N. Kryazheva - The United States and the United Kingdom. Past and Present (doc) (798446), страница 18
Текст из файла (страница 18)
THE WEEK-END
Most people in Britain work for five days a week from Monday to Friday. Schools, colleges and universities are closed on Saturday and Sunday. The week-end consists of Friday night, Saturday, and Sunday. People who stay at home at the week-end try to relax, enjoy themselves.
Week-end starts on Friday evening when people leave work and wish each other a nice week-end. Those who work away from home may go home. Some people go away for the week-end. They stay in a hotel or boarding house in the country or at the sea. On Friday night people like to go to a bar for the happy hour, or the theatre. Nowadays it is not "in" to go to all-night parties, they get up early on Saturday morning. Saturday morning is the time for cleaning the house, washing the car, doing the laundry. Women usually do housework, sewing and gardening. Saturday morning is a busy time for shopping. On weekdays shops close between 5.30 and 6 p.m. (They are closed on Sundays.) The shops in the centre of big cities usually close at 1 p.m. in the afternoon.
At about one o'clock people go out for lunch. After lunch they go for a walk or do some sports. On Saturday afternoon sporting events take place - football, horse-racing, rugby, cricket and other sports. People either go and watch or sit and watch the sport programmes on television.
Saturday evening is the favourite time for going out: parties, dances or theatre, may be pictures. Some people like to go to watch a band.
Church bells are a typical feature of an English Sunday morning. On Sunday morning most people stay in bed till 9 o'clock. Then they have a cup of tea or coffee. They look through the newspapers. Reading Sundays papers is one of the numerous traditions in Britain. There are quite a number of papers which are published weekly on Sundays.
After breakfast most people go for a walk or to the local pub. Usually men go to the pubs alone and their wives and children prepare for brunch*.
At one or 1.30 people have brunch. It is a good time for all the family, when grandparents, parents and children go out to some restaurant and spend an hour or two over brunch. Brunch is a huge meal. They have all sorts of salads, vegetables, chicken, cold meat, pies, fruit, coffee, pudding.
Sunday evenings are rather quiet. Most people prefer to stay at home and watch television or just get ready for Monday. So, they usually have an early night.
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* brunch - поздний завтрак.
PUBS IN BRITAIN
Most countries have a national drink. In England it is beer, and the "pub" is a peculiarly English institution.
The pub is the place where people can meet and talk in a friendly atmosphere. It is quite different from bars or cafes in other countries. In cafes people drink coffee and get out. The atmosphere is rather formal. But in pubs there is a general atmosphere of warmth and cosiness.
Every pub has a sign outside with its name. ("The Pig and Whistle", "The Red Lion", "The Duke of Cambridge", etc.). All pubs have one distinctive feature: there is no waiter service there, if you | want something you have to go and ask for it at the bar. People usually sit at tables to chat in a small room, called the "bar", but the same term is used for great counter of wood, where people stand and have their drinks.
English people are proud of their traditions, that's why even modern pubs look as if they were several hundred years old. In ealier times people were served only drinks in pubs. Today you can get wine, coffee and some food in them.
The staff of the bar usually knows the regular customers and chat with them. The customers may play different games (the most popular is the game of darts) or just watch TV. Some pubs organize a pub quiz.
Nowadays nearly all pubs are owned by brewery*. The person who runs a pub (he is called "landlord") is employed by the brewery. But in earlier times all pubs were privately owned (they were called "inns"), and people could stay there for the night.
There are two important peculiarities about pubs. One is that they have strictly limited hours of opening. Pubs are usually open from 11 a.m. to 11 p.m. Each local government authority has power to fix its on "licensing hours".
The second peculiarity is that most pubs are divided into at least two separated bars: the public bar and the saloon one.
The difference between them is that the saloon bar is less comfortable.
Children are not allowed inside a pub if the pub, has no children's certificate.
TELEVISION IN GREAT BRITAIN
Television is the most popular entertainment in British home life today. In London people have four TV channels:ВВС I, ВВС II, ITV = Independent Television (Channel III and Channel IV).
The BBC is known for its objectivity in news reporting. The BBC is financed by Payments which are made by all people who have TV-sets. People have to pay the licence fee.
In 1932 the BBC World Service was set up with a licence to broadcast first to Empire and then to other parts of the world. There is no advertizing on any BBC programme.
ITV started in 1954. Commercial television gets its money from advertizing. The programmes on this channel are financed by different companies, which do not have anything to do with the contents of these programmes.
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* brewery - пивоваренный завод.
ITV news programmes are not made by individual television companies. lndependent Television News is owned jointly by all of them. So it has been protected from commercial influence.
There are different types of TV programmes in Great Britain. BBC and ITV start early in the morning. One can watch news programmes, all kinds of chat shows, quiz shows, soap operas, different children's programmes, dramas, comedies and different programmes of entertainment on these channels.
News is broadcasted at regular intervals and there are panel discussions of current events. Broadcasts for schools are produced five days a week during school hours. In the afternoon and early evening TV stations show special pro-grammes for children.
Operas, music concerts and shows are presented at various times. A large part of TV time is occupied by serials.
Britain has two channels (ВВС II and Channel IV) for presenting programmes on serious topics, which are watched with great interest by a lot of people. These channels start working on early weekday mornings. But they translate mostly all kinds of education programmes.
Week-end afternoons are devoted to sport. Sport events are usually broadcasted in the evening.
These are the main channels in Great Britain. Only about a fifth of households receive satellite or cable.
LEISURE
The British may be conservative about the times at which they take their holidays. Holidays are much concentrated in the period between mid-July and mid-August. State schools and universities usually have six-eight weeks off in summer from July to the end of August. Industrial workers and employees have two or three weeks holidays, most professional workers have a month or more.
Coasts are the most popular objectives of English people for their annual holiday. But many families are ready to go to new places. They have always been pioneers in travelling far away. Now foreign travel is within reach of most working people and they become familiar with some parts of continental Europe. Many take their cars often with tents or caravans, others travel in groups. As to every day leisure the English are great lovers of competitive sports. Many games are English in origin and they have been adopted to other countries, but cricket has been seriously adopted only in Great Britain. Organized amateur cricket is played between club teams on cities, towns and villages. "Rugger" (rugby football) is played especially in summer. People visit horse races and dog races. The British have a mania for gambling. They can spend the whole day playing roulette or computer games.
Great numbers of people, especially women of middle class and middle age spend much of their leisure time working together for good causes, making clothes or food or collecting money for the benefit of various types of people who are in need. England is famous for its gardens, and most people like gardening.
Dancing is very popular, and there are numerous public dance-halls. They are Isited mainly by young unmarried people. Lately night-clubs have spread from jondon to other towns. They arrange dances and balls as social occasions for |ieir members. Everywhere there are plenty of pubs in which people play darts, alk and drink usually while standing up. Snack bars and espresso coffee bars jave great success among young people.
IN THE END
Britain has more living symbols of its past than any other country. It still has a Ipyal family and a small nobility. Its capital, cities and countryside boast of many Indent buildings, castles, cathedrals and the rich houses. Every year there are Bstorical ceremonies. These symbols are a true representation of the past.
When looking at Britain today, it is important to remember the great benefits (rom the past. No other country has so long a history of political order, going back almost without interruption to the Norman Conquest. Few other countries have fenjoyed such long periods of economic and social well-being. The government lays much about maintaining "traditional values", particularly law and order. But puture is full of uncertainty.
These doubts resulted from disappointment with lost economic and political bower. People are divided concerning the nation future possibilities. Some of them lire optimistic and some of them are very pessimistic. They are worried by the weakening of the welfare state, particularly in the educational and health services.
The questions are almost endless, and the answers are neither obvious nor easy.
SUPPLEMENTARY READING
US INFLUENCE ON THE WAY WE SPEAK IS A HOT 'POTAYTO'
By A J Mcllroy
The generations are at war over a surge in "Americanisms" entering our every day use of words, according to a survey for the authoritative Longman pronunciation dictionary.
Older people loyal to traditional pronunciation are complaining that the Queen's English is being abused by the young, who prefer "skedule" to schedule the survey says.
The research, the most comprehensive examination to date of the way we pronounce words finds that the young are giving in to the11 all-pervasive" influence of American English already marked by the different pronunciation of "tomato" at home and "tomayto" across the Atlantic.
Of 2,000 people in England, Wales and Scotland questioned on their pronunciation preferences, two-thirds of those aged under 26 referred to schedule as "skedule". This was in sharp contrast to the 95 per cent over 65 years old who insisted on using "schedule" and disapproved of the American influence.
John Wells, professor of phonetics at University College London, who is the dictionary's author, said yesterday that the survey, based on 100 words, had shown a growing trend among the young for Americanism. Those questioned used "veycation", placed the emphasis on PRIN in "princess"and turned "garage" into "guRARGE", stressing the final syllable.
Half of the young pronounced "ogle" as "oggle", while nearly all those over 65 used the traditional "oagle".
Prof. Wells, the world's leading authority on English pronunciation, said there other examples of the older generation's impatience with what was seen to be youthful lack of respect for the Queen's English.
"They are shocked at those under 26 preferring "misCHIEVous" to traditional "Mischievous" and who think that a shopping mall should be pronounced "mawl" and not after "the Ma//" leading to Buckingham Palace, he said.
"The young in their turn laugh at the older ones who don't know how to pronounce gigabyte [starts like giggle]".
He said his research had shown a tendency among young southerners to adopt a northern lilt in pronouncing some words. For example, chance was pronounced "chans' with a flattened vowel by 60 per cent of them while 80 per cent of the over 65s used "chance".
The new edition of Longman pronunciation dictionary is due to appear in November and will contains 80,000 words.
THE QUEEN'S ENGLISH AND THE PRESIDENT'S ENGLISH
The American vocabulary during the 19th century began to be exported abroad, and by the 20th century, with its economic, political and technological prominence in the world, America and its language became one of the greatest
forces for change and the expansion of English, American infiltration of the British Bord stock began before talking films, radio and television were ever thought of, lalthough they have certainly hastened the process.
In recent years many Americanisms have been introduced into British usage: "cafeteria, cocktail, egghead, electrocute, fan". American "radio" has replaced British "wireless". The ubiquitous OK seems to occur more frequently nowadays К England than in the land of its birth and may be found in quite formal situations, Buch as on legal documents to indicate the correctness of details. These and Bther Americanisms have slipped into British English in the most unobtrusive way, Ко that their American origin is hardly regarded at all; since they are used by the English, they are "English", and that is all there is to it.
We can cite as firmly established in Standard British English "disk jockey", Wnatural" (something very suitable), "show business", "star" (popular performer) -Bill originally from the usage of the world of entertainment, enormously important
in Modern America. Most words and usages are frequently borrowed from Ameri-Ban English quite unconsciously. Even when they are consciously borrowed, the
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