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Unit 18 The Rise and Fall of Literacy Introduction

Literacy is the ability to read and write, but the debate which provides the focus of this unit is not about whether people can simply read and write - it is about the place of the written word in our culture. Books and other printed material used to be central to our culture. Now, with the rise of cinema, television and computers that book-centred culture has bitten the dust (as they used to say in movies about the Wild West). It is true that those piles of yellowing paper stuck together with glue still remain, but they increasingly look like relics from a bygone age.

Although people are still reading newspapers and text on their computer screens some people argue that younger people in particular are paying less and less attention to the finest examples of their literary heritage – examples that include the best works of literature, for instance. According to one study in America, young adults between the ages of 18 and 34 used to be the most avid readers of literature. Now this is the age group that is the least likely to pick up a novel.

However, the news from book publishers does not sound so grim. When the Harry Potter book “The Half-Blood Prince” went on sale in British bookshops in July 2005 it broke all records. One chain of shops (WH Smith) said it was selling 13 copies a second on the first day of release. The total number of books bought on that day across the country reached 2 million. Furthermore, the number of new titles published in the UK is higher than ever before: 161,000 in 2005 (up from 65,000 in 1990). But another statistic from the US suggests that figures like these could conceal more than they reveal. One survey showed that 90% of all books are bought by people over the age of 30. Although young children might be buying books, it seems that today’s generation of young adults has lost interest.

Discussion

1. Take it in turns to talk briefly to the rest of the class about your extra-curricular reading habits,

covering the following points:

• The sorts of books you have enjoyed reading for pleasure.

• If you read very little or not at all, explain why this is so.

• If you were interested in a book and then found out it had been made into a movie would you still

read the book or would you wait to see the movie? Why?

• If you saw a really good movie and then found out that it had been based on a book, would you

want to read the book?

2. As a class try to come to some agreement on answers to these questions:

a. According to the statistics, reading for pleasure is quite a popular activity amongst very

young children. Then around the age of 11 or 12 interest starts to dwindle rapidly. Why do you think this is?

b. Teenage boys are particularly averse to reading for pleasure. How come?

c. Students at school are obliged to read a great many books but what do schools do to try to encourage reading for pleasure?

d. Which do you prefer as a source of information about what’s going on in the world: newspapers and magazines or the TV? Why?

e. Do books really matter? Novels tell stories but stories can also be told on film, and instead of turning to a non-fiction reference book you could watch a documentary. Do we necessarily

lose anything if we stop reading books?

Vocabulary Look for words in the introductory text with the following meanings.

a. decline b. keen, enthusiastic c. not included in the list of things you have to do for school d. objects left over from a previous age e. going on sale f. the culture which is passed down to us g. having a dislike for and unwilling to do something h. bleak, depressing, making you feel pessimistic i. hide (paragraph 3)

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Reading Remember: when you travel you use a means of transport, but when you express yourself you use a medium (plural: media). Hence we talk about artists working in the medium of oil paint, for instance.

From Gutenberg to Spielberg We live in a different age. One university professor, Neil Postman, has tried to highlight the difference by drawing a contrast between the earliest American presidents and the most recent. The earliest, he says, could have walked through a city street in America unrecognized, but the majority of people would have recognized their most memorable written statements. By contrast, everyone recognizes the faces of the most recent presidents, but can anyone remember them ever having said or written anything of any consequence?

In the past, public life was focused on and shaped by the printed word. This was a world made possible by Gutenberg’s invention of the printing press in the mid fifteenth century. It was his invention that first opened up a completely new public space in which ideas and arguments could circulate amongst the general population. A new public emerged – the reading public - and anyone who wanted to influence that vast audience had to do it in print.

The printed word also helped to foster certain values and a certain attitude to public life. The printed page needed to be filled with texts, and this inevitably encouraged a more widespread articulate use of the written word. The articles and essays that were printed presented arguments that readers had to thoughtfully reflect upon and evaluate - a time-consuming process that leisurely reading was perfectly conducive to. In short, the printed word was food for the intellect and the medium inevitably helped to cultivate a more general intellectual engagement with the issues of the day.

Things have changed. Although a greater amount of printed material is being published now than ever before, it no longer shapes the public consciousness. Television has now taken centre-stage and the Gutenberg epoch is well and truly over. The new medium gives pride of place to images. Few things are reported on television unless there is footage to accompany the story. The incessant flow of images arouses a great deal of feeling but it does little for the intellect.

The pictures need words, but the pace of TV demands that they come in small chunks. Instead of lengthy articles and essays that might help people understand the complexities of their world, we are given a superficial presentation of the events with little or no analysis. In the torrent of talk about current affairs there is little that ever rises above the level of chatter – the really big ideas and theories that shape public policy around the world are avoided as if they were taboo subjects. Despite the endless stream of images and information it is unlikely that when we switch the box off at the end of the evening we will have a deeper understanding of our world.

The visual bias of the medium also has a direct impact on public life, with politicians, for instance, spending less time working on persuasive and profound speeches than on developing an image that will appeal to viewers. Important statements by public figures are reduced to brief “soundbites” that can easily be slotted into a tightly scheduled programme. Whenever there is a presidential debate on American TV the amount of time allocated to candidates to answer questions is measured in seconds. How is it possible to say anything enlightening in such a short space of time? In the end the success of the candidate is more likely to depend on the image conveyed by the TV screen rather than the principles and policies that he or she advocates.

As Postman sees it, this marginalization of the printed word by TV has lead to an erosion of our collective intelligence – what he and others have also called a regression of thinking and a “dumbing down” of the culture. Not only does TV drag down the level of public debate but it also quietly dissuades us from taking anything seriously. Shortly before he died in 2003, Postman didn’t believe he was exaggerating too much when he warned that we were in danger of slipping into a televisual barbarism.

Questions 1. What point is being made in the comment about the American presidents?

a. People can now recognize their political leaders.

b. Presidents don’t make many speeches nowadays. c. More emphasis used to be given to arguments and ideas.

d. It was easier for presidents to remain anonymous in the past.

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2. What was the machine called that enabled large numbers of copies of a text to be made extremely quickly?

3. Paragraph 3 says that reading is conducive to something. (Damp, for instance, is conducive to the rotting of wood because the moisture is good for the development of the fungus that

destroys the wood.) What does the passage say leisurely reading is conducive to?

4. The word “engage” originally meant “make a vow or promise” and when people in love make certain promises before they get married we say they get engaged. The word can also be

used to mean “connect”, and so we can talk of one part of an engine engaging with another when they come into contact and motion is transferred. In the light of this, what do you think

the term intellectual engagement means as it is used at the end of the third paragraph? a. the activity of thinking about something

b. a connection between the brain and something else

c. what clever people do before they get married

5. You know the word “cease”, but what does incessant flow mean in paragraph 4?

6. Why are the words accompanying the images on TV reduced to such short chunks?

7. What is a “soundbite”?

8. What do you think is meant in the last paragraph by the phrase “a dumbing down of the

culture”?

9. Which of the following best sums up Neil Postman’s view of the most important impact that TV

has had on society? a. It has given us images that we can be proud of.

b. It has enabled politicians to become more widely recognized. c. It has lowered the level of public debate.

d. It has helped the public become better informed.

Over to you 1. Do you agree with Postman’s claim that images are more important now than ideas and

arguments, or do you think he is wide of the mark?

2. Nothing was said in the passage about computers and the internet. There is an awful lot of

text with myriads of ideas and arguments about current affairs on the internet. Do you think that this might spur a renewed intellectual engagement with the issues of the day?

Vocabulary 1. Look for words in bold which are opposites of the following.

a. intellectually shallow b. progress (noun)

c. persuade (meaning: encourage) d. civilisation

2. When you go on a military training exercise, for instance, you are given a certain number of

bullets for your gun. In situations like this where quantities must be measured in a fair way by someone in authority what verb (in bold in the passage) can we use instead of “give”?

3. Which two words in bold both mean “a period in history”?

4. If someone says or writes something that helps you understand a difficult topic what adjective

could we use to describe what they say or write?

5. It used to be the case that in polite society you weren’t supposed to mention certain subjects (like toilet activities, for instance). Which noun refers to these forbidden subjects?

6. On vending machines (where you might by a bar of chocolate, for instance) you can see the instruction: “insert coin in slot”. The slot is the hole you must put the coin in. In the passage

this word is a verb. What does it mean here?

7. Which of the words and phrases in bold above correspond to the following definitions?

a. important

b. top priority (noun)

c. preference (negative connotation)

d. a piece of film

e. a piece (e.g. of chocolate)

f. convey, give (information)

g. able to express themselves well

(adjective)

h. helpful for the development of

something

i. to help something develop (verb)

j. literally: a lot of water falling or

flowing rapidly

k. pull a heavy weight

l. making something insignificant in

society

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Vocabulary practice Complete the second sentence, trying not to change the meaning and using one of the words or phrases in bold from the previous text.

1. The government will give more public funds to the military.

More public funds ............................................................

2. Nuclear proliferation* does not help the cause of peace.

Nuclear proliferation is ........................................................

3. We want to persuade countries not to go to war.

We want to .......................................................

4. I learnt a lot from that discussion.

That discussion ......................................

5. Proficiency students ought to be able to express quite difficult ideas well.

Proficiency students ought to ........................................

6. Nietzsche** thought about things very deeply.

Nietzsche was .............................................. thinker.

7. He wanted to help people become more critical.

He wanted to ....................................... a spirit of criticism.

8. The party has a prejudice against female candidates.

There is .......................................against female candidates in the party.

(*An increase in the number of nuclear weapons. Proliferate = multiply.

** The famous German philosopher 1844-1900.)

Discussion While we are on the topic of language and literacy it is worth discussing a related topic: English as

a foreign language. Here are some questions to discuss either in pairs or as a class:

1. How would you describe your attitude to the English language? Is there anything that makes

it appealing or is it just a means of getting another certificate?

2. How important do you think it is for students of English to feel positive about aspects of British or American culture, or does that not play a role in the learning process?

3. What is your response to the following statements made at a recent conference on the teaching of English as a foreign language?

“It is preposterous to say that foreign students of English should strive to attain the same command of the language that the native speaker has. Native levels are unattainable by those who are not living in an English-speaking environment and are immersed in the culture. Not only is the standard set by the native speaker unattainable, but it is also unnecessary. Foreign speakers may have an accent and an imperfect grasp of the language and yet be able to communicate quite adequately.”

4. Have you any idea why English is now the international language?

5. International languages have come and gone. In the time of Alexander the Great Greek was an international language, and then during the Middle Ages Latin was the language that

enabled educated people across Europe to share ideas. Their time has passed, though. Do you think English will share a similar fate? Do you have any ideas about the future of English

as an international language?

Language extra: formal and informal English A. By now you should be quite adept at spotting the difference between informal and formal English. Have a look at these pairs of sentences. Say which is formal and which is informal.

1a. Today’s young people have unrealistic expectations. 1b. Kids nowadays want to have their cake and eat it too.

2a. This book has a lot of pretty sad stuff in it. 2b. A great deal of the content of this book is rather sad.

3a. Look at this passage. It’s rather good. 3b. Check out this really groovy bit.

4a. He ain’t too keen on posh restaurants. 4b. He is not particularly fond of high-class restaurants.

The sort of English that is definitely informal and more suitable for conversation is called colloquial English. Which expressions from the sentences above are particularly colloquial?

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B. Regulations and notices usually use formal English in a form which is often abbreviated. Use more simple English to explain what the following mean (the information in brackets says where

the phrase comes from).

a. Expiry date. (on a carton of orange juice)

b. Insert coin in slot. (vending machine selling snacks on a railway platform)

c. Ticket to be retained until leaving the motorway. (receipt from a motorway toll)

d. Special rates available for groups. (admission regulations at a museum)

e. Colour subject to alteration without notice. (details for an electrical device in a mail order catalogue)

f. All offers subject to availability. (supermarket advertisement for the week’s special offers)

g. Enter full name of spouse. (passport application form)

h. See notes overleaf. (airline ticket)

i. Not valid on underground services. (train ticket)

j. The consumption of alcohol is forbidden on the premises. (Youth Hostel regulations)

k. Membership fee payable annually. (club regulations)

l. Students holding a valid railcard are entitled to a 20% discount. (rail ticket regulations)

m. A charge of 1.5% is payable on all withdrawals from overseas cash machines. (information regarding a cash card)

n. Interest will be paid after deduction of tax at the applicable rate. (details of a savings account from a bank)

o. An attractive remuneration package is offered. (advertised vacancy for a trainee manager)

C. Sometimes in English we have a less formal phrasal verb and a more formal equivalent. Match the informal expression on the left with the formal equivalent on the right.

1. throw away/ get rid of

2. get on (a plane or boat)

3. get off (a plane)

4. put someone up for the night

5. get on my nerves

6. look into (a crime)

7. look down on (a minority group)

8. put (the pieces of your fishing rod) together

9. break down (food in the stomach)

10. hand in (an application form)

11. hand out (campaign leaflets)

12. pass out

13. do up (a house)

14. hang on

a. investigate

b. have contempt for

c. accommodate

d. disembark

e. board

f. dispose of

g. irritate

h. digest

i. decorate

j. distribute

k. submit

l. wait

m. assemble

n. faint

D. Make these sentences more formal by using the word in bold.

1. Many kids think reading sucks. averse

A large proportion of young people .....................................

2. I think it’s a really bad idea to let children have a telly in their bedroom. favour

I am not ........................................................... children have a television in their bedroom.

Discussion The passage that follows concentrates on writing. To lead into it, discuss the following questions:

1. An informal question: Is writing in your own language fun sometimes? Here’s the more formal equivalent: Do you ever derive any pleasure from writing in your mother tongue? When?

2. Compare someone living nowadays who can pick up a phone to call home with a colonial employee living a hundred years ago in a part of Africa where the only contact with the folks back home was a monthly postal service provided by the ships loaded with ivory. Do you think that it was good for our linguistic abilities when we had to write to communicate long-distance?

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Reading

Literacy in the Cyberage If you took a random sample of today’s e-mails and compared them with the letters people sent 50 or 60 years ago to friends and relatives, you would surely notice a decline in the English. As far as writing is concerned, people seem to have become less articulate.

There is no doubt that technology is partly to blame for this. Think back to the days when the only writing instruments were the pen and the mechanical typewriter. People had to take great care over what they wrote simply because making corrections and other changes was a laborious process. When people have computers with text editors that allow them to delete or cut and paste text, and check both their spelling and grammar the need for forethought, planning and being meticulous simply evaporates. All too often the result is sloppy writing. The fact that communication can now be instant means that standards fall even further. If the e-note that we rush off is short and messy, it doesn’t matter because we can send another one tomorrow. Quantity will make up for the lack of quality.

To be a good writer you must be a good reader. You might think that the contemporary proliferation of stuff to read would make us better readers, but the effect is probably quite the opposite. A century ago a young person’s reading material could have been tidied away quite easily on a couple of short shelves. Because of their rarity and value books would be read with a fondness and a certain reverence, and the reader would linger over certain lines, pondering the deeper meaning and committing favourite sections to memory. By contrast, a young person who logs onto the internet has access to billions of texts for the price of a packet of chewing gum. This profusion encourages people to skim through passages quickly so that they can move onto some of the thousands of others that they know are relevant to their chosen topic. The child who lovingly reads and re-reads a treasured, well-written book will enrich her language. Someone who simply skims myriads of mediocre texts will not.

If literacy is on the decline now, some people argue that this is nothing compared to what will happen once there is widespread use of the software and hardware that will make it possible to “write” with a microphone instead of a keyboard. The impact could be profound. For the time being at least, the written language is different from the oral in that it has its own set of conventions. Writing generally involves a careful use of complete sentences with a wider range of more complex structures and more formal expressions, and written texts are traditionally much more tightly composed than a stream of spontaneous speech. Once the pen and the keyboard become obsolete, though, writing as a skill distinctive from speaking could disappear altogether. Apart from a few remaining words on the side of a packet of biscuits letting us know whether they are plain biscuits or our favourite chocolate chip cookies society may revert to being an oral society and literacy as we now know it will have come to an end.

However, not everyone is so pessimistic. One of the more moderate and optimistic voices is that of Umberto Eco. To make his point he reminds us that in ancient Greece there were fears that the new art of writing would lead to a withering of the memory and a diminution of the intellect. Eco argues that many contemporary fears about the future of literacy will prove to be as groundless as the fears of Plato’s predecessors. Technology will undoubtedly bring changes, but the fact that some of the old habits will be lost does not mean that there will be a general decline.

Other optimistic people would point to the new opportunities opened up by the web. That young boy a hundred years ago with his shelf of books would almost certainly have remained a passive reader (unless he just happened to be one of a handful of budding literary geniuses). Nowadays the web offers undreamed-of possibilities for people to upload their own webpages. The internet is also teeming with forums and message boards where people can share opinions, ideas, reactions and experiences. Even though the quality of so much of this writing is mediocre, the fact that many, many more people are now writing in the public domain is surely a gain for literacy.

Questions 1. In the first paragraph what is said to be the difference between letters of 50 or 60 years ago

and the e-mails of today?

2. Which adjective from the third paragraph best sums up the quality of a lot of today’s writing?

3. What is said about the benefit to children of having only a couple shelves of good books?

4. As the amount of reading material increases what happens to the way people read?

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5. In the fourth paragraph which technological change is said to be one that might push communication back to being exclusively oral?

6. What is the point of Umberto Eco’s reference to the ancient Greeks? a. It is unreasonable to be afraid of the future.

b. Every technological development has impacts which are both detrimental and beneficial for

society. c. Those who predict a decline often fail to foresee the positive aspects of new developments.

d. The invention of writing did not make people less intelligent.

7. It says in that paragraph that those fears proved to be groundless. What does this mean?

8. According to the last paragraph how has the internet given a boost to literacy?

Vocabulary 1. The third paragraph talks about remembering things by heart, but it doesn’t use this phrase.

Which phrase not in bold does it use?

2. In that same paragraph there are two words which are synonymous with “abundance”. What are they?

3. Revere means to respect greatly. What is the corresponding noun to describe what you feel?

4. What adjective can we use to describe a task that involves a great deal of work?

5. Some things that people do are outstanding, others are of a very poor quality. What adjective means: of average quality, and implies that something is not as good as it should be?

6. We say a car reverses, but if a society goes back to an earlier and more primitive state, which verb do we use?

7. As an adjective the word minute (pronounced: “my-newt”) means: very small. Which related noun refers to the process of making something much smaller?

8. One of the nouns in bold originally comes from a verb we use to talk about what happens to plants when they don’t have enough water. Here the noun is used to mean “reduction”.

Which is it?

9. Which adjective is derived from a word that refers to a young flower before it opens?

10. Now match the other words in bold with the following definitions: a. to think carefully b. very careful with their work

c. read very quickly (just to get the general idea of a text)

d. to spend more time on something or at a place

e. careless and messy

f. stick g. deep

h. full of i. very large numbers

j. without anything extra such as a special flavour or design

Over to you 1. Do you agree with the argument that the modern technology of writing and communication

could be having an adverse impact on people’s linguistic skills?

2. If people could have the computer read text to them so that they only had to listen instead of reading themselves, do you think people would choose to do this or would they prefer to read

the words on the screen? In English many novels are available as audio books, but the only

people who buy these are the blind. Can you think of any reasons why it might be preferable to read the words on the page yourself rather than have the text read to you?

Language extra: more links practice A. in that

In the passage above we came across the following sentence:

The written language is different from the oral in that it has its own set of conventions.

This little linking device introduces a clause that answers the question: “In what way?” So: In what way does writing differ from speech? The answer here is that it has its own set of

conventions.

Use your own ideas to complete the following sentences:

a. My new ................... was a disappointment in that ..................................................

b. Tracy takes after her mother in that ....................................................

c. Home entertainment in the future will be different in that ....................................

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B. Fill in the gaps in the following sentences with these links. (Some will be used more than once.)

despite yet if though although

1. She remained cheerful ................. she had lost so much. (2 answers)

2. ......................... not having much money left, I carried on betting.

3. Even ......................... I didn’t have much money left, I carried on betting.

4. Even .......................... they torture me, I will not agree to become a spy.

5. ........................ still alive, she is no longer conscious. (2 answers)

6. There was a power cut so we had no lights or music for the party. We had a good time, ............ .

7. It was pouring with rain, and ............... thousands of fans came to see the match.

8. Some people say that we came from a planet near the star Sirius. A better theory, ................., is that we evolved from the apes.

9. I managed to get to sleep ....................... the noise of her snoring.

10. He was so pale. He looked as ..................... he had seen a ghost.

11. Tired .............. he was, he kept on climbing towards the summit.

C. much as

Much as I’d like to exercise more, I just can’t find the time.

Much as I enjoy extreme sports, there is no way I would go free-fall parachuting.

Here “much as” means “although” but we only use it in this way with the following verbs: like, dislike, love, admire, approve, sympathize and enjoy.

Complete these sentences in a way that makes sense:

a. Much as I enjoy reading, ................................................

b. Much as I disapprove of the needless slaughter of animals, ......................................

c. Much as I love English ...............................................

D. Fill in the gaps in the following sentences with these links (one of them more than once).

as as if no matter as from as for as far as

1. .................... how hard I try, I always make a mess of things.

2. Unemployment is a threat to the economy ............... it will reduce the demand for goods and services.

3. He treats me ................... I were his butler.

4. It’s not always easy to see yourself ............. others see you.

5. John was late, ............. usual.

6. ........................... next Friday, I’ll be retired.

7. .......... I see it, the entire country is going to the dogs.

8. I’m a bit of an idiot .................... maths is concerned.

9. In Uzbekistan there have been numerous abuses of human rights. .................. Kazakhstan, things are not much better.

10. He said no one had had a chance to see the crashed UFO ............ the military had very quickly taken it to a secret bunker in the desert.

Writing Here is today’s topic:

Some people argue that books as we have known them for the last five hundred years will soon be a thing of the past. The days of the conventional book are numbered, they say. What are the alternatives that are sometimes said to be superior to paper books? What is your prediction about whether conventional books will be able to withstand the competition?

A. To answer this question you need to be familiar with some of the technological developments

that might decrease demand for conventional books. One of these is hypertext. Another is the e-reader. If you are unsure what these are, the passages that follow aim to fill you in.

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From Text to Hypertext Writing on paper is plain and simple text, but writing on web pages is known as hypertext. The most interesting feature of this digital form of writing is that key words can be made into links which users can click on to take them to a new piece of text. This provides an extremely user-friendly way of accessing information. A page giving an overview of a topic will be filled with links that allow users to discover the particular details that interest them in an instant. In addition, the use of graphics, animations and sound can make a web site much more visually appealing and enjoyable to use than a conventional book.

E-readers The promise from companies such as Sony is that the latest compact and lightweight devices for reading electronic books will revolutionize the world of book publishing just as the iPod and MP3 technology revolutionized the world of music. The first e-readers were launched in 2000 but the technology was then not sophisticated enough to catch on. The latest e-readers are similar in size and weight to a paperback book, yet they are able to store hundreds of books on a hard disk. The screens now have a much higher resolution to make reading text easier on the eyes and they are powered by long-life batteries. The software can even mimic the appearance of a page turning. A wireless connection to the internet will also enable books to be downloaded, cutting out the need for time-consuming trips to the local bookshop or library.

B. Here are some suggested topics for the main body and conclusion of this essay. What order

would you put them in? Would you put two of the topics into a single paragraph?

• What the future will hold.

• The reasons why conventional books might continue to be popular with some people.

• The disadvantages of the electronic alternatives.

• The attractions of new electronic readers.

• The attractions of text on the web.

C. Here we have some notes and questions. In pairs work through them discussing what points they raise, whether they are relevant and, if so, where you would include them in your essay.

• What about the environmental impact of conventional book production? Trees are cut down and toxic chemicals are released during the paper production process. Should environmentalists welcome the demise of the paper book?

• What about the experience of reading long texts on a computer screen? How well do LCD screens work outdoors in bright sunlight? Umberto Eco: “After two hours in front of the screen my eyes feel like tennis balls.”

• What about the convenience of a paper book? Would you want to take your expensive e-reader to the beach?

• Umberto Eco: “Conventional books will remain indispensable not only for literature, but for any circumstance in which one needs to read carefully, to speculate and reflect upon what has been written.”

• Reference works on the web can be kept up-to-date, so if you want the latest information about something, the web is the place to look for it.

• Umberto Eco: “In my periods of optimism I dream of a generation which gets acquainted with reading from a screen but then starts to feel unsatisfied and returns to the more relaxed form of reading provided by conventional books.” Do you think this is likely?

• How about the perspective of new writers who would otherwise have no opportunity to get their articles and books published? Why might the new technology be a boon to them?

• 80% of boys under 16 in the UK no longer read any novels at all. When asked why, they replied that books lacked the excitement of computers. With electronic books is there a hope that they could be encouraged to read more?

D. How will you begin? In your first paragraph you need to mention the new technology and raise the issue of whether conventional books can compete against the new alternatives. Why not

write your introduction now and compare it with those of your fellow classmates?

Write it! Write 250-300 words on the demise of the paper book, and, if possible, try to include a sentence with the link “in that”.

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F u l l s p a t e P r eF u l l s p a t e P r eF u l l s p a t e P r eF u l l s p a t e P r e ---- P r o f i c i e n c y P r im e rP r o f i c i e n c y P r im e rP r o f i c i e n c y P r im e rP r o f i c i e n c y P r im e r

Unit 19 The End of Work

Introduction A. Why work? What’s the point of working? If someone works simply to earn money, we say that work has a merely instrumental significance, i.e. it is a means to an end (a way of obtaining some other thing). By contrast, if someone says that there is something enjoyable about the work itself, we say that work has an intrinsic significance. In this second sense, what might make certain kinds of work satisfying? Try to come up with a list of what makes work rewarding.

B. Read this little extract about a man called Lynn Fritz and answer the question below.

One successful American businessman, Lynn Fritz, sold his international delivery firm for $500 million and used $4 million to set up a charity. He carried on working, not for profit, but to help others. He described the experience this way: "When you’re working for a corporation, for every unit of work you put in you get 1.5 times as much back. With humanitarian aid, for every unit of work you get 20-30 times as much back. You feel you are really making people's lives better. It's the most damn fine thing I have ever done."

What satisfaction is Lynn Fritz describing? Would it ever attract you to work for a humanitarian aid organisation?

C. Lynn Fritz could have taken early retirement and put his feet up, but he chose to carry on working. If you already had an income and didn’t have to work to make ends meet, what would you do?

D. Read this little extract and then answer the question about unemployment.

In our society you are your work. One of the first questions a stranger will ask you is: “What do you do for a living?” Society is organized in terms of occupations. To be recognized as a full member of society you have to have a proper job. Hence, it has become one of the most important bases for a person’s sense of self-respect.

Apart from the lost income, unemployment is difficult for people to cope with. What does this extract imply about the psychological cost of unemployment?

E. One of the many functions of religion is to provide answers to the really tricky questions in life. One of the tricky questions is why we have to work so hard. What does your religion say about why we have to work? Does it have a little story to explain the origin of this onerous necessity?

One explanation comes from the book of Genesis in the Old Testament. According to that account, work is a punishment and a curse. After Cain commits his unforgivable sin, God decrees: “From here on you will earn your bread by the sweat of your brow*.” However, the English tradition is ambivalent about the value of work. Although we keep the old story of work as a curse, we also have what is called the Protestant work ethic, according to which work is definitely a virtue. (*Note: “brow” refers to the forehead.)

F. Does your culture have any sayings or stories that parents and teachers use to prick the conscience of idle youngsters and make them feel guilty about being slothful (sloth is the vice which is the opposite of the virtue of diligence, i.e. hard work)? English has the saying: “The early bird catches the worm.” (However, we are also told that “All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.”)

Vocabulary search Look for words and phrases in bold that have the following meaning.

a. to officially order/command b. holding two contrasting ideas about something simultaneously

c. E.g. when someone says: “May you burn in hell.” d. a morally bad characteristic (the opposite of virtue)

e. lazy and unwilling to work

f. not working (sometimes synonymous with f.) g. company, corporation, business

h. the quality of being hard-working (noun) i. difficult and unpleasant (e.g. work)

j. in the interests of humanity

k. relax

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A bumper collection of words for work Use these words to fill the gaps that follow.

shift

lay off

trade union

flexibility

assembly

deduct

stock market

net

shares

supervisor

incentive

negotiate

field

sector

prospects

perks

eligible

curriculum vitae (CV)

1. With most job applications you are asked to enclose a copy of your ................................, which gives your personal details plus an overview of your educational and professional background.

2. No one wants to end up in a dead-end job so before you accept a job offer you should consider carefully the ............................ for professional development. (chances of something happening in the future)

3. Hospitals, schools and other services owned and run by the state belong to part of the economy known as the public .......................

4. I had always wanted to follow in the footsteps of Jacques Cousteau so I jumped at the chance to specialize in the .......................... of marine biology.

5. In general, anyone from another country in the European Union is ......................... to work in Greece without having to apply for a special work permit. (i.e. they qualify for this privilege)

6. “Downsizing” is what they call it nowadays when companies .............................. workers (i.e. make them redundant), perhaps because production is being transferred to a foreign country where labour costs are cheaper.

7. Henry Ford is famous for having developed the ........................... line along which a product is passed from one worker to another as it is gradually put together. This way of organizing the manufacturing process made it possible for him to mass produce cars for the first time in history in 1908.

8. If you work on the factory floor you will have to put up with the ............................. looking over your shoulder and checking what you are doing.

9. Nurses are regularly required to work on the night ....................... They may start work at 10pm and finish at 6am.

10. Most employers ....................... (take off) tax from your monthly salary or weekly wage.

11. The money you actually receive from your employer and can put in your wallet is known as your .............. income, as opposed to your gross income (your salary before tax is taken off).

12. As a(n) .............................. (something that motivates people) to work harder some employers give their employees ............................ in the company (parts of the ownership of the company that can be bought and sold on the .................................).

13. To defend their rights a large group of workers may set up a(n) ..............................

14. The representatives of these labour organizations are the people with whom employers must ....................... (discuss) future pay rises or pay cuts and alterations to the other terms and conditions of employment.

15. One of the buzzwords in today’s world of business is .............................. People have to accept short-term contracts and not complain when their jobs or working hours are changed. The days of the permanent 9 to 5 job are long gone. (Clue: also refers to things that can be bent easily)

16. One of the ........................ of being a travelling saleswoman is the company car and the free petrol. (something attractive in addition to the salary)

Pre-reading 1. Do you think that people will always have to work in a way that is similar to the way they work

now and to the extent that they work now or do you think that future technological developments might liberate people from that?

2. Would a life with little or no work as we know it now be desirable?

More and more technology is being used in the economy and levels of unemployment in the older

industrialized countries are rising (over 5 million adults were registered as unemployed and looking for work in Germany in 2006). Most of us just accept this as a fact of economic life but at the beginning

of the modern period the development of science and technology led some people to believe that the

world generally and the world of work in particular was about to change in a wonderful way. Some of these dreams ought not to be forgotten. Read the following passage about the ideas of one

particularly optimistic group: the Positivists.

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Reading

The Positivist Dream The founder of the positivist movement was a Frenchman, Count Henri de Saint-Simon (1760-1825). He and his followers were absolutely over the moon about modern science – the science whose most basic principles had been laid down by Newton (1642-1727). What really excited them was the idea that if society could be based on scientific principles we would finally be able to achieve universal peace and social harmony. In the economy, for instance, with new technology industrial output would soar. With an abundance of basic goods there would be an end to scarcity, and if everyone had what they needed then there would be no excuse for social conflict.

With the new technology there would also be a decreasing demand for human labour as machines did more and more of the work. This brought the happy prospect of a society in which people no longer had to work to make a living. Thanks to science and technology, people would finally be liberated from the drudgery of work.

The Positivists assumed that people had a finite number of fairly basic needs such as the need for a roof over their heads, a shirt on their backs and some reasonably appetizing food on their plates. They took it for granted that once those needs could easily be met by the economy people would feel an enduring sense of satisfaction. History, unfortunately, has proved that this assumption was way off mark. The system that satisfies our needs also generates as many, if not more, new needs. A pattern of consumption develops in which we are never satisfied: the more we have, the more we want. The TV used to be a simple box with a flickering black and white image. This was fine for a couple of decades but then the colour screen was invented and the older sets started to look horribly out of date. Then a video recorder had to be added and the sound system had to be stereo, although it wasn’t long before that, too, was superseded. Later on the old curved screen had to be replaced with a flat one. Then came the DVD and satellite TV, and now TV on the internet. Each one is more expensive than the last, but each one promises more and seems to be no less necessary. The endless flow of new products is staggering, and because they continue to mount up, a person ends up slaving for an entire lifetime in order to pay for them, and the positivist dream of a simple life without work is long forgotten.

Questions 1. According to the positivists what was the mechanism by which economic growth would secure

social harmony?

2. According to many traditional ideas about work, it is our fate to have to work hard to earn our living. What did the Positivists believe about this issue?

3. The last paragraph is a critique of one assumption made by the Positivists. Which assumption is this?

4. Why was the assumption wrong?

Vocabulary 1. If we say that food is scarce and people are going to bed hungry, what does this mean?

2. Which word used in the first paragraph (not in bold) is the opposite of scarcity?

3. Look for words in bold with the following meanings. a. lasting

b. increase

c. replace an older model d. limited

e. incredible and surprising f. tasty

g. with a light which is not steady (like

the flame of a candle in a breeze)

h. working hard i. the boredom and difficulty (of work)

j. delighted k. inaccurate

Over to you 1. The last paragraph described a particular pattern of consumption (some would call it over-consumption). How prevalent is this pattern of consumption? How do you feel about this lifestyle? Is

it worth it, or is it a treadmill that we ought to try to get off? If people stopped chasing after the

newest gadgets what would happen to the economy?

2. The Positivists assumed that our needs would remain as simple as they were at the end of the

eighteenth century, that technology would help us satisfy them easily and then we could relax and concentrate on other things like being nice to each other and reading a few more good books. Few

people seem to be interested in a simple life like this. Why not?

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Reading If you read the literature about automation and work you will come across the term “Luddites” – a term used to refer to people who oppose increasing automation. Although the word is used very generally now, it was originally the name of a historical movement whose story we will now tell.

The Luddites Anyone telling the history of automation cannot fail to mention the uprising of the Luddites in England in 1811 and 1812. The Industrial Revolution was just beginning and the first large mills (factories) were coming into operation. One of the first processes to be automated was the production of cloth. Fabric had traditionally been painstakingly woven on small hand looms operated by weavers who ran their own small businesses. Now, the power of steam was harnessed to drive large new looms which could weave cloth at a rate incomparable to that of the older hand looms.

The weavers, who were proud of their traditional skills, were outraged that their livelihoods were being destroyed. Having no other means of making a living, and facing not only unemployment but also starvation, groups of weavers broke into the new factories and began destroying the machinery. Sporadic attacks broke out in each of the English cities that had a flourishing textile industry.

The government responded in 1812 by passing a law which made destroying factory machinery a capital offence. From then on, weavers who were arrested and found guilty of attacking mill property were hanged. Others were put on ships and sent to Australia. To further protect the mills the government called in 12,000 troops to guard them.

Speaking in Parliament when the new law was being debated, Lord Byron called for understanding. While the acts of violence were to be condemned and deplored, he said they were perfectly understandable in the light of the fact that the men had lost all means of subsistence and had no peaceful means of expressing their grievances.

The combination of hangings, deportation and military protection proved to be effective and within two years the protests had ended and the factory system was able to expand unobstructed by local opposition.

Questions 1. What do you think a weaver is?

a. someone who runs a small business b. someone who makes cloth c. someone who breaks machinery

2. What is the name of the machine used to make cloth?

3. What is meant by the phrase “their livelihoods were being destroyed”?

4. Attacking factory machinery was made a capital offence. What is a capital offence?

5. What form of execution was used in England in the nineteenth century?

6. Did Lord Byron approve of or disapprove of the attacks on factory property?

7. Did the protests have a lasting effect on the course of the industrial revolution in England?

Vocabulary 1. The verb that refers to the act of making cloth is an irregular verb that follows the same

pattern as the verb “break”. What are its three forms?

2. If you harness a horse you put a set of straps on its body so that it can pull a plough or some other machinery. In the first paragraph we are talking about steam, not about horses, what does the word mean here?

3. There are two phrasal verbs in the second paragraph (not in bold), one meaning “to enter by force” and the other meaning “start”. What are they?

4. There are two synonyms for the word “cloth”. What are they?

5. Which adjective could we use to describe something that is so much better than something else that it is in a completely different league?

6. Look for words in bold with the following meanings.

a. rebellion

b. source of income c. way of satisfying the most basic

needs (e.g. for food) d. soldiers

e. a complaint

f. extremely angry

g. happening at irregular intervals h. forcing people to leave the country

as a punishment i. done with great effort and care

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Over to you What do you think should be done when new industrial techniques mean that people will lose their jobs? The Luddites wanted to abolish the new industrial practices, and some people would say they wanted to bring economic development to a standstill. Is there an alternative?

Reading

Automation: from Boom to Doom? For some people, the story of the Luddites is a lesson in how short-sighted people are when they resist new technological developments. Blinded by their anger about the jobs that will be lost, they fail to see all the new jobs that will be created.

The effect of introducing new technology has been called creative destruction: some occupations become obsolete and certain people lose their jobs, but new areas of human endeavour are opened up, and that creates new jobs. The development of a steam engine capable of running along rails, for instance, spelt disaster for horse-drawn transportation and for those who depended on it for their livelihood, but the developing railway created a whole new set of occupations.

Another argument is that new technology and new ways of organizing production make it possible to produce goods more cheaply. If goods become more affordable for a larger proportion of the population, demand goes up. More goods can be sold, more money is made, and that gives entrepreneurs an incentive to set up new businesses, which, in turn, creates more jobs.

For a long time the level of creation more than compensated for the level of destruction, as far as employment was concerned. Recently, however, some people have started to argue that the character of automation has changed in a way that severs the link between economic growth and the maintenance of a high level of employment.

One economist, Jeremy Rifkin, points to the US steel industry to illustrate the change. From 1982 to 2002 steel production rose from 75m tonnes to 102m tonnes. In the same period the number of steelworkers declined from 289,000 to 74,000. Conventional economic wisdom says that the number of jobs lost in the old industrial sector (and the steel industry is an old industry) will be offset by new jobs created in the growing services sector (where services include retail, telecommunications, catering, entertainment, transport, tourism, health and financial services). However, the proliferation of new technology is wreaking havoc on jobs in this sector too. A new internet banking company in the US, Netbank, is doing so well that if it were organised along more traditional lines it would be expected to employ a staff of 2,000. However, it only has 180 people on its payroll. More generally, as e-commerce mushrooms the number of jobs in the retail sector plummets. Automated cash machines in banks mean the number of cashiers can be reduced. Desktop publishing software has led to a drastic decline in the number of people involved in the publishing business. New design software means fewer people need to be employed by architects and engineers. Similarly, software to help people fill in their tax forms will reduce the amount of work available for accountants, and voice recognition software is already enabling companies to cut back the number of people they pay to answer their phones. New computerised stock control systems will enable companies to have smaller warehouses with fewer staff. The list goes on and the phenomenon called “downsizing” (a euphemism for reducing the size of the workforce) continues.

The gains in productivity are now being achieved at the expense of human labour as more and more workers are being pushed into part-time employment or redundancy. This is a problem, Rifkin insists, that those in charge of the economy will not be able to ignore for long. Not only is rising unemployment deplorable for anyone concerned with human dignity, but it also threatens to undermine future economic growth. A shrinking workforce means diminished income, reduced consumer demand, and an economy unable to grow.

Questions 1. Paragraph two refers to one advantage of new technology in the economy. What is it?

2. Which other benefit is mentioned in the first step of the argument in paragraph three?

3. Until recently what impact did economic growth have on a country’s level of employment?

4. What change in the impact of new technology does Rifkin highlight?

5. The last paragraph implies that governments are ignoring the problem. What reason is

given to explain why governments will have to attend to the problem soon?

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Vocabulary Look for underlined phrases that match the following.

a. selling to customers in the high street

b. out of date

c. suffering from myopia d. someone who handles people’s deposits and withdrawals in a bank

e. area, field, part (e.g. of the economy) f. large building where a company stores its goods

g. goods for sale

h. the growing quantity i. big (for changes that might be worrying)

j. to get smaller k. to cause widespread destruction

l. unemployment m. cut off (e.g. a limb)

n. people who start new businesses

o. pulled p. compensated

q. activity in which people try to achieve things

Language extra: wishes etc

A. Perhaps you remember this structure from Unit 5: She acts as if she were the boss.

Here we use the past tense (as if she were) to indicate that we are describing something

that is not true (she isn’t the boss, she only acts as if she were the boss). We do the same

with wishes because when we wish we dream about states of affairs that are unfortunately unreal and not going to become real.

Which of the following describes something seen as impossible and which describes something considered to be possible?

I hope I win. I wish I were able to win.

Practice: Tracy studied interior design and now can’t find a job. Her friend Sandy studied plumbing and now she is earning good money. Think of a wish Tracy might make about her

past.

Tracy: I wish ................................................................................

Instead of “I wish ...” we can say “If only ...”. Think of a sentence for this situation: You accepted the offer of a promotion but now you don’t have any free time for your favourite

hobby.

If only I ........................................................................................

Note 1: instead of “was” we can use “were” (which is the subjunctive, but let’s not worry too much about what on earth that is). Hence we can say:

If only Bob were here.

I wish I were more assertive.

Note 2: with wishes “would” is not used for talking generally about the future. Instead we

save it for certain kinds of complaint. Hence:

I wish you would stop belching.

If only they wouldn’t keep making so much noise.

She wishes it would stop raining.

Imagine that you are Cinderella, the fairy Godmother has not arrived yet and you are very sad because you will not go to the ball. Because you have a good command of the English

language you know that you can’t say: I wish I would go to the ball. What can you say instead?

I wish I .......................................................................

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B. Wish + infinitive. This is used for making formal requests. For instance, you are in a shop and you are not happy with what the sales assistant is telling you, so you say:

I wish to see the manager.

Another example: The old sailor said he wished to be buried at sea.

C. Before you blow out the candles on your birthday cake you are supposed to make a

wish, but not out loud.

D. It’s time ... There is another structure that uses past tenses for talking about the

present, although the reason for doing so is different. Here’s an example: Your Dad said that you and your sister had to be home before midnight. It is now ten to, so you say to your

sister: It’s time we left. Or: It’s time we were going.

With this structure we can’t change the “was” to “were” so if your friend said she was going

to arrive at 8.00pm and it is now ten past you might say:

It’s time she was here.

With “It’s time ...” we can also use the infinitive:

It’s time to go.

Or a prepositional phrase:

It’s time for bed.

E. I’d rather... This phrase is followed by a verb in the past tense when you might expect the present. Look at this little dialogue:

“Shall I bring some of my home-made pizza to the party?”

”I’d rather you didn’t”

Although we use the past tense here we are talking about a real possibility so it would be

inappropriate to try to say the same thing beginning “I wish ...”

Don’t forget that we can use “I’d rather ...” with the infinitive to express our personal

preferences.

John wants a beer but Bob would rather have a glass of mineral water because

it’s his turn to drive.

Practice What could you say in the following situations? Keep the sentences as short as possible.

1. You keep forgetting things all the time.

I wish ....................................................

2. You didn’t try hard enough and that’s why you didn’t make the grade.

If only ....................................................

3. Your parents won’t let you have your birthday party in the local nightclub.

I wish I ..........................................................................................

4. An irritating boy in your neighbourhood has cut the end off the exhaust on his

scooter and he insists on riding that loud machine up and down your street every

evening.

I wish that stupid boy .......................................................................

5. You have wasted enough time and now you should start working.

It’s time we ........................................

6. The Uzbek police have arrested you and you want to ask to speak to a lawyer (even

though you know it is a waste of time in Uzbekistan).

I wish ...........................................

7. At a meeting of your local “Bash the Burger” group a hot-headed young man suggests

breaking the windows of a fast food restaurant. Having just finished reading a

biography of Ghandi you suggest a non-violent alternative.

I’d rather we ...................................................................

175

Over to you You are going to read a text about the experience of working in a modern factory, but first here is something to discuss:

Question: Ideally, how should businesses be organized? Imagine you are going to help set up a

new business where 20 or 30 people will work. What system of organization would you prefer it to have? For instance, should people be permanently assigned certain tasks and responsibilities, or

should a rota* system be implemented so everyone has an opportunity to do the attractive jobs and everyone is obliged to spend time doing the unpleasant jobs? What about the decision-

making processes? Would it be better for an individual to have ultimate authority or would a more

democratic system be preferable?

* (Note: “rota” comes from the verb “rotate” meaning “to go round”. Here we have a rotating system for

the allocation of jobs.)

Mini-reading

Fordist Factories and What They Feel Like For some social critics, new technology at work and new ideas about how to organise the work process have proved to be a very mixed blessing. The new developments have helped ensure an abundant supply of affordable goods for consumers but they have not done much to improve the quality of work. The experience of work is an issue that is all too often ignored.

Discussions of this often refer to Fordism – the system introduced by Henry Ford when he created the first assembly line for the mass production of cars (the first model T Ford cars came onto the market in 1908). The overriding value for Ford was efficiency, and to maximize that he broke the production process down into a series of simple tasks. Instead of having a group of skilled mechanics working together to assemble an entire car, he developed the assembly line along which individual unskilled workers were given a single task to repeat as quickly as possible throughout the day. There was no need for them to understand anything about cars and there was no need to collaborate with their colleagues.

This aspect of the new way of organizing the manufacturing process has been called deskilling. In fact, this was one of the complaints of the Luddites. The weavers saw themselves as skilled craftspeople. They knew about cloth and how to make it from start to finish – skills which proved to be irrelevant in the new factories. Although this process removes an important source of satisfaction for workers it is a big plus for the employers. Instead of paying the relatively high wages of skilled workers the factory can cut its costs by hiring unskilled people.

Questions 1. According to the passage, what is often overlooked in discussions of the benefits and

drawbacks of new technologies in the economy?

2. What is an assembly line?

3. Why was Henry Ford able to employ unskilled workers to do jobs that were previously done by

skilled workers?

4. Deskilling is beneficial for employers, but what is the downside for employees?

Vocabulary 1. Who might bless you? When can we use the phrase a mixed blessing?

2. What is the adjective in the first paragraph that means “not too expensive”?

3. If your career is your overriding priority, what does this mean?

4. Which word in the second paragraph means “work with someone else”?

5. Painting and sculpture are arts. Can you name any examples of crafts?

6. Which phrase in the last paragraph means “reduce the amount of money it has to pay”?

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Writing

Here’s the topic:

What is your assessment of the impact of increasing automation? In your opinion, what, if anything, should be done to maximize the benefits of automation for society?

Automation has obviously had both costs and benefits, so it would be logical to have one paragraph for the positive aspects and one for the negative aspects after your introduction. The last paragraph should include your final assessment plus your view about what ought to be done in the future.

You could begin your introduction like this:

Since the dawn of the Industrial Revolution .... (describe increasing automation, first in

factories then, with the proliferation of computer hardware and software, in every single office.

You can emphasize how tremendous the ramifications/repercussions of this have been both for

consumers and for those at work.) Few would doubt that ... (mention how beneficial the

development has been), but many would also concede that... (mention that some of the

consequences have given us a cause for concern).

Here’s a phrase you could use for the second paragraph:

Automation has been a boon to both employers and consumers.

(You will remember that if something is a boon to someone you mean it improves their lives in some

significant way.)

The third paragraph could begin like this:

On the other hand, increasing automation has not been without its drawbacks.

In the conclusion you don’t simply have to decide whether or not to give the thumbs-up to automation. The question gives you the opportunity to think about some of the steps we should be considering. For instance, should we be trying to keep as much skilled work for people to do as possible? (Would this be feasible? Could you ban word-processing software in offices to protect the jobs of secretaries, for example?) Alternatively, should we give free rein to increasing automation and deskilling and tackle unemployment by reducing the length of the working week for everyone (e.g. limiting it to, say, 20 hours a week)?

You could begin in one of the two following ways:

On the whole, it seems clear that the benefits of ........... outweigh the drawbacks.

After considering both sides of the issue, it is clear that although automation has had important benefits it has also had some unpleasant consequences.

You could continue like this:

As far as the future is concerned, it would seem wise to try to ...

Writing tip A piece of advice about writing generally is: avoid platitudes. A platitude is a boring statement that is too general or too vague. Here is an example from a student who cannot be bothered to think sufficiently deeply about the topic to find an interesting way of beginning his introduction:

As time passes everything changes. This is certainly true about work.

Other platitudes include: There are two sides to every coin. And: What goes up must come down.

Platitudes are to be avoided because they indicate that we are not thinking carefully about the topic in question. A good essay is not just a collection of grammatically correct sentences. It must also have something interesting and informative to say about the topic.

Write it! Write 250-300 words about the thorny issue of automation.

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Unit 20 Cyberspace

Introduction

Let’s get things going with a little discussion of the internet.

1. For you personally, is the internet useful? Is it worth the money (assuming you have to pay

an Internet Service Provider to get access to the internet)?

2. What difficulties have you encountered when trying to gather information on the web?

3. How useful is email?

4. Do you have any experience of chat rooms? Do facilities like these mean that the internet can

really help put people in touch with each other?

Reading

A Crash Course in the Internet The internet was originally the brainchild of the US Department of Defense. In the late 1950s and early 1960s the Cold War between the US and the Soviet Union was particularly icy and the military planners were worried that once things started hotting up and the bombs started falling traditional telecommunications systems would soon fail, dealing a severe blow to the planned counter-strike. Hence the idea for a bomb-proof tele-communications system: the internet.

Traditional telephone conversations involve the use of a single line and require a connection to be established by a central switching station. If that line was broken – by being blown up, for instance – all communication would be lost. Another vulnerability was that the central control system would be an obvious target for attack.

To avoid these weaknesses the internet was to be a decentralized network of communicating computer systems where signals would always have many alternative routes between all senders and receivers. In addition, a message would no longer be sent as one long signal down a single line. Messages would be split up into small chunks of information (called packets), labeled electronically and then sent along different routes in the network simultaneously – a process called packet-switching. If part of the network got shot to pieces, the chunks could still get through to their ultimate destination along the remaining connections. At the receiving end the software would reassemble the chunks in the correct order to reproduce the original message. Protocols were devised to standardize the way information gets broken up into packets and then labeled (“protocol” being a piece of terminology that refers more generally to any standard way of doing something).

Once the first primitive version of the internet was set up in 1969 between a small number of US universities the various potential uses of the net soon became apparent. One was the sharing of computing facilities. People could remotely log onto computers in a different part of the country enabling programmes to be run or files to be transferred from one computer to another. Very quickly, though, it became apparent that the net was being used more for sending personal messages than for serious research. E-mail, which began in 1971, became one of the most popular services offered by the internet due to its speed and the fact that there were no extra charges for long distances.

Everything changed in 1991 when the world-wide web was established. People who have grown up with the web sometimes assume that the web is synonymous with the internet. This, though, is a misconception. The internet was text-based and too complicated and off-putting for people without specialist knowledge. The web made it possible to present text, images, animation and sound together on pages which were easily accessible for the general public using a simple programme called a web browser. One feature was the system of links – text or images that could be clicked to take you to other pages instead of the laborious process of retrieving information in the internet’s pre-web days.

The popularity of the web took off at a staggering rate. When the first browser came on the market in 1993 there were only 600 websites but this soon rose to 10,000 in 1994 and then topped 100,000 the following year. By the end of the decade there were over 68 million websites and it was estimated that one in three English speakers around the world were regular internet users.

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Questions 1. What was the original idea behind the internet?

2. What is packet-switching?

3. The passage mentions a number of different things that can be done over the internet.

Describe three of them.

4. What is a browser?

5. When trying to relate the internet and the web, which is the most accurate description?

a. The web and the internet are interchangeable expressions.

b. The web replaced the internet, so it would be better if we stopped using the word “internet”.

c. The web offered a new way of representing and accessing information transferred over the internet.

Vocabulary A. Look for words in the text above with the following meanings (the numbers in brackets refer to

the paragraphs)

a. a suffix that means “not affected or damaged by” (p1)

b. a noun indicating that something can be easily damaged or hurt (p2) c. divide (p3)

d. at the same time (p3)

e. small piece (p3) f. final (p3)

g. put back together (p3) h. from a distance (adverb) (p4)

i. a mistaken idea (p5)

j. requiring a lot of work (p5) k. to fetch or get something (p5)

l. surprising (p6)

B. The name for the software that gives you access to the web – browser – is derived from the

verb “to browse”. The following dialogue from a bookshop illustrates the main use of this verb. What does it mean in this context?

Assistant: “Can I help you, Sir?”

Customer: “I’d just like to browse, if that’s alright.”

C. In the passage we came across the word counter-strike. In the following three sentences

counter is used in closely related ways. In the fourth, however, it is quite different.

a. If you launch a counter-attack, are you the aggressor or did the enemy attack you

first?

b. We hear a lot nowadays about counter-terrorism operations. What do you think these are?

c. If you are bitten by a snake you need to be given something to counteract the effect of the poison. What does this mean?

d. If you are your country’s Minister for Education and you refer to your counterpart in

Bolivia, who are you referring to?

D. Choose the correct meaning for the word deal in each of these sentences:

1. At the beginning of a card game someone deals the cards. 2. It is against the law to deal in drugs. 3. Unemployment can deal a heavy blow to families that are already on the poverty line.

a. inflict (give something that hurts) b. give them out

c. buy and sell

Language extra: Get and Have A. Surely you remember the so-called causative form from the old days. Let’s say you don’t want to paint your house yourself. You know Bob’s a good painter, though. So (complete this

sentence): You get Bob ...............................................

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We can also use “have”, but it is not quite so common and can sound a bit more formal. With “have” the grammar changes slightly. How could you rewrite the sentence above beginning like

this? You have Bob ..............................................

Bob is a painter, so let’s call him the agent of the action in question. Instead of the agent,

“have” and “get” can be immediately followed by the object of the action (e.g. the house that is

going to be painted). Let’s imagine you are a lazy rich guy who can’t be bothered to mow his own lawn (mow is an irregular verb: mow, mowed, mown). Fortunately there is a kid down the

road who is keen to supplement his pocket money with a little weekend gardening. So you can say:

I will get the lawn ..........................................

Now, if we use “have” instead of “get” does the grammar change?

How would you complete the following sentence to describe situations like the ones above where we use the causative?

We can use the causative to talk about situations in which

a. people offer to do things for us. b. we arrange for people to do things for us. c. someone does something to us.

B. There are other uses of “get” and “have”. In some situations nobody is asked to do something.

You’d better not do that again or you’re gonna get your teeth kicked in.

He was such a funny guy. He had us laughing all the way through the show.

Last month I got my MP3 player stolen. I was so angry.

C. “Get” can also be used to mean “persuade”:

She’ll never get me to apologise.

Try and get her to tell you what she saw.

D. “Have” can be used with “won’t” to express your refusal to allow something:

I won’t have my kids treating me like a bloody taxi driver.

I won’t have them spoil my party.

I won’t have the innocent minds of my young children corrupted by the filth that is

broadcast on TV nowadays.

Practice: Use “get” or “have” to rewrite these sentences (omitting one or more verbs as

appropriate):

1. Tell them to sit down and shut up.

........................................................................

2. I’ll take my bike to Eddy and he’ll fix it.

.................................................................................

3. They smashed her windscreen during the riot.

.........................................................................................

4. Your hair needs cutting.

..................................................

5. I persuaded them that the plan was crazy. (Hint: use the verb “realize”)

..........................................................................................

6. King Charles’ head was cut off.

..............................................................

7. I refuse to let them use bad language in the house.

.......................................................................................................

8. I won’t let my lovely lawn be used as a football pitch.

.........................................................................................................

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Pre-reading Let’s get back to the web. It can be an amazing resource but connecting your PC to the internet is not without its hazards. Before you read the next passage you should discuss what you

already know about the unpleasant things that can happen to your PC if you connect it to the

internet without having adequate security software.

Reading

Net Threats As the internet grew in popularity with people who wanted to make good use of it, it also became increasingly attractive for mischievous individuals who just wanted to throw a spanner in the works. The first form of internet mischief was the virus. In 1988, only five years after the internet came into operation for civilian use, large parts of the system crashed when Robert Morris spread a self-replicating worm programme that put over 6,000 host computers out of action.

The next form of mischief was hacking. In 1989 Kevin Mitnick attained notoriety as the first person to be convicted for gaining unauthorized access to a computer for criminal purposes. After being locked up for a year Kevin was obviously unrepentant. The hard-core cyber barbarian went right back to his old ways on release. He hacked his way into bank computers and stole 20,000 credit card numbers only to be found out, arrested and sent back to jail for another four years.

A more recent form of mischief has involved using certain viruses to create so-called zombie PCs. In contrast to earlier viruses which were designed to do obvious and disabling damage to your computer, the new pieces of malicious software – malware – can be operating on your PC without you being aware of it. The most vulnerable PCs are those with a broadband connection which are permanently online. Thousands of these can be infected by the same piece of malware so that they are ready to coordinate their activities in what is known as a botnet.

The hijacked computers may be used to spread spam (unsolicited e-mails which usually advertise something), to gather personal information which can then be sold to advertisers, or even to mount attacks on websites. Companies have been known to attack their competitor’s websites using botnets to inundate them with so much data that they are overwhelmed and knocked offline.

If you are worried that your computer might have been hijacked, watch out for these telltale signs: it becomes unusually sluggish and so you have to wait for it to perform operations that were previously done in a fraction of a second; the LEDs on your modem (if you have an external modem) start flashing even though you are doing nothing online; you suddenly find that the homepage for your browser has been changed or that new web addresses have popped up in your favourites list; or you find it impossible to send e-mails to your friends because they keep getting rejected by their spam filters. To avoid all this, you need a properly configured personal firewall (your first line of defence against nasty stuff on the internet that wants to use your computer) coupled with the latest anti-virus software that must then be regularly updated by downloading the latest additions. The net can be fun, but it is also fraught with danger.

Questions 1. A spanner is a tool for tightening or removing nuts and bolts. In the expression “throw a

spanner in the works” the word “works” refers literally to a piece of machinery with interconnected moving parts. What do you think the expression means here (paragraph 1)?

2. Which three threats to users of the internet are mentioned in the passage?

............................. ............................. ......................................................

3. After committing his crime Kevin Mitnick was unrepentant. What do you think this means?

(Clue: in a religious context it is not uncommon to be told that because we are sinners we should repent so that we can be forgiven.)

4. What is malware?

5. What is spam?

6. What is a botnet?

7. How can you protect your PC against these internet threats?

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Vocabulary Look for words or phrases with the following meanings:

a. an adjective describing someone who wants to cause trouble for others (p1)

b. making copies of itself (p1)

c. (literally:) a small, legless animal that lives in the soil and eats dead vegetable matter (p1) d. fame for disreputable activities (p2)

e. without permission (p2) f. wanting to cause harm (adjective) (p3)

g. a word indicating that something has not been asked for (p4)

h. to launch or start (p4) i. (literally:) to flood (p4)

j. a verb indicating that something is too much for someone to cope with (p4) k. too slow (p5)

l. the name for a type of small light (p5) m. going on and off (p5)

n. with the settings changed in line with your system’s requirements (p5)

Notes: 1. Fraught with danger is a relatively common expression even though the word fraught is the past

participle of a verb that is now long-forgotten. The verb originally meant “to load a ship”. A related word is freight, which refers to the cargo carried by ships or trains.

2. We know what software and hardware are, but do we know what the “–ware” suffix refers to? Let’s remember that we also have the words warehouse, kitchen ware and glass ware. Wares are

actually merchandise, so a warehouse is a place for storing merchandise and kitchen ware is simply things you can buy for your kitchen.

3. Sluggish comes from slug which is the name for a slimy animal that “walks” on its mouth. It bears a strong resemblance to a snail – which you may have eaten – the big difference being that the snail

carries a shell around while the slug remains homeless.

Vocabulary extra In this unit we have come across the adjectives accessible and vulnerable. The suffixes –able and –ible can cause problems. Sometimes there is a difference in pronunciation, as in possible

and probable, but the difference is small and not always easy to remember. In general the suffix -able is more common, and it is the one chosen for all new adjectives. Unfortunately there is no

simple rule to determine whether an adjective should end in –able or –ible, so you just have to

write a list and learn it. Use our list on the left to fill in the gaps on the right.

credible

indelible

irresistible

(in)compatible

(im)plausible

(in)edible

(in)audible

(in)comprehensible

(in)digestible

(il)legible

(im)permissible

(in)flexible

(in)admissible

(ir)reversible

(in)accessible

gullible

(in)fallible

(in)defensible

(un)feasible

susceptible

1. Your handwriting is so ....................... that I suggest you type your next composition on the computer. There is no point handing in work that I can’t read.

2. When you buy a new piece of hardware to connect to your computer you need to check that the two are .................................... otherwise you won’t be able to connect them or they won’t work together properly.

3. When people are too trusting and naive so that they are easily tricked, we say that they are ........................

4. People in marketing know that children are even more .............................. to advertising than adults – they are much more easily influenced.

5. Some marks or stains on clothes will come out in the wash, but others are ............................

6. Something might be ................................ because you can’t chew it or because it has a disgusting taste or because it is poisonous.

7. There are whistles which produce a sound that is painful for dogs but ....................... to the human ear.

8. When I looked more closely at the plan I realized it wasn’t going to work – it was just not ...........................

9. According to theology, God never makes any mistakes. In other words, He is considered to be ................................

10. Because there were signs that the accused had been tortured the judge decided that his signed confession was ................................. – it could not be accepted by the court as evidence.

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Language extra: spelling

Trying to get the spelling of English words right can be a real headache. Of course, nowadays we have spell-checkers, but there are still a few rules that one ought to be familiar with. Here are a

handful:

1. We know the verbs refer and rebel, and we know that when we add –ed they look like this: referred and rebelled. Here the last consonant is doubled. But why isn’t it doubled in

labeled and benefited? Try this to find out what the rule is: Say the verbs refer, rebel, label and benefit aloud. These are words of more than one syllable, and you should notice

that in the two groups the stress falls on different syllables. Can you work out the rule?

Which syllable is stressed in those words whose last consonant must be doubled when we add –ed?

2. Those were words of more than one syllable. But what about one-syllable words like peel (as in: peel an orange before you eat it) or rap (which can mean “hit” or, in American

English, “have a friendly conversation”)? With peel we don’t double the consonant when we add –ed (peeled), but with rap we do (rapped). Again, say the words out loud, think

about the length of the vowel sound and try to work out the rule. Explain how the rule

works in these cases: wipe, whip.

A similar rule applies to words like holy (of great religious significance) and holly (a tree

with small red berries and spiky green leaves used as decoration at Christmas). Which word has the double consonant: the one with the longer vowel sound or the one with the shorter?

3. The spelling rule that every English kid learns at school is: “I before E except after C.” This

as a fairly good rule for words with one particular vowel sound. Hence, we have mischief, field, thief, grief and siege, and then we have receive, receipt, deceive and ceiling.

Can you say the vowel sound (-ei- or –ie-) that these words have in common? Now you should be able to explain why it applies to these words but not to words like: either,

neither, weight and height.

Unfortunately, as with every rule, there are exceptions, such as: protein, species, seize, and caffeine.

Console and PC Games: harmless fun or a worrying development?

Let’s turn to computer games. Everyone has a list of fun things to do in their free time. How high up on your list are computer games? Discuss this as a class and compare your levels of interest.

What are your favourite games?

Now we will have a look at three short texts on the topic of computer games as preparation for the

writing task at the end of the unit.

1. Toys for Boys?

Computer games are often said to be toys for boys. The overwhelming majority of the programmers are men and they design games that are of interest primarily to fellow males. Hence the proliferation of games to do with guns and cars. The female characters that populate these virtual worlds are often the product of inflated male fantasies. After taking a critical look at digital girls like Lara Croft, the feminist Germaine Greer said: “Whatever these characters are, they are not real women.” One result of this sexism is that many women are put off computer games.

Henry Jenkins, director of comparative media studies at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, has even argued that the prevalence of sexist stereotypes in games is one of the reasons for the huge gender gap in the world of computing. Since electronic games are often a person’s first introduction to the world of computing, off-putting sexist stereotypes in those games are bound to be one reason why so few women choose to pursue a career in IT.

Doug Lowenstein, president of the US trade body, the Entertainment Software Association (ESA), expressed his reservations about the narrow appeal many games have for women. Although ESA figures show that a third of console players are women, many of these women are casual gamers, who play far fewer games, far less frequently than their male counterparts. Lowenstein concluded: "We need a cultural shift so that young girls and women feel that playing games is not a hobby reserved for their boyfriends and husbands."

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Vocabulary Match the words in bold with the following meanings:

a. discouraging b. a little box with switches and knobs

used to control a machine or play a game

c. change

d. spread, multiplication e. widespread existence

f. mild criticisms g. overly developed, swollen

Note: Notice the way the phrasal verb put off is turned into off-putting. The same pattern is evident in

these words: upbringing, outspoken, downtrodden, outstanding.

Questions 1. The passage concentrates on one feature of computer games that might justify calling them “toys

for boys”. What feature is that?

2. What is Henry James’ concern about the long-term influence of male-orientated computer games?

3. Given Doug Lowenstein’s job he is unlikely to give overriding priority to the moral issue of gender equality, so why do you think he urged the entertainment software industry to produce more

female-orientated games?

Over to you a. Do you agree that girls are put off computer games? If so, what makes them off-putting?

b. How sympathetic are you to Germaine Greer’s point of view? Is it reasonable to expect to see

realistic characters in games? Do boys mind if male characters in games are not entirely true to life?

c. Henry Jenkins blames computer games. Can you think of any other reasons why so few girls are interested in a career in information technology?

2. Dumbing Down? A. The phrasal verb to dumb down is a recent addition to the English language – it is an informal expression meaning “to reduce the intellectual level of something”. Back in unit 18 we

came across the idea that TV is helping to dumb down the culture that kids are acquiring.

Discussion: Do you think computer games might help to develop certain intellectual abilities? Could they hold back other aspects of a child’s development?

B. Now read these three paragraphs and answer the questions which follow:

Some critics have frowned upon computer games because they help to consolidate a culture that does not promote the intellectual development of the child. There are a number of aspects that have been picked out. One is language. Some critics who were brought up on a diet of literature are grieved to see generations of young people spending less and less time on activities that might help them to become more articulate. Books used to be a form of escape for some children, and reading them improved their language skills. Computer games join movies and music as forms of entertainment that require much less effort and do nothing to improve a child’s command of his or her language.

Other critics are more concerned about the fate of critical thought in contemporary culture. These games, like all forms of easily consumed entertainment, never prompt us to reflect upon ourselves and our world – they encourage an approach to the world which could be called superficial. Fast-paced, visually stimulating games suck kids into a virtual world where they are trained to shoot first and ask questions later (although, in practice, the questions never get asked at all). Admittedly the games are far from mindless activities, but the intellect that they require is merely one which can quickly solve technical problems – it is not one which might question the rules of the game. These games quietly convey the message that anyone who wastes time contemplating the ultimate values that the game promotes is going to lose.

Another aspect is emotional intelligence (EQ). Even when playing football in the street, there is a chance that children’s emotional intelligence might flourish. When they play with real kids people get hurt from time to time and they need to learn how to deal with that to ensure that everyone wants to carry on playing together. With virtual opponents in electronic games the other guy always comes back to play as soon as you press the button even though you’ve shot him a thousand times and have never gone over to say you are sorry. If kids spend too much time in virtual, push-button worlds, there is a real possibility that the development of their emotional intelligence will be retarded.

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Vocabulary Match the words in bold with the following meanings:

a. sadden b. think about c. thinking about

d. able to use language to express yourself well

e. hold back the development of something f. control, mastery

g. look down on h. cause, encourage

i. make something stronger j. concerned only with the surface of things

Questions 1. What are the three different aspects of the intellect that these critics are concerned about.

2. According to the first paragraph which of the following is true?

a. Playing computer games can actually reduce the level of a child’s linguistic abilities. b. Children who do not play computer games will improve their command of their language. c. computer games do not help children become more articulate.

d. Playing computer games is the worst way a child could spend his or her time.

3. As it is used in the second paragraph, does suck mean:

a. the opposite of “blow” b. be bad

c. attract

Over to you 1. In some parts of the world candidates for pilot training programmes in the air force are put in

front of a computer to see if they can play two games at the same time. Clearly, the air force thinks that certain computer games can be used to demonstrate that the player has some kind of intellectual ability. Does this undermine the argument in the second paragraph?

2. To what extent do you agree with the idea that computer games give kids a training in insensitivity?

3. Would it be better if kids played games in which they had to solve conflicts instead of trying to slaughter the enemy and conquer the world?

3. Will Wright’s defence of gaming Will Wright has been hugely influential in the world of entertainment software, particularly in creating games with simulated virtual worlds that players can design and watch develop. Sim City was the first of these in 1989, and the Sims, which went on sale in 2000, became the best-selling computer game of all time, spawning numerous expansion packs and related games. Here are some of his thoughts about the value of games like his.

The human imagination is an amazing thing. As children, we spend much of our time in imaginary worlds, substituting toys and make-believe for our real surroundings. As we play, we learn. We develop and practise strategies for meeting the challenges that confront us – strategies that are equally useful in the real world.

For instance, when kids nowadays have a new game to play they don’t bother with the manual, they just pick up the controller and start pressing buttons to see what happens. A process of trial and error gives the players the empirical evidence they need to start to grasp the underlying rules of the game. As the players refine their understanding, they begin to master the game world. It's a rapid cycle of hypothesis, experiment, and analysis. This isn't a random process; it's the essence of the scientific method, and a great form of intellectual training.

People who denigrate computer games as violent, addictive, childish or worthless are on the whole non-gamers. The fact that they can’t appreciate the positive aspects of gaming stems from the fact that watching someone play a game and actually playing it are vastly different. Only by playing a good interactive computer game can you appreciate the opportunities it gives the player to explore a new environment, and then use their ingenuity to try to direct the drama that unfolds within it. Instead of just passively following a linear narrative, as you do with a novel or a film, you are actively involved in shaping the lives of the characters. Contrary to the criticism that videogames lead to a

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withering of the imagination, interactive PC games actually amplify our powers of imagination.

There is also a social dimension that people often forget. This is not limited to multiplayer games. There are also online communities for players and these are some of the most vibrant on the Web. For these players, games are not just entertainment but a vehicle for self-expression and an invaluable opportunity to interact with other people who share the same interests.

Vocabulary A. Look for words in bold in the text and in the introduction that have the following meanings:

a. put down, criticize severely

b. using one thing in the place of another c. that look like the real thing

d. based on experience e. face, stand in front of

f. creating, leading to

g. understand h. cleverness

i. by chance j. to take something to a higher level of perfection

k. becoming weaker, less well developed l. lively

m. going in a straight line

n. a booklet telling you how to use something

B. You know how to fold a piece of paper, but what does it mean when we say that a story

unfolds?

Questions 1. According to Will Wright, how does playing computer games help prepare a child for the

world of modern science and technology?

2. According to Will Wright, why is playing a computer game superior to reading a novel?

3. Some people have criticised computer games for retarding children’s social development. What is Will Wright’s response to this criticism?

Writing Having discussed this rich array of ideas the following writing task should be a piece of cake.

One US senator (Hillary Clinton) made the following comment: "The disturbing material in many games is stealing the innocence of our children and it's making the difficult job of being a parent even harder..." She is not alone in being concerned about the impact computer games are having on the development of the younger generation. To what extent do you think that anxieties like these are justified, and what response, if any, do you think parents and others ought to make?

Planning: If you are either ambivalent (in two minds) about computer games or if you are generally positive it might be a good idea to concentrate on the positive aspects in the second

paragraph. Then you could mention your misgivings or other people’s misgivings about certain

aspects of the phenomenon in the third paragraph. Alternatively, if you disagree with the critics you could present some of their ideas and try to show why they are wrong. You should save

your advice to parents for the last paragraph.

Try to come up with a plan now and discuss it with the rest of the class. Share your ideas about

the advice to be given to parents.

There isn’t any extra help with the language in this unit but you should feel free to look back at other units if you want to borrow phrases that we have already come across.

Just do it! (to borrow a motto from an American sportswear manufacturer)

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F u l l s p a t e P r eF u l l s p a t e P r eF u l l s p a t e P r eF u l l s p a t e P r e ---- P r o f i c i e n c y P r im e rP r o f i c i e n c y P r im e rP r o f i c i e n c y P r im e rP r o f i c i e n c y P r im e r

Unit 21 The Last Rights Introduction Death is the last taboo. In a culture which would prefer to think only about youth, health and

vitality, it is a topic that few are willing to talk about. Yet, despite its unpleasantness there is no

getting away from the fact that dying is a part of living.

The topic of this unit is not death as such, but whether or not we should be allowed to control the

manner of our dying. A few people argue that it would be easier for them to get on and enjoy life if they knew they would be able to control the course of events at the end of their lives. This is

a particularly pressing issue for those who suffer from a terminal illness. Some of these people don’t want to have the rest of their lives clouded by the prospect of a possibly painful and

lingering death.

In other words, the topic of this unit is the thorny issue of euthanasia.

First of all we need to distinguish different forms of euthanasia. Try to match the names of the

three forms to the explanations.

1. Involuntary euthanasia

2. Voluntary euthanasia

3. Medically assisted suicide

a. Before the condition of a terminally ill patient deteriorates she makes a clear and

uncoerced statement that she wants her life to be ended at some specific point in the

progress of the illness. When that point arrives the doctor grant’s the patient’s wish by administering a lethal injection.

b. The patient signs an official request form and after a number of checks by other doctors and psychiatrists a doctor prepares the drugs which the patient then takes by herself

(either orally or by means of a patient-controlled injection system if oral administration is impossible).

c. Also known as “mercy killing” it refers usually to cases where there is no relief for a person’s suffering and people feel that the most compassionate response is to end that

person’s life even though he or she never previously expressed a wish for that.

Vocabulary A. Use simpler expressions in English to explain the meaning of the phrases in bold:

1. Like the activities that go on in bathrooms and bedrooms, death is a taboo subject for many people.

2. A few people want to have more control over the manner of their dying.

3. Some issues are pressing, others are thorny. Which would you say are urgent and which are particularly difficult to solve?

4. What does it mean if the rest of your life is clouded by worries?

5. If the police coerce you into signing a confession do you sign voluntarily?

6. What does a doctor do when she administers an injection?

7. If your fairy godmother appeared, what wish would you like her to grant?

8. When we talk about oral hygiene we talk about keeping a specific part of the body clean and healthy. Which part?

B. In the introduction we came across the word linger. Can you work out what the word means

in these sentences:

• The bar was now closed and everyone had gone to bed but I wanted to linger for a while by the hotel pool.

• (About a woman who is dying:) There’s really no way of knowing how long she’ll linger.

• In some remote rural areas a few of the old traditions linger on.

The word linger can have a positive connotation. By contrast, the word loiter (meaning “hang around”) often has a negative connotation:

• Many local residents are complaining about the number of illegal immigrants who loiter in the town square.

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Reading A national debate about euthanasia was sparked in Britain by the case of Dianne Pretty. She desperately wanted a form of euthanasia. Do you think her wish should or should not have been granted?

The Story of Dianne Pretty Dianne Pretty was a 41-year-old mother of two when she was diagnosed with motor neurone disease in 1999 – an incurable disease of the nervous system that causes a progressive degeneration of all the body’s muscles. Dianne knew that in the last stages of the disease she would face a slow death. Completely paralysed she would be unable to swallow so she would have to be fed through a nasogastric tube. She would also lose her speech and it would gradually become more and more difficult to breathe. Dianne found it particularly disturbing to think that she might finally choke to death.

Knowing what lay ahead she desperately wanted to arrange things so that her life would end the moment she lost the ability to speak to her loved ones. By that time her limbs would be paralysed so she would need help to die. Ideally she wanted her husband, Brian, to be the one to give her the injection that would spare her any further agony.

In 2001 she took her case to court to try to establish that she and her husband had the right to do this. One of her arguments was this: since under British law she had a right to commit suicide, surely it must be permissible for someone to help her commit suicide once her paralysis meant that she could no longer do it herself?

Before the verdict she made this comment to the press: “I hope I am granted this last wish. If I am allowed to decide when and how I will die, I will have kept hold of my autonomy and my dignity.”

The court dismissed her arguments on the grounds that according to British law it is illegal to help someone commit suicide. Consequently she was, in effect, compelled to end her days in just the agony that she so wanted to avoid. A friend of hers who was with Dianne shortly before she died in 2002 said it was utterly distressing to see Dianne feel that she was being tortured by not being allowed to leave her family in peace and tranquillity at the time of her choosing.

Questions 1. How are people with Dianne Pretty’s disease normally fed once they can no longer swallow?

2. Why didn’t Dianne Pretty want to die a natural death?

3. What was one of the arguments she used to try to justify what she and her husband were

planning to do?

4. Why did the court reject that argument?

Vocabulary Match the words in bold with the following.

a. reject

b. becoming weaker and weaker c. peacefulness

d. being unable to breathe because something is obstructing the normal functioning of the lungs

e. the final judgment in a court of law f. to do something so that someone doesn’t suffer something unpleasant

g. to clarify the truth about something

Over to you Do you think that the court was right to dismiss Dianne Pretty’s request? Should her husband

have been allowed to help her pass away painlessly?

Can you think of any reasons people might use to argue that assisted suicide should remain illegal?

Reading Another frequent point of reference in the debate about euthanasia is Holland. Holland and

Switzerland are the only European countries where voluntary euthanasia is legal. (In the US it is generally prohibited although a prominent exception is the state of Oregon.) What follows is the

story of one woman from Holland. (In the title the word “fitting” means “right and appropriate.”)

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A Fitting End Tina announced she wanted euthanasia. Being Dutch, she had every right to be granted this request. For years the 92-year-old woman had been battling against bone cancer - one of the most painful forms of the disease - with the help of an oxygen tank and morphine. Her three daughters were taking turns to nurse her at home.

This proud and independent woman had said that she didn’t want to end her days confined to bed in intolerable pain or heavily sedated, so when the pain worsened and she found she could no longer get out of her chair on her own the final arrangements were made.

She had decided it would happen on Monday 13 January at 2pm and that she would drink the fatal mixture, rather than having the alternative of an injection. The doctor also wanted it to be a Monday. He only carried out euthanasia about once in two years and always found it emotionally draining. Mondays were the easiest days to take off.

As required by Dutch law, a doctor who was a stranger to the family and who was specially trained to handle euthanasia cases had visited her the week before to make sure there was nothing more that could be done to alleviate her condition.

The family had a champagne party with her the night before and Tina made a speech. She was proud of the speech, noting in her diary that the champagne had helped her speak well.

The next day, when Tina was waiting for the doctor she turned to the four grandchildren and asked: “Aren't you bored? Don't you want to make it nicer? Go and get some cakes or something.” She had been a teacher and lecturer all her working life.

When the doctor arrived everyone was gathered around the bed. The doctor asked her formally if she wanted to go ahead. Sometimes patients change their mind at this stage, but not Tina. The youngest daughter handed her the cup. She drank it without hesitation, but as was her habit with tea and coffee, she left some dregs. The doctor asked her to drink up. Within 30 seconds she was unconscious and 15 minutes later the lethal cocktail had taken its full effect.

One of her relatives commented afterwards: “It was clear that her decision had given her back her old pride and dignity: she was now in control - not the illness, not death, and not even us. She managed to remain right up to the end the strong, wise woman she had always been.”

Questions 1. Why did Tina not want to “let nature take its course”, as we say in English?

2. Why did the doctor want to take the rest of the day off?

3. What did she do to try to make the procedure less unpleasant for the grandchildren?

4. What was the last thing the doctor did immediately before Tina was given the lethal mixture?

5. What did she usually do when she drank tea or coffee?

6. What is implied about the attitude of Tina’s relatives to the way she chose to end her life?

Vocabulary 1. People who are very ill are confined to bed. What does this mean?

2. Which word in the second paragraph (not in bold) indicates that someone has been given a drug to make them calmer?

3. Bathrooms in the Mediterranean often have a hole in the floor called a drain that allows any water that falls on the floor to drain away (i.e. to flow away so that there is no water left on

the bathroom floor). What do you think the doctor means when he says that the experience of carrying out euthanasia is emotionally draining?

4. Which verb in the fifth paragraph – well-known by now – means: to make a bad situation better?

5. It should be obvious from the context what the word dregs refers to.

6. Your friend can’t wait to go bowling but you still haven’t finished your milkshake. Why does she tell you to drink up (instead of just saying “Drink”)?

7. In this context does cocktail mean “alcoholic drink” or “a mixture of liquids”?

Discussion point If you had been one of Tina’s relatives, would you have gone along with her decision or would you have tried to get her to change her mind?

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Vocabulary extra A. Here are some closely related adjectives and an adverb. Put them into the appropriate gaps in the sentences below. An eighth word not given below is required in sentence 3.

mortal fatal lethal malignant deadly malicious terminal

1. The publication of the allegations was clearly a ........................ act. It was obvious that the editors wanted to do real harm to the leader of the opposition.

2. Unlike God and the angels, we are only here for a short time. In other words, we are .............

3. A tumour (cancerous growth) which would lead to our death if left untreated is called .............. (The opposite adjective is: b....................... – the adjective used to describe lumps that won’t do any damage to us if we leave them untreated.)

4. A tool or a weapon that could easily be used to kill people is said to be ...........................

5. A ................... mistake is one which has disastrous consequences for the future.

6. There are special hospitals called hospices, which cater specifically for patients who have a ....................... illness and are not expected to live more than a few weeks.

7. I thought she was joking, but it turned out she was ....................... serious about resigning.

B. Because we don’t want to be morbid (as you are when you think too much about death and

other unpleasant things) let’s practise a few words with more positive connotations.

invigorating crowning triumph

prolific hatch birth

bliss fruit benevolent

guardian console revive

1. After giving ........................... the female employee was granted four month’s maternity leave.

2. Despite all the rejections, the author’s effort and determination finally bore ..................... when her book was accepted by a major publisher and quickly became a best-seller.

3. She is one of the most ........................... writers I have ever known, sometimes managing to write two books a year.

4. The .......................... achievement in her career came when she was given the Nobel prize for literature.

5. The boy had been looking forward to seeing the baby chickens ...................... He loved to see the eggs crack and the tiny beaks appearing as the birds broke through the shell.

6. Although the patient’s heart had stopped the doctors were able to use an electric shock to ...................... him – a technique known as artificial resuscitation.

7. Despite my terrible wounds and the fact that I would never walk again, Tracy tried to ................ me with the thought that as long as there is love there is hope.

8. For him it was a great ......................... when he finally managed to kick his habit and stop being an alcoholic.

9. The women’s association in the village is a .................................... organization that aims to help local people who are in need.

10. I find that a quick cold shower in the morning is very ........................... – it makes me feel so much more energetic.

11. Some people believe that they have a ............................. angel – an angel that watches over them and protects them from harm.

12. If we want to experience pure ......................... (happiness) perhaps we will have to wait until we pass through the gates of paradise.

Reading Here is a brief description of what the law says doctors can and cannot do regarding the care of

the terminally ill in the UK. The title uses a Latin expression which is used in English to mean: the way things stand now.

The Status Quo As things stand at the moment in Britain it is illegal for a doctor to help a patient die. If the patient makes it clear that they want to die and the doctor helps them in some way this would amount to assisting someone to commit suicide. Although suicide is legal in Britain, anyone who assists someone else to commit suicide could face a 14-year prison sentence.

According to British law, patients can make a written statement (called “a living will”) declaring that they do not want doctors to use certain techniques that might prolong

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their lives – techniques such as inserting nasogastric feeding tubes and saline drips (known as artificial nutrition and hydration) or artificial resuscitation in the event of a heart attack or the use of antibiotics in the event of a serious infection. Although doctors generally strive to preserve life, they are legally obliged to respect any refusal of treatment.

This gives patients a degree of control over what will happen to them at the end of their lives, but only patients with the strongest of wills could face the sometimes disturbing consequences – which is doubtless why very few patients make statements like this.

Consider the elderly patient who suffers a huge brain haemorrhage that leaves him in a coma. If he has previously stated that he doesn’t want to be given artificial nutrition and hydration, neither of the drips for liquid food and water will be inserted and the patient will, in effect, be left to die of starvation and dehydration. The chances are that the patient will be aware of very little by that stage, but it will undoubtedly be distressing for his relatives to watch their loved one slowly becoming more and more emaciated during the two weeks or so it may take before he finally passes away.

Without any formal statement from the patient it is left to the senior doctors to decide what treatment should or should not be given to a patient who is terminally ill. In some cases there will come a point when the doctors will judge that it is futile trying to prolong their life. The nursing staff are then instructed to switch off or take down whatever artificial aids are keeping the person alive. For the medical profession and in British law there is a very clear distinction between stopping trying to keep someone alive and doing something (like giving them an injection) that will certainly kill them. In comparison to the latter, which is regarded as an “action”, the former is regarded as merely an “omission”.

A few people, though, who have watched relatives die a slow and lingering death in hospital find it hard to believe that a doctor can leave a coma patient to die of dehydration but cannot give him an injection to grant him the peaceful and dignified end he wanted.

Questions 1. There is no law in the UK which specifically prohibits voluntary euthanasia. What law could a

doctor be accused of breaking if he were to grant a patient’s wish for voluntary euthanasia?

2. What is a living will?

3. In the second paragraph what is the name of the device that allows a very dilute salt solution to be slowly introduced into a vein in the arm?

4. What is said in the passage about the unpleasant consequence of the fact that patients can

only refuse treatment?

5. What is the crucial difference in law between switching off someone’s life-support machine

and giving a terminally ill patient a lethal injection?

Vocabulary 1. Which verb means: “make something last longer”?

2. You know the verb drip and the noun drop, but what is the drip that doctors use to maintain a patient’s fluid levels?

3. If you visited a region where there is a famine you would see people who are emaciated. What does this mean?

4. What do we call the drugs used to treat people who have infections?

5. Which adjective means: “lasting longer than expected”?

6. If you declare your support for the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, what do you do?

7. Euphemisms are expressions we use to refer to something in a more sensitive way. Which euphemism is used in place of the verb die in the fourth paragraph (not in bold)?

8. Can you think of any circumstances in which a doctor might judge that it is futile to continue prolonging a person’s life?

9. If a doctor omits to do something, what does this mean?

10. If you are doing hard manual work outdoors on a hot summer’s day and you don’t take any water with you, what are you likely to suffer?

11. What do we mean when we say that the doctors strove to keep the patient alive but in the end they had to accept defeat? (Note: strive, strove, striven)

12. What’s the medical term for internal bleeding?

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Vocabulary extra Linger is a word to do with time. Here are a few more. Use them to fill the gaps below.

protracted prolonging ceaseless defer perpetual durable eternal enduring

1. Some relatives are unhappy when they see doctors artificially ......................... the dying of their loved ones.

2. Some plastics are more vulnerable to the effects of ultraviolet radiation and so are less .................... than others if exposed to sunlight.

3. Dianne Pretty’s lawyer has dedicated herself to the defence of human rights. We have been impressed by her ............................ (never-stopping) campaign for the rights of the terminally ill.

4. Since the earliest days of science people have dreamed of inventing a machine capable of ........................ motion, i.e. a machine that will keep moving forever once it is set in motion .

5. I still wasn’t sure which degree course to do so I decided to ........................ going to university and take a year off.

6. There are those in the field of medicine who still dream of discovering the secret of .................. life (i.e. a life that will never end).

7. One of the problems of getting a divorce is that the legal proceedings are often so .................. (they take ages and ages)

8. As a child I witnessed the wonderful care my Aunt received in hospital, and that left me with a(n) ................ sense of admiration for the medical profession. (it has lasted a long time)

Language extra: discourse markers A. As well as trying to say something about the world we also need to show how sentences relate to each other and we need to show our attitude to what we are saying. Discourse markers are what we use to do this. Read the little dialogues or monologues and match the phrases in bold with the explanations and equivalents on the right.

1. “Maybe someone had placed bombs in the Twin Towers, but the big

story for me is why the firemen didn’t have a good enough

telecommunication system so that the cops in the choppers could

let them know the towers were going to fall.”

“Yeah. By the way, shall we go bowling this evening or just rent

another DVD?”

2. “It was quite a bad accident. She dislocated her shoulder and had

a nasty bruise on her leg for a while. Anyway, she’s as right as rain

now and we’ve managed to fix the scooter.”

3. “I demand to see the manager.”

“I’m afraid she’s away at the moment and she’s left me in charge.”

4. “I think we should allow Fiona to have her nose pierced if she

wants to. After all, a 16-year-old girl deserves a little more

freedom to make her own mistakes.”

5. “Mum, what do you think of my lovely nose ring?”

“Quite frankly Fiona it saddens me that a girl from a family like

ours should have such a poor sense of style.”

6. “So how do you see your life?”

“Well, I don’t know. I guess it’s ..... it’s a kind of ..... it’s a sort of

disaster really.”

7. “I’ve been looking forward to a piece of your tasty chocolate fudge

cake all day, so where is it?”

“To be honest, I’ve eaten it all. I don’t know what came over me.”

8. “Why do you walk around wearing earphones all the time?”

“People talk such rubbish. I’m sick of hearing it. I had to find a

way of avoiding all that verbal garbage. Hence the MP3 player and

the incessant music. It really is the only way.”

a. to admit something unpleasant

b. to introduce a sincere and

critical remark and show that

you are not too worried about hurting people’s feelings

c. to introduce what you think is the strongest argument

d. to show that you are now moving to the end of the story

e. to indicate that you are

apologetic

f. “hang on while I think about

how to put this”

g. “that’s the reason for...”

h. to introduce something that

has no connection with the previous topic of conversation

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B. Some people are still confused about apart from, except for and with the exception of. Let’s clear this up once and for all. Use these phrases to fill the gaps in the following sentences.

In one gap all three phrases are possible, in the other only one.

Everyone passed that tough exam .............................. Bob.

........................ table tennis I am also mad about free-fall parachuting.

Reading Although most of the opinion polls in the UK indicate that the general public is largely in favour of

allowing voluntary euthanasia, the members of parliament have consistently voted to keep it illegal, believing that the arguments against it are too powerful to be dismissed. Here are the most

common arguments:

The Voices of Opposition Speaking on behalf of the many doctors it represents, the British Medical Association (BMA) has strongly opposed the idea of voluntary euthanasia. They have two main arguments. One is that if doctors are obliged in certain circumstances to help people die, this will undermine the ethos of medical practice and the trust that patients have in their doctors. Medicine is about preserving life, not about ending it, and patients trust their doctors partly because of this.

Another objection is that if voluntary euthanasia became available, some terminally ill patients might feel that they were under pressure to opt for it. They might feel that the new law indicated a general social expectation that the terminally ill should choose voluntary euthanasia or they might feel under pressure to choose it because they have become a burden to relatives and carers.

A similar point has been made by a number of groups representing disabled people. One group had this to say: “Legalizing voluntary euthanasia will place pressures on people near the end of their lives. Being the cheapest, quickest and simplest option it will be so much more attractive to health services than providing expensive long-term care.”

A coalition of disabled groups united under the banner “Not Dead Yet” are also worried about the way any change in the law could open the floodgates of social prejudice. They are worried that even a very limited law allowing voluntary euthanasia only for the terminally ill would fan the flames of social prejudice and send society sliding down a slippery slope into the worst form of social discrimination. By making it possible for the terminally ill to end their lives you would feed a wider social presumption that this group of people ought to die. Some disabled spokespeople shudder to think that those with this prejudice would then see no reason for limiting the argument to the terminally ill: why not expect all the unproductive and useless members of society to end their lives?

Although the main reasons why the idea of voluntary euthanasia has been rejected in the past have little or nothing to do with religion, there is a vociferous minority which does base its argument on religious principles. The Christian Medical Fellowship (CMF), for instance, insists that life is sacred. Life is not a thing that we have at our disposal. When it begins and ends lies in the hands of God. It would be a sin for a doctor to help end someone’s life since it would be a breach of the sixth commandment, "You shall not kill."

Questions 1. The BMA claims to speak “on behalf of” all doctors. What does this mean?

2. What is the BMA talking about when it refers to the ethos of medical practice?

3. Some people argue that there would always be a doubt about whether voluntary euthanasia

was completely voluntary. What is said in the passage about why it might it not be completely voluntary?

4. What is the most disturbing repercussion that some disabled groups envisage?

5. Which religious objection to voluntary euthanasia is presented in the fifth paragraph?

Vocabulary A 1. Which word in bold means: a set of ideas and attitudes associated with a particular group of

people or a particular activity?

2. Paragraph 2: if you feel you are a burden to other people, what exactly are you unhappy about?

3. Which word literally means: to destroy the foundations of something, and is used metaphorically

to mean: make a position weaker?

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4. Paragraph 4: what sort of people often carry banners through the streets?

5. Which word means “shake” (usually out of horror)?

6. Can you remember what a vociferous minority is?

7. Which word means: an association or alliance?

8. Which word is virtually synonymous with “holy”?

9. In this context, does “open the floodgates” mean: a. let a huge volume of water in

b. save an area from a disaster comparable to that caused by a flood c. encourage a large number of people to express a feeling

Over to you. In pairs discuss the following:

1. Would the ethos of medical practice and the trust of patients be undermined if voluntary euthanasia were legalised?

2. It is easy to imagine that some people might feel under pressure to opt for euthanasia. How could that be avoided?

3. To what extent do you think that the fears of these disabled groups are reasonable?

4. If a government wanted to legalize voluntary euthanasia what steps could be taken to make sure that they didn’t promote a negative image of the sick and disabled?

5. How appropriate is it to base political policies on religious principles in a liberal democracy?

Vocabulary B We came across the words prejudice and discrimination. Here they are again with some related words. Can you put them in the correct gaps?

impartial racist sexist prejudice biased discriminated dogmatic

1. Edward is a male chauvinist who still thinks a woman’s place is in the home. He is also ....................... against women when it comes to hiring new managers for his business.

2. He says he doesn’t regret having made the ....................... comment that women ought to keep out of politics.

3. People who are .............................. feel contempt for those who have a different ethnic origin.

4. A ............................ is an unreasonable dislike of something. Even after the horrors of World War 2 a few people continue to express a profound racial ...................... against the Jews by writing books denouncing the Semitic race. (N.B. same word twice.)

5. People who are ................................ are so convinced that their opinion is true that they think it is a waste of time looking at the evidence or considering other points of view.

6. Statues representing justice often have a blindfold, indicating that judges are supposed to be ........................

7. The law now states that nobody should be .............................. against just because of their race, gender or religion.

Writing

Topic

Some people who are in the early stages of a terminal illness would like to be able to arrange for a doctor to help them end their lives painlessly when their illness reaches the stage at which they can no longer enjoy a reasonable quality of life. Write an essay of 250 to 300 words in which you weigh up the arguments for and against legalizing voluntary euthanasia in cases of terminal illness. On balance, should this form of voluntary euthanasia be legalized or is the case against legalization the stronger of the two?

To prepare for this essay you could work in pairs to recall and note down the main arguments that

you think you should refer to in your essay, and also try to come to an agreement about the final

assessment. Do the arguments for voluntary euthanasia outweigh those against?

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F u l l s p a t e P r eF u l l s p a t e P r eF u l l s p a t e P r eF u l l s p a t e P r e ---- P r o f i c i e n c y P r im e rP r o f i c i e n c y P r im e rP r o f i c i e n c y P r im e rP r o f i c i e n c y P r im e r

Unit 22 Girls Will Be Girls, and Boys Will Be Boys. Introduction A huge debate that raged throughout the twentieth century concerned the origin of our gender identity: Are girls, for instance, born with a predisposition to engage in certain activities like

playing with dolls, or is it just that they see their mums nurturing children and want to do the

same? This question of whether masculinity and femininity are either biologically or sociologically determined is also known as the nature-nurture debate.

At one extreme is the idea that our characters are extremely malleable. If you believe this, you

might also be convinced that the world would be less brutal, ruthless and bloody if only boys (and let’s face it, it’s the boys who are doing the fighting) could be brought up to be more sensitive,

caring and peace-loving. At the other extreme is the idea that our characters are fixed from birth. In relation to the problem of war, the members of this school of thought might say, with a sigh

of resignation: “Ah, boys will be boys,” implying that there is nothing society could do to stop

them wanting to throw sticks and stones at each other.

Activities 1. One bone of contention here is whether or not there are traits, inclinations and abilities that

men and women have from birth. In pairs go through the following list of characteristics and say

whether you think they are characteristically masculine or feminine.

• selfishness

• an aptitude for languages and for

expressing themselves in language

• being competitive

• having an interest in constructional

toys (building blocks, etc)

• resorting to aggression as a means

of conflict resolution

• willingness to share personal

emotional distress with friends

• an aptitude for maths

• an inclination and ability to reassure

others in distress

• navigational skills, including reading

and drawing maps well

• being able to control how you

express your feelings

• assertiveness and leadership skills

• making more eye contact during a

conversation

• having an appetite for taking risks

• decoding subtle variations in non-

verbal communication to understand

how people are really feeling

• a tendency to be obsessive

• being bitchy*

* i.e. making nasty comments about people

2. You should have a brief discussion as a class to see if there is any consensus about the

origin of our gender identity: is it biological or is it social? Are you on the side of the biologists who say that it is innate, or are you on the side of the psychologists and the

sociologists who say that society constructs masculine and feminine roles which boys and

girls then identify with through a social learning process?

3. Look for the words in bold above that match the following definitions:

a. without mercy b. bringing up

c. acceptance of an unpleasant

state of affairs d. an inclination

e. upset/sadness f. interpreting

g. an adjective indicating you are born with something

h. ability i. become involved in/do

j. route finding

k. set so that it cannot be changed l. able to be changed and reshaped

m. a group of people with a particular idea

Pre-reading If you were a scientist and you wanted to prove that we learn our gender roles, you might

jump at the chance to operate on a new-born boy so that it looked as if he had the reproductive organs of a girl and then arrange things so that the parents brought the child up

as a girl. If someone did this, what do you think the outcome would be?

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Reading

The Case of David Reimer Of all the attempts that were made to try to disprove the idea of a biological basis for gender identity one case in particular stands out. In 1972 Dr John Money, a psychologist, started to publish research papers in scientific journals about a child called Brenda who had been born a perfectly normal boy but who was being brought up successfully as a girl. The papers were to become hugely influential.

The boy had been left with severe anatomical problems after a routine operation had gone horribly wrong. Because the child was still less than a year old Dr Money persuaded the parents that the wisest course of action was immediate plastic surgery to enable him to be brought up as a girl (in 1967 plastic surgery to reconstruct anything resembling a functional male organ of reproduction was impossible). Although Dr Money assured the young and desperate parents that the outcome was bound to be positive, in truth it was merely an experiment conducted in the hope that it would prove once and for all his conviction that at birth a person’s gender identity is undifferentiated.

In the published papers Money portrayed the transformation as an unqualified success. The child, he said, had responded perfectly to his parents, who had consistently treated him as a girl and had kept the anatomical alteration completely secret. According to Money the child at the age of 6 had typically feminine character traits and interests: “She was observed to have a clear preference for dresses and frilly blouses over pants and T-shirts. She took pride in her long hair and loved being her daddy's little sweetheart.”

The real story was not made public until 1997 when one of the less senior psychiatrists who had been treating the girl finally found the courage to speak out. The ensuing reports included quotations from relatives and friends. The child’s twin brother (who knew nothing of the truth at the time) said: “To me she was my kid sister, but she just never acted the part. She'd get a skipping rope for a gift and the only thing we'd use that for was to tie people up or whip people with it. She was always playing with my toys: toy dump trucks, cars and stuff. The sewing machine she got just sat there. And when she was 6 she said that her ambition was to be a garbage man. I thought it was kinda bizarre – my sister a garbage man!” One of her female classmates also recalled the way she reacted sometimes when she was teased at school (as she often was): “What always impressed me about Brenda was that when the boys called her ‘Cavewoman’ or ‘Gorilla’ or something like that she might grab one of them by his shirt and punch him. I always wished I could do that.”

Despite the concerted efforts of her parents, the psychologists and the doctors the child was never happy with the idea that he was a girl. After obstinately refusing hormone therapy at the age of 14 (“They told me it would fix things so that I could wear a bra – but I didn’t wanna wear a bra!” he later recalled) his parents finally told him the truth. Looking back in 1998 he said: “I was so relieved. Suddenly it all made sense, and I finally knew that I wasn’t some sort of freak.” Shortly afterwards he willingly underwent the medical treatment necessary for his final metamorphosis back from being a girl to a boy, and the person previously known as Brenda settled into a new and more contented life as David.

Questions 1. From the context do you think that a “research paper” is:

a) a piece of paper to be used in a research project

b) an article describing a piece of research

2. Do you think a “scientific journal” is:

a) a daily newspaper for scientists b) a special magazine for academics

c) a kind of diary

3. What was Dr Money aiming to achieve when he took responsibility for the case of David/Brenda Reimer?

4. What is implied about the reason why none of the carers published anything before 1997 to contradict Money’s version of events?

5. What is said in the last paragraph that creates the impression that David’s story had a happy ending?

6. What ideas about our gender identity does the true story of David Reimer seem to support?

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Vocabulary A. The following numbers refer to the number of the paragraphs in the previous passage. Look for words or phrases in those paragraphs having the following meanings:

1. a) be different from and superior to

the others

2. a) looking like

b) operational c) result

d) indeterminate (i.e. not yet

fixed)

3. a) described

b) change c) characteristics

4. a) that followed (adjective)

b) hit someone with a rope c) weird

d) made fun of e) hit with the fist

5. a) coordinated and organized

b) stubbornly c) something shockingly abnormal

d) had (medical treatment) e) change

f) happy

B. Here are some more sentences from the David Reimer story. Read them first and then match

the words in bold with the definitions given afterwards:

• When Brenda was a young child the regular trips to see Dr. Money, who asked her about things she daren’t even talk about with her mum, were unsettling and bewildering: "For the life of me, I couldn't understand why, out of all the kids in my class, I was the only one going to talk to a creepy psychologist.”

• The reportedly successful switch from boy to girl set a precedent which other surgeons around the world then followed and thousands of boys born with anatomical abnormalities were operated on to make them look like girls.

• The true story of David Reimer exposed some fundamental flaws in John Money’s theories.

• Money never subsequently published anything in which he admitted that his earlier arguments about gender had been spurious.

• Several months into his first relationship with a girl, David, then 18 years old, trusted her with his secret, telling her that he had suffered an “accident”. He realised his mistake a few days later when he saw the girls giggling and ridiculing him.

• “What struck me about David when I met him in 1998 was how forward-thinking he was. He wanted to make a success of his marriage and be a good father to his wife’s three children. He refused to dwell on the past.”

a. weird and scary

b. confusing

c. disturbing d. mistakes/imperfections

e. based on faulty reasoning f. laughing quietly in a silly way

g. basic

h. making fun of

i. think a lot about

j. a case where something is done that sets an example for others to

follow k. change

Over to you Looking back at the case of David Reimer, what conclusions would you draw about the role which social factors could play in the formation of our gender identity? How significant are the different

ways that boys and girls are treated in the process that sociologists refer to as socialization?

Epilogue Here’s how the story ends:

When David was in his mid-twenties he met and married a woman who had three children from three unsuccessful relationships. She was bowled over by how caring and considerate he was. To one of the few journalists David agreed to speak to he described how proud he was in his role as husband, father and sole breadwinner in the family – a family that he never believed he would be lucky enough to have. "From what I've been taught by my father what makes you a man is: You treat your wife well. You put a roof over your family's head. You're a good father. Things like that add up much more to being a man than just sex. I guess John Money would consider my children's biological fathers to be real men. But they didn't stick around to raise the children. I did. That, to me, is a man."

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Language extra: adverbs Don’t overlook the adverbs. Not only do they convey important pieces of information, but they also add colour to your language.

A. Use these adverbs to fill the gaps in the sentences that follow. (Although in each case one

answer is the best, sometimes others are also possible.)

terribly

angrily

firmly

widely

narrowly

grossly

profoundly

disturbingly

outrageously

absolutely

heavily

gladly

fondly

meticulously

hotly

warmly

1. When David’s mother first saw Dr Money on television she said to her husband: “We ................. must get in touch with him.”

2. Dr John Money ................................. believed that children had to compare themselves with others before they could feel that they were either male or female.

3. There was no consensus in the academic community at the time, and the origin of our gender identity continued to be a ............................ debated issue.

4. When he took on David’s case, Money was already ........................... acknowledged to be one of the foremost psychologists working in the field of gender identity.

5. The boys knew things were going to get violent when they saw Brenda staring at them ..................

6. David’s parents told him that they were ............................. sorry for what had happened.

7. He had a pet cat and he would often stroke it .........................

8. The woman ........................... accepted David’s proposal of marriage.

9. With his usual care, David planned the arrangements for the wedding and the reception ................................. so that nothing would go wrong.

10. They were lucky with the weather because on the previous day it had rained ......................

11. Personally, when I first read the full story of David Reimer I found it ........................ moving. (Clue: we also say something moved me deeply)

12. When we went to that remote village I was struck by the way the villagers welcomed us so ............................ I had expected a much cooler reception.

13. When I fell asleep at the wheel I was unbelievably lucky – I ............................ escaped having a fatal accident.

14. Although there has been tremendous economic growth over the last 50 years, the distribution of wealth is still ........................ unfair. (Clue: the difference is too big)

15. The number of people dying every day of preventable diseases is ............................... large. (I.e. the figure is shocking and it is not something to be calmly accepted.)

16. To those who live on only a few dollars a day, almost all modern medicines are ....................... expensive.

B. So and such

Use one of these two familiar words to complete the following sentences:

1. Do you enjoy films about guys who get lost in the jungle? If ..........., you really must see ‘Apocalypse Now’.

2. “Is there anything else you would like to ask?” ”I don’t think ..........”

3. I got ......... a shock when the results arrived.

4. Society was cruel to bastards and even more ......... to their mothers.

5. “Hey, they might laugh at us.” ”.......... what?”

6. Have you ever seen ........ big crabs?

7. “This is my second year studying philosophy.” ”............ you already know something about metaphysics?”

8. I came to university ........... as to deepen my understanding of the grounds of human knowledge.

9. Psychology is full of grand theories. By their nature ............ theories make sweeping generalizations and ignore a lot of the variety between individual cases.

10. The results of the research are presented in ............ a way that they exaggerate the difference between the sexes.

11. Would you be ....... kind as to accept this little gift and let us continue our journey? (An attempt to bribe a police officer after he asks you to pay a fine for speeding.)

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In general the rule is that such goes with a noun. To do the following transformation you will need to think of an appropriate noun:

It wasn’t so long ago that people had to create all their own entertainment.

It wasn’t such ............................................................................................

To round off this little section here is the classic Proficiency so-such problem. Which goes where?

I have never seen ............. a handsome man.

I have never seen ............. handsome a man.

C. Only you....

Say which part of the sentence the word only refers to and think about whether we could change the position of the word without changing the meaning of the sentence:

Only you could do something so stupid.

I only stole a packet of chewing gum, for God’s sake!

Reading

It’s All In The Brain To try to prove that gender identity has a biological basis some researchers have gone back to look more closely at the anatomy of the brain. They have brought to light what is known as a neurological sexual dimorphism, meaning that there are marked differences between male and female brains. Some differences are visible to the naked eye: the two hemispheres of the male brain consistently show more asymmetry whereas in women the two halves of the brain are much more alike. Studies of the activity of living brains also reveal that when men and women are engaged in the same mental activity they often use quite different parts of the brain.

However, none of these differences shed much light on the link between the physiology of the brain and the psychology of gender. Some animal research, though, has been more illuminating. Studies have shown that rats can be given a predisposition to behave either like males or females by injecting them with either testosterone (the male hormone) or oestrogen (the female hormone) immediately after birth. This has led to the hypothesis that hormones can effectively programme the brain so that the individual is bound to act in either a masculine or feminine way.

Evidence that this also occurs in humans has come from studies of girls with a condition known as congenital adrenal hyperplasia (CAH). In this condition, which affects one in 10,000 children, the foetus is exposed to abnormally high levels of androgens (a group of masculinizing hormones that includes testosterone). Those hormones are produced by the foetus’ hyperactive adrenal glands (glands situated immediately above the kidneys). One long-term study looked at 60 girls who had CAH and who also had unaffected sisters. The CAH girls were found to be more aggressive and more interested in male-typical activities, toys, and careers. They preferred mechanical toys to dolls, for instance. Relatives often described them as tomboys and, later on, the girls tended to show little interest in motherhood.

An interesting twist to this piece of research is that none of the girls said they were confused about their gender identity or confessed to feeling that they were really boys. The researchers tried to explain this by hypothesizing that the children's brains had been exposed to enough androgens to result in male-typical behaviours but not enough to generate a male gender identity.

Questions 1. What are the most obvious differences between male and female brains?

2. From its context in the second paragraph try to work out what the phrase “shed light on” means.

3. What can be done to a new-born female rat to make it behave like a male rat once it reaches maturity?

4. Looking at the description of congenital adrenal hyperplasia which of the following is the correct inference: a) the masculinizing hormone testosterone is present only in males b) testosterone occurs naturally in both males and females

5. What conclusions about the role of hormones like testosterone can be drawn from studies of girls with CAH?

6. What explanation was put forward for why the girls with CAH were never subsequently confused about their gender identity?

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Vocabulary 1. When we refer to the naked eye, what are we talking about exactly?

2. What phrase in the first paragraph means “are doing” an activity?

3. Shed is an irregular verb (shed, shed, shed). Try to guess its basic meaning by looking at

these common uses: Snakes periodically shed their skin. Deciduous trees shed their leaves in the autumn. It was a sad film and we shed a few tears. The driver drove round the bend in the road too fast and the lorry shed its load.

4. Which other adjective in paragraph 2 can we use to describe something that helps us

understand a topic?

5. Which words in the third paragraph refer to

a) a condition a person is born with b) the small organs that produce chemicals such as hormones, enzymes, sweat, etc.

c) the organs in which liquid waste is removed from the blood d) young girls who are considered to have boyish interests

6. In the fifth paragraph twist is used as it is in the phrase “a twist in the tale” meaning an

unexpected development in a story. What is the more literal meaning of this regular verb? Here is an example: “To make a thread from cotton, the fibres must be twisted tightly.”

7. We have two pairs of adjectives: female/male and feminine/masculine. Which is used for talking about feelings, inclinations and interests, and which is used for talking about our

anatomy and physiology? All boys are male, but could some boys be (to some extent)

feminine?

Over to you If you wanted to identify the social pressures that shape the development of our gender identity

you might highlight the ideas that circulate about what makes men or women attractive. To think

a little about this, consider this example:

In a discussion on the Web one mother described how proud she was of her 18-year-old son because he was so in touch with his feelings, as well as being sensitive to those of others and acutely conscious of issues concerning social justice. The problem, she said, was that girls his age just weren’t interested in caring guys like him with whom they could talk about their deepest feelings until the early hours of the morning. “They are more interested in more macho guys who will sweep them off their feet,” she said.

Do you agree that this sort of thing goes on? Is it natural for girls to be more attracted to guys

who obviously have much higher testosterone levels, or is this influenced more by images in the media? Some people would argue that women are “programmed” by nature to find the more

dominant males in the group attractive in the same way that female gorillas are naturally drawn

towards the largest and most powerful males often seen in documentaries beating their chests, making a big noise and chasing away the little guys. Could this be the case?

How much of a girl are you? Test 1: a quick way to put your mind at rest. You may never have been confused about which changing room to use when you went to the swimming pool, but after reading all this stuff about the effect hormones can have on your brain you may be a little concerned about just how biologically masculine or feminine you really are. Wouldn’t it be nice if there were a quick and easy test? Actually, there is. It’s called the finger test. Hold your hand out so that it is open and flat with the fingers straight and touching each other. Now, look at how the length of your first finger (also known as the index finger because it is the one most often used to point to something) compares to that of your third finger (also known as the ring finger). People whose first fingers are much shorter than their third were exposed to much higher levels of masculinizing hormones in the womb.

Why not conduct a quick survey of the class to see if there is any correlation between the result of the finger test and the presence of typically masculine traits such as being loud and nasty or being obsessed with technical things like how to get to level 68 on your favourite computer game.

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Test 2: plunging into the depths of your psyche You may not be convinced that the length of your finger proves that you have the right kind of brain. To allay those remaining fears, let’s take a little psychological test.

Put an a or d next to these statements according to whether you agree or disagree with them.

1. When I gaze up at the clouds I sometimes wonder about things like how those clouds

would be classified, and why the water vapour condensed at that particular altitude.

2. If someone tells me something is getting them down I tell them to cheer up and to think of

other people who are in a far worse position than they are.

3. I would much prefer to play a game with my friend than sit chatting about the things going

on in our lives.

4. People have told me that I was too aggressive when arguing with others.

5. It doesn't bother me much if I am late meeting a friend.

6. In a conversation, I tend to focus on my own thoughts rather than on what my listener

might be thinking.

7. When I was a child, I thought it was fun to cut up animals like worms to see what would

happen.

8. I can pick up quickly if someone says one thing but means another.

9. When mechanical things around the house break down I enjoy being able to fix them

myself.

10. I find it easy to put myself in somebody else's shoes.

11. When people start to tell me about what’s going to happen to the planet by the end of the

next millennium I just shrug my shoulders.

12. I have an aptitude for spotting when someone in a group is feeling awkward or

uncomfortable.

13. If I say something that someone else is offended by, I think that that's their problem, not

mine.

14. If anyone asked me if I liked their haircut, I would reply truthfully, even if I didn't like it.

15. If I got lost in a strange city I would rather ask someone the way than try to work out how

to get to my destination using a map.

16. Other people tell me I am a good listener and they enjoy talking to me about their

problems.

17. I enjoy playing war games on the computer and it doesn't bother me that I'm playing at

shooting people and leaving them to bleed to death.

18. I enjoy stroking cats and it makes me happy to hear them purring.

19. I can sense if I am intruding and the other person would prefer me to leave, even if he or

she doesn't tell me.

20. I sometimes make jokes about people and, without wanting to, I sometimes upset them.

21. If I see a stranger in a group, I think that it is up to them to make an effort to join in.

22. I often get emotionally involved in films and sad endings frequently make me weep.

23. I would consider turning down an offer of promotion at work if it meant I would have to

spend much less time with my family.

How to score the answers: Give yourself two points if you said you agreed with these statements: 8, 10, 12, 15, 16, 18, 19, 22, 23.

Give yourself two points if you disagreed with: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 9, 11, 13, 14, 17, 20, 21.

What do the scores mean?

A high score means you have more empathy, and the top score is, obviously, 46. According to the psychologist who created the test the higher your score, the more feminine your brain is. Test this little

hypothesis in your class by working out the average score for the girls and the average for the boys. The former should be significantly greater than the latter. Is it?

If you are a bloke and you scored a big zero, you might be a whizz at chess or war craft or astrophysics but

your wife is going to be a little disappointed that she married someone with the emotional life of a stone.

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Reading The test that you have just done is a version of one compiled by the psychologist Simon Baron-Cohen. His original aim was to come up with a quick and accurate way of assessing how

masculine or feminine a person’s brain was. To get a better understanding of his ideas read the

article below.

It’s a Fact: Brains Have a Gender Simon Baron-Cohen is another advocate of biological determinism. According to him there are basically two types of human brain: a feminine brain that is programmed more for empathy (i.e. for being sensitive, considerate and caring) and the masculine brain that is hard-wired more for understanding and building systems.

The evidence for a female advantage in empathizing comes from many different studies. For example, if you leave out some of those big plastic cars that kids can ride on, what you see is that more little boys play the "ramming" game, i.e. they deliberately drive the vehicle into those of other children. The little girls ride around more carefully, trying to avoid crashing into other vehicles. This suggests the girls are being more sensitive to others.

Baby girls, as young as 12 months old, respond more empathically to the distress of other people. It seems that virtually from birth girls are better at decoding non-verbal communication, picking up subtle differences in the tone of voice or facial expression. Furthermore, by 12 months girls make more eye contact with others than boys, showing a greater interest in the feelings expressed in other people’s faces.

Some people argue that parents shape a child's character by imposing their choice of toys, but research shows that if toddlers are given a free choice of toys the boys naturally choose to play with cars, trucks, planes, guns and swords, constructional and mechanical toys. They seem to love putting things together, and to be naturally drawn to toys that have clear functions, buttons to press, things that will light up, or devices that will cause another object to move.

Should a theory like this be a cause of concern? There is the obvious worry that people could use a theory like this to argue that women ought not to be considered for certain roles in society. This, however, would be a misuse of the theory. Baron-Cohen is not saying that all men lack empathy and all women get tied up in knots when faced with a complex system. That would be a gross over-simplification. His point is simply that there is a statistically significant difference between the average scores of large groups of men and women. A few outstanding women may still outshine most men in a field like engineering, for instance, and some men may be as caring, understanding and considerate as their female counterparts.

Questions 1. Which of the following is the best summary of Baron-Cohen’s thesis:

a. There are two completely different kinds of brain: male and female, and all men have a

male brain while all women have a female one. b. There are two different kinds of brain: masculine and feminine, and women are just as

likely to have a masculine brain as men are.

c. Women are more likely to have a feminine brain, which is different in important respects from the masculine brain that men are more likely to have.

2. What is meant when we are told that Baron-Cohen advocates a form of biological determinism?

3. What reason is given in the last paragraph to deny the implication that this theory could be used to justify excluding women from certain roles in society?

Vocabulary 1. The first paragraph uses the word “programmed”. Which alternative expression is also used

later in that paragraph?

2. Work out from paragraph 2 what activity the verb ram refers to.

3. As it is used in paragraph 2, which of the following best identifies the meaning of “suggests”?

a. propose an activity b. give us a reason to believe that something is the case c. prove conclusively that something is the case

4. What is the adjective derived from the noun “face”?

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5. We have a name for children who are at the stage where they are just beginning to walk (and still fall over a lot). Find the word in the fourth paragraph.

6. Draw is an old word that originally meant “pull”. In what sense are the boys being pulled in the fourth paragraph?

7. We have already come across the words “use” and “abuse”. Which alternative negative

expression is used in the last paragraph?

8. If someone gives you a difficult maths equation to solve and you get tied up in knots, what

happens?

9. Look for adjectives in the last paragraph that mean: a. unacceptably big

b. different from and better than the rest

10. Which verb means: “be better than”?

Over to you A. One reason why some people are reluctant to accept the idea of innate differences between the

sexes is that ideas like those have been used in the past to deny women certain opportunities. Before you discuss this, look at the following little story.

The president of Harvard University in the US, Lawrence Summers, gave a talk in which he tried to explain why such a small minority of high-ranking scientists are women. He attributed it to the hard-wiring of the male brain which gave men a greater aptitude for the most abstract and theoretical sciences. Some female scientists in the audience were outraged and walked out in protest.

In an interview afterwards some of those female scientists said that the reasons for the lack of women in science had nothing to do with neurophysiology. One of them said: “Look. Open any high school physics book and what do you see? You'll see a rifle shooting a bullet and an exercise to calculate the acceleration of the bullet three seconds after it’s fired. You'll see a baseball player hitting a ball, a footballer kicking a football. …It's saying to women: 'You don't belong here.' "

What were these female scientists saying about why the scientific community is predominantly male?

Are they right?

B. In Britain women wanting to join the medical profession couldn’t find a medical school that

would admit them until 1894, and it wasn’t until the First World War – 1914-18 - that a large

number of medical schools began to welcome women students instead of treating them with scorn. Even then the most prestigious schools kept their doors shut to women until 1948. At the end of

the nineteenth century a male doctor expressed a widely held view when he said:

“Women are born nurses. Mother Nature has given them the instincts to care for others. However, they are not born doctors. The few women who have become physicians have tried to be men, and have succeeded only in becoming third-rate men.”

Can you imagine why the male members of the medical establishment might have wanted to keep

their profession exclusively male?

C. Although western societies have the principle of an equality of opportunity for both men and women there is still a fairly widespread belief that a woman’s first priority ought to be the home

and the family. Consider the case of a married couple with one or two very young children. Discuss the following alternatives and try to decide which you most agree with.

• The woman should stay at home, looking after the children and relying on the money her husband wants to give her.

• The woman should stay at home but she should have a legal right to 50% of her husband’s income in return for her domestic labour.

• Both parents should arrange to work part-time so that they can both work and play an equal role in bringing up their children and looking after the house.

• The state should offer tax incentives and launch a campaign to persuade fathers of young children to stay at home and look after their kids, aiming for a society in which roughly half of those at home are househusbands and half are housewives.

• The state should provide top-quality child-care facilities so that no one has to stay at home to bring up their children for more than a very brief period.

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Writing Here is today’s topic:

Your teacher is producing a publication which will introduce other students to some of the most controversial topics. She has asked you to contribute an essay in which you give an overview of the nature-nurture debate insofar as it concerns the origin of our gender identity. You should give a clear presentation of the strongest points from the two opposing schools of thought and then end by giving your informed opinion about where the truth lies.

You already have more than enough ideas about biological determinism (the “nature” side of the debate). What about the other point of view? Even if there are biological determinants of our

character as men or women, the culture which we are brought up to accept must also play a very

important role. To try to develop your understanding of this side of the argument you can discuss the following points.

• There is no gene for skirts or trousers or monogamy or polygamy. Although nature sets some limits, our culture defines a lot of the ideas that are important for the way we think of ourselves as men or women and the way we behave.

• Young people and adults rarely act purely out of natural instinct. They pay a lot of attention to the social norms that dictate how it is appropriate for men and women to act in particular social situations.

• Although there are some underlying similarities, different societies define male and female roles differently. In the Massai tribe in Kenya, for instance, it is the men who wear the make-up and the jewellery, and it is the women who chose who they will be married to.

• Civilization is not about letting natural forces rule society. It is about transforming nature into something we can judge to be good.

Getting started

When you have to present two opposing points of view from a debate it might be appropriate in

the introduction to mention when the debate began or how long it has been going on for. Alternatively you could mention how widespread, interesting or influential it has been. Here’s one

possible outline.

Although most debates in science are of interest only to scientists and other

academics, the debate about the origin of our gender identity has captured the

interest of many people outside the scientific community. It has given rise to two

schools of thought about ................. Some people are adamant that ..................... while

others insist that .......................

Once you have found a way to introduce the debate and indicate the two points of view you are

going to present the rest of the essay should be fairly straightforward, so we will leave it up to you. Good luck!

Write it! Write 250-350 words on this fascinating and thought-provoking debate.

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F u l l s p a t e P r eF u l l s p a t e P r eF u l l s p a t e P r eF u l l s p a t e P r e ---- P r o f i c i e n c y P r im e rP r o f i c i e n c y P r im e rP r o f i c i e n c y P r im e rP r o f i c i e n c y P r im e r

Unit 23 Happy Families Warm-up A little discussion about family life to get things going:

1. What is the difference between a nuclear and an extended family?

2. What would you say are the most important changes that have occurred in the patterns of family life over the last 50 or 60 years?

3. What would you say are the pros and cons of being an only child?

4. Do you look back, or do you think you will look back, at your childhood as having been the best

years of your life?

Part1 Tweenagers

The word “adolescence” refers to that difficult period between childhood and adulthood. Because it is a transitional phase one

British TV documentary jokingly referred to adolescents as

“tweenagers” (not a word you would find in the dictionary).

In this section we want to talk about the difficulties of being an

adolescent and of being the parent of one. Here is the view of one British mother:

My son has just turned 13. He can be so obstructive whenever I try to arrange something. He can get so violent – if he doesn’t get his way, he swears at me, storms off and slams the door - and yet he has everything he could need. We are an otherwise happy and settled family, and he isn’t mistreated by anyone at home or at school. I ask myself “why?” all the time.

A journalist gave this impression:

It is as if boy teenagers have been infected by a psychol-ogical virus, with the symptoms including a refusal to settle and periods of sometimes uncontrollable anger. When it comes to revising for exams, parents say their boys are unable to concentrate sufficiently even to get down to studying. If they start to revise, the quality of what they do is abominable. Lying on the bed with a book half-open, their mind on the text messages that might arrive any minute, they seem to take pride in being idle and undisciplined. One mother tells me about the daily struggle to get her son out of bed and the verbal abuse she encounters.

Looking back at his adolescence, one man, now in his 20s, had this to say:

When I was a teenager living at home I was a complete terror. I was so angry that I'd explode at the slightest provocation - throwing stuff, shouting abuse, you name it. For some reason, I was only like this at home with my family; with friends I was prepared to be open, considerate and supportive. At the time it seemed that the authority my parents wanted to exercise was totally unreasonable. Why was I supposed to do what I was told by these two people who didn't understand how I was feeling about things and had such irritatingly conventional ideas about what was right and wrong? I did feel totally powerless, and I believe that this was at the root of a lot of my anger.

Points to discuss 1. Arguably, the three quotations on the

left give an accurate reflection of what goes on in quite a few British families.

How different is your experience, and

that of your peers in your culture?

2. In the last quotation the person said

he had only been angry and aggressive at home. Is there a good reason why

some teenagers respond like this in a domestic environment, or is it simply

inexcusable?

3. All three quotations concern teenage boys. What about teenage girls? Do

they go through a crisis period at home, and perhaps suffer a loss of

motivation too? If there is a crisis,

does it manifest itself in a different way?

Vocabulary Look for words in bold on this page with

the following definitions.

a. that cannot be justified

b. thoughtful with regard to other people’s feelings

c. show

d. involving change from one stage to another (adjective)

e. to shut noisily

f. really horrible, terrible

g. cause (noun)

h. lazy

i. preventing someone doing what they want (adjective)

j. be allowed to do what they want

k. to leave a place in a noisy and angry way

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More points to discuss A. Some people argue that adolescent boys have a problem whereas girls don’t because they are born with a natural aggression that they can’t find an outlet for. Read the following paragraph

and then discuss the questions that follow.

Boys have an innate aggression which girls lack. Let’s not forget that it was only 14,000 years ago that agriculture was developed and men started to switch from hunting to animal husbandry. In evolutionary terms 14,000 years is a very short time – just the blink of an eye. Men have still got that instinct in them to go out, take risks and test themselves against hostile forces. Teenage boys feel it most strongly, they don’t know what to do with it, and life in large modern cities gives them no outlet for it. Inevitably, the frustration boils over at home where parents seem to personify the imperatives that make modern life far too highly organized and regimented.

• Try to explain in your own words what is said here about why teenage boys tend to

behave so badly.

• Does this hit the nail on the head or is it wide of the mark?

B. There are those who put the blame on parents. Here is what one man from Greece said:

Too often parents in the UK are obsessed with work or addicted to TV, their hobbies or alcohol, and that is bound to have an adverse influence. Which child would aspire to emulate a parental figure like that? Over in Greece kids seem much more balanced and happy than in the UK. It can’t just be the sun. Partly, it must be because they can see adults who enjoy life as well as working hard; and when they see that, they feel better about the future and more positive about adult life.

• Is parental neglect a factor that might help explain some adolescent outbursts?

• Is it a recipe for a harmonious family life if parents are role models that teenagers can

find attractive?

• In the end are parents to blame or is it just that some kids seem programmed to bite the

hand that feeds them?

C. To what extent do you agree with what this woman has to say about the influence of the wider society on the behaviour of some teenagers at home?

Although the symptoms are different for girls, the disease is the same. I would say a lot of the rot stems from contemporary culture. There are two things going on. Kids are bombarded with the message that life is about immediate gratification: life is fun; just enjoy it. It’s a youth culture – on TV everyone acts like a kid nowadays – so teenagers are bound to feel that they ought to be able to do whatever they want. Back at home, though, parents – quite understandably – can’t let the kids run wild. They maintain the prerogative of giving the orders or laying down the law, but once you’ve been persuaded that life is about being a party animal your parents are going to sound like something from the Middle Ages.

Parents want their kids to grow up and be sensible, but some kids see what the grown-up world really has in store for them, and they don’t like it. They see the grim reality of work where adults have to work long hours doing dreary, repetitive jobs just to pay the bills and keep hold of the little box they live in – jobs they might lose at any moment if someone decides they are no longer needed. Facing the prospect of becoming tiny cogs in a huge, soulless cash machine, they hesitate to take any further steps to become an adult and prefer to retreat into a fantasy world instead. Disillusioned with what they see of the world of work they rebel against their parents when put under pressure to shape up for the rat race.

• According to the first paragraph what is the cultural influence that might undermine the

relationship between young people and their parents?

• According to the second paragraph how does the world of work play a role even before

young people have joined it?

• In your opinion, are either of these important factors?

Sections A, B and C on this page look at three different kinds of influence on the behaviour of

young people. Using one word for each one (e.g. “political”) how would you identify those three different types of influence?

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D. Let’s move now to the steps parents might take to try to keep the friction between themselves and their offspring to an absolute minimum. Look at the following ideas and discuss whether or not they would be good pieces of advice for parents to follow:

• Be firm, set high standards and clear boundaries between what is acceptable and what isn’t.

• Be lenient and don’t try to organize everything for your offspring – adolescents need room to experiment and make their own mistakes.

• Strive to set an example to your children.

• Be approachable at all times and know how to listen.

• Keep in touch with the latest trends in popular culture so that your child doesn’t feel there’s a huge cultural gap between you.

• Give them the freedom to mix with whoever they want to even if some of those in their circle of friends are not people you entirely approve of.

• Make sure that they spend some time in the Scouts or a similar organisation to help them acquire a little more self-discipline and respect for authority.

• Ensure that on most days of the week all the members of the family sit down to share a meal together.

• Take steps to cultivate the child’s religious faith – religious ideas about not being led astray by an uncontrolled life of passion can help young people keep a grip on their lives.

• Be patient – a lot of kids go through a difficult stage but the vast majority of them end up as well-adjusted adults.

What are the two or three key pieces of advice you would give to parents?

Vocabulary Look for words and phrases in bold to match the definitions below:

a. control

b. someone you can easily go up to

and speak to (adjective) c. when the feelings of anger or

aggression become too great d. a quick movement of opening and

closing e. farming cows, sheep, etc

f. organized in a military fashion

g. an opportunity to express something

h. copy i. to start behaving and working well

j. satisfaction

k. dull, boring

l. depressing

m. having lost hopes and the rosy

image you had of something n. quite strict

o. strictly enforcing the rules p. react against and refuse to obey

q. right, privilege r. wheels with teeth (components of a

machine)

s. fiercely competitive society t. encourage someone to leave an

ethical way of life and begin living unethically

u. bad state of affairs (literally:

something that has gone bad)

Writing You should now be overflowing with ideas that you could use to carry out the following writing task.

Relations between parents and their adolescent offspring can generate a great deal of friction. Write an essay in which you highlight what seem to you to be the most likely explanations for why there is this tension between the two generations during the period of adolescence. End your essay by suggesting what parents can do to keep those moments of acute unpleasantness to a minimum.

The writing task requires you to do two different things. What are they?

In pairs, come up with some notes about the main ideas you will present and discuss in those

two main parts of your essay.

How about beginning with an inversion?

Rarely do you come across a family in Europe that does not experience difficulties

when the younger generation reaches adolescence.

An alternative idea would be to begin with some imaginary statistics. You could try to imagine

what percentage of parents in your country would confess to having difficulties bringing up

teenage offspring, and you could begin like this: “Recent estimates indicate that .....“

Tip: Although questions might be extremely general, it is perfectly acceptable for you to indicate that you are going to talk mainly about the situation in your country or continent. No one can

expect you to have an in-depth knowledge of all the cultures of the universe.

Part 2 Now we turn to a question about marriage: Why should a couple who are in love get married instead of just cohabiting (i.e. living together)? Before reading the following passage, you

should share your ideas about the necessity of marriage with the rest of the class: Does it just

seem obvious that people who love each other should get married or do you have your doubts about whether there really is a good reason for this social custom?

Marriage: Is It Outdated? In the UK it is increasingly common for couples to choose simply to cohabit rather than get married. If current trends continue, by 2030 only a minority of adults will be married. This will mark a threshold in the history of the family since from the time that records began it has always been the case that the majority of the adult population has been married.

In the past, society obliged people to get married. Unmarried couples were said to be “living in sin”, and any children born “out of wedlock” were stigmatized as illegitimate. It was considered shameful to be a bastard, which partly explains why that word could be used more generally as an insult.

In addition to religious ideas there were also the imperatives of the family. It could be argued that marriage actually functioned, not as a way of keeping people from sin, but as a way of preserving the integrity of the family together with its property over the generations. The law required that the wife take the husband’s family name, as, in turn, her children would. Other laws protected the property of the husband’s family. Legal control of whatever the wife had was automatically transferred to the husband, while he retained exclusive control of the property his family had accumulated over the years, even if the couple broke up.

Arguably, one of the most important factors that undermined the institution of marriage was the campaign for the equality of women with men. During the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries in Britain a growing women’s movement succeeded in establishing a long series of reforms so that the rights of men and women were virtually equal. This helped to give rise to a more individualistic mentality. Increasingly, when people thought about marriage they saw themselves above all else as individuals rather than as representatives of their families. Another factor was the increasing secularization of society, as a result of which the religious discourse of sin started to sound to many ears like a quaint relic from the past. If neither the continuance of the family line nor our salvation from sin are vital issues any longer, it is understandable that a larger number of couples are wondering why they shouldn’t just carry on cohabiting.

Vocabulary Match the words in bold to the following meanings:

a. gather or collect an increasing amount of something

b. something that remains from an epoch in the distant past c. the process by which society ceases to pay much attention to religion

d. a set of linguistic expression used in talking about a particular topic

e. an important level marking a change from one stage to another f. when people denounce something as shameful (verb)

g. not approved of by the law or local customs h. the act or process of being saved from eternal damnation

i. to attack the foundations of something so that it starts to collapse

j. quite attractive because it is old-fashioned

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Questions 1. What does the passage say is likely to happen sometime around 2030?

2. You could not be expected to know the word “wedlock”, but you should be able to guess what we mean when we say that a child is born “out of wedlock”. What does it mean?

3. The second paragraph describes one of the forces that helped preserve the institution of marriage. How would you characterize that force?

4. Paragraph three mentions one idea about the function of the institution of marriage. What idea is this?

5. What historical movement is identified in the passage to account, in part, for the rise of a

more individualistic mentality.

6. Which two developments are referred to in the last paragraph to explain why more and more

people are questioning the point of getting married?

Points to discuss A. Many marriages in the US and Europe take place in church. What do you know about the religious ideas which require people to get married if they want to start a family? If you are

religious, why is it morally unacceptable to cohabit with your partner?

Here is one interpretation. How close is it to your understanding of the significance of a religious

marriage?

According to one strand of the Christian tradition if two people simply live together for their mutual pleasure and enjoyment there is little hope of the relationship lasting. Only if a relationship is built on the unshakeable rock of Divine Love will it be able to withstand the trials and conflicts that all relationships are bound to go through. The couple’s willingness to be united in church is itself a step on the way to setting aside the egocentrism that could so easily undermine their relationship. After the ceremony in which they are united in the eyes of God, their staying together will no longer be a matter of mutual self-interest but of religious obligation. They can thus be confident of having found a firm foundation for their relationship.

Do you agree with the claim that only a shared religious faith can enable a couple to have a relationship that will last?

B. In one recent survey in the UK the most common reason for getting married was to confirm a

commitment to remain faithful to each other. Does it make sense that these people wanted to confirm their commitment publicly (in a church or registry office) instead of doing it privately

with the person they loved?

C. A glance at discussions of the issue on the Web reveals that for some people nowadays the

decision about whether or not to get married hinges on financial considerations. After looking into the regulations concerning things like income tax, welfare benefits and pension rights, some

people decide it just isn’t in their interests to get married. Read what one woman said and then

discuss the questions that follow:

“I think that what puts people off marriage these days is the knowledge of what would happen to their wealth if they got divorced, and - let’s be realistic - one in three marriages in the UK ends in divorce. You’ve worked hard for so long to have your own home, your own car and to get your pension going, then you get married and divorced and suddenly you have to split it. Your ex- will take you to court to claim 50% of it all. Scary, isn't it?

“For my partner and I, we just felt that it didn’t make sense financially to get married. For some people marriage is about love, but we don’t need a piece of paper to say we love each other. Other people need to know their partner is committed to them, but in practice that doesn’t mean very much, does it? I'm an independent woman with the right to live with a man instead of marrying him and being financially responsible for another adult in the eyes of the law.”

In your own words as much as possible, how would you sum up this woman’s objection(s) to marriage?

Do you feel that this attitude is perfectly reasonable or do you find it deplorable?

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D. Some people feel that marriage started to become meaningless once it became relatively easy to get divorced. In the English Church couples must vow to stay together until death

parts them, so shouldn’t marriage be for life? Can you think of both the arguments for and those against making it easy for married couples to get divorced?

Vocabulary A. Match the words in bold above with these meanings:

a. selfishness b. separate things that were together

(verb)

c. one of the long collections of fibres that make a thread

d. promise e. survive, not give in to (a force)

f. reliable basis and support g. holy

h. an adjective used when criticising something (often behaviour) which is

thought to be very bad and immoral

i. the difficulties that people have to go through

j. relating to both parties equally k. the place where births, deaths and

marriages are officially recorded l. depend on

B. Here are some more words which are vaguely connected with the theme of this section. Use

them to complete the sentences that follow:

oath epitome spouse mutual quarrel

bond hand commandments submissive strain

married marital affair humble leave

1. Some people would like to base their morality on the ten ................................ which were given to Moses on tablets of stone.

2. A synonym for polite is courteous because the well-mannered ladies and gentlemen at the royal court a few hundred years ago were meant to be the .............................. of politeness. (perfect example)

3. I loved her and I was sure the feeling was ........................ but I later found out that she was just looking for a shoulder to cry on.

4. If marital partners have unrealistic expectations about married life it can put their relationship under a great .......................

5. After you are married, another word for your marital partner is your .....................

6. When you get married you take a solemn vow, but when you are in a court of law and are accused of a crime you take a(n) ...................... in which you swear to tell the truth.

7. In a relationship that will last you feel there is a powerful ..................... between you – an emotional tie that gives the relationship a special ethical significance.

8. Some people say that instead of being arrogant we ought to be ......................., which means that we refrain from putting other people down, we readily accept criticism and we are not interested in being the centre of attention.

9. Women who have just given birth are allowed by their employers to be absent from work so as to be with their new-born children – a period of absence know as maternity .................... .

10. If two people start arguing with each other and shouting at each other they are said to row or to ........................

11. Some men still expect their wives to be ............................. , i.e. they expect their partner to yield to their power and authority and not challenge the right of the man to give the orders.

12. One of the grounds for divorce is adultery, which occurs when one of the partners has an extra-marital .......................... (relationship).

13. Once two people are married they become ........................ partners,

14. and their life together is known as ......................... life.

15. If you want to give your special skills, knowledge or possessions to your children, you will .......................... those things down to your children.

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Language extra: the subjunctive The subjective is a source of mystery even for native speakers of English. Actually, it ought to have dropped out of use altogether by now. A grammar book published in 1898 said: “The Subjunctive Mood is rapidly dying out of use in modern English” and yet it stubbornly persists in a few contexts, especially when we are describing states of affairs which don’t exist.

A. The most common examples are conditionals and wishes where were is used instead of was:

I wish it were Friday.

If I were you, I would talk to him first.

If he were more talkative, we could work things out.

You will no doubt remember that were can also be used with the infinitive in some conditionals:

If she were to take me to court, I would lose the house.

Here we can drop the “if” and rewrite the sentence this way:

Were she to take me to court, I would lose the house.

B. A similar structure is commonly used after the following verbs:

order command insist demand request ask recommend propose suggest

In one of the passages above we had the following sentence:

The law required that the wife take the husband’s family name. Similarly:

They recommended that he see a marriage guidance counsellor.

She insisted that he spend more time with his family.

Here, the infinitive form is used. When the verb is be we don’t use were in these contexts.

They proposed that a camera be used to record their conversations.

C. The same structure can also used after It is important/vital/essential/necessary/ desirable that ...

So you may come across:

It is essential that the interests of the child be given priority.

Although it is more common for people to say:

It is essential that the interests of the child should be given priority.

Practice Transform these sentences, keeping the meaning of the second as close as possible to that of the first.

1. I am too obsessed with my work, which is why my marriage is falling apart. Were .........................................................................................................

2. If she didn’t spend so much time gossiping, I would talk to her more. Were she ..........................................................................................

3. If we spoke to a marriage guidance counsellor, things might improve. Were ...................................................................................................

4. “He must turn the telly off and speak to me!” She insists that he ............................................

5. “We should remove the television from the bedroom.” I propose that the television .................................................

6. He was requested to reveal his innermost secrets to the psychologist. The psychologist requested that ...........................................................................

7. The best thing would be to end the treatment. I recommend that .........................................................

8. What is vital is the resolution of the conflict. It is vital that ..............................................

9. It would be much better if you spent more time together. It is desirable that ..........................................................

10. It is really important to give the child a secure home life. It is essential that the child ..............................................

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Part 3

Bliss People seem to like a happy ending, so to satisfy demand, here at the end of the book, we have a

little section about happiness. In keeping with the rest of the book, though, we will make this an issue and talk about it. The following are fragments from discussions of human contentment.

Take each in turn and discuss the point they make and whether or not you agree with it.

• That restless German philosopher Nietzsche said: “Man does not aspire to happiness. Only Englishmen do that.” For Friedrich the idea of happiness conjured up images of reclining lazily, getting fat and doing nothing. He thought life ought to be about striving to push oneself forward into new territory, to continually struggle to achieve new things. With each breakthrough there will be a moment of elation, but at no point would he say: “That is it. Here I will rest content.”

• Happiness is only for the wealthy. If you are jobless with four children to feed or if you are stuck in a city slum without sanitation what hope is there of happiness?

• To many of us happiness seems to be elusive. Even when we get what we think will make us happy, the feeling eludes us. Perhaps we have adopted the wrong approach. A Buddhist once said: “Happiness is not about having what you want but about wanting what you have.”

• More than a few pop songs - love songs, of course - contain a line like this: “You make me feel, Mi-igh-ty real.” The implication being that when Cupid’s arrow first strikes, one of the effects, amid the swirl of emotions, is a heightened sense of reality. Colours seem brighter, music seems to have become more musical, every face is smiling (or so it seems) and it feels great to be alive. This is happiness.

• Happiness is just a momentary feeling. Something that is more durable and of greater significance is self-esteem – the term may be a little ugly but what it denotes is invaluable. If we are with friends who value our friendship, and we have an occupation which gives us a valued place in the community and if our deeds are recognised and esteemed by others, then we feel good about ourselves and our lives. That is what really matters.

• True happiness is the tranquillity described by the Stoics of Ancient Greece. The key is to be indifferent to everything which does not depend upon your will. You can’t change your fate, so just accept it. The past cannot be undone, so there is no point crying over spilt milk. It is not entirely in your hands whether you are esteemed or held in high regard by others, so don’t concern yourself with such things. The true Stoic is happy even when society takes away his liberty because he is not enslaved by passions for things which it is not within his power to achieve.

• All our efforts at achieving a lasting happiness in this world are in vain. But if we sincerely believe in that which is beyond this valley of tears, there will be moments of spiritual joy which will be a tremendous consolation in our earthly struggle – moments that give us a foretaste of the only true happiness: the bliss to be found in paradise.

If none of these encapsulates your idea of happiness, how would you put it into words?

Vocabulary Look for words in bold with the following meanings.

a. happiness (two words which are synonymous) b. a circular movement

c. a huge area of a city where hundreds of the poorest people have built shelters d. a part (usually broken off)

e. lying down

f. difficult to find or achieve (adjective) g. that will only last for a very short time (adjective)

h. “signifies” or “refers to” i. actions

j. escape; avoid being caught (verb) k. futile

l. peacefulness

m. something which takes the edge off your suffering n. relating to the soul (adjective)

o. reverse a course of events (verb) p. an adjective indicating that you don’t care about something

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Epilogue

The famous French philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau wrote a book in the eighteenth century which includes a description of an aristocratic woman, the Countess de Vercellis, whom he had the good fortune to befriend. He says she had always impressed him with her distinguished appearance, her intelligence and her grace. Later in her life she was afflicted by cancer – a fatal disease that caused her to suffer terribly. During her illness Rousseau was struck by the strength of character she showed in confronting the disease and never doing anything unwomanly. On her last day the writer was at her bedside. He writes: “She was already in her death agony. At one point she tried to change position in bed and broke wind loudly. ‘Good,’ she said, ‘a woman who can fart is not dead.’ Those were her last words.”

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