a few.
I have a lot of movies that I really like.
Some of my favorites are It's a Beautiful Life and Forrest Gump, Lord of the
Rings, just to name a few.
Of course, there are many that I like.
So now you know how to use that phrase.
Use it sometime today.
Joe says just to name a few.
And she says: I ran errands to a shop where all the male employees were Orthodox
Jews.
Here we see that key word: errand.
An errand is something that you do, is something that you need to do or get
done.
What's an example of an errand that you might run?
I would say going to the store, maybe to buy some milk or some other things that
your family needs, just a little job that you need to get done.
That's right.
And you usually use the word "run" with errand.
You can do some errands, but you can also run these errands.
I need to go run a few errands right now.
So she would run these errands and meet some different people from different
walks of life.
They wore their hair in traditional curls.
These Orthodox Jews wore their hair in traditional curls.
We see that key word right there too.
A "curl" is something that some people have.
My hair does not have curls.
Nathanael, does your hair have curls?
Yes, I do have curly hair.
Orthodox Jews actually have long curls right here on the side of their face that
hang down that looks kind of unusual.
That's right. It's very unique.
And I think, Carolyn, you do have curls, right?
I do have curly hair, but today it's not too curly.
And now that my hair is short, you can't really tell.
Great. And as you can see, we use the word "curls" - the noun - and "curly" -
the adjective - in kind of the same way.
I have curly hair, or I have curls in my hair.
Joe continues and says: I spent hours wandering Canal Street in Chinatown - the
closest I'd ever been to an Asian country.
Which is kind of funny because it's not really that close to an Asian country,
it just resembles an Asian city maybe.
Right.
Well, right now it's time for us to learn something with Michelle at the
Language Lab.
Hey, Michelle.
Hi, Michelle.
Hi, everyone. I'm Michelle.