Writing paragraphs

Introduction

Academic writing is divided into paragraphs. If your writing is one continuous piece of text, it will be very difficult for any reader to follow your argument. Therefore your written work needs paragraphs. Written work is divided into paragraphs in a meaningful way. A paragraph is a group of sentences that develop one topic or idea. The topic of one paragraph should follow logically from the topic of the last paragraph and should lead on to the topic of the next paragraph. The paragraphs have different functions, but all develop an idea - that is, they add information, explanation, examples and illustrations to the central theme or idea until the theme is fully developed.

Exercise 1
Divide the following text into paragraphs. Remember that each paragraph should develop a particular theme. How to stop yourself snoring. Snoring is caused when the airway at the back of the nose and throat becomes partially obstructed. This is usually due to the loosening of the surrounding oropharyngeal muscles, but the reasons why this should occur are varied. The most common are smoking, obesity and the consumption of relaxants such as alcohol and sleeping pills. As with any common ailment, there are a host of "miracle" cures advertised - but you should first try a few simple steps to see if you can halt the snoring before adopting more drastic measures. Lifestyle changes can be the most effective. If you are overweight, a loss of weight will help to reduce the pressure on your neck. You should also stop smoking and try not to drink alcohol at least four hours before you go to bed. Beyond this, try to change your regular sleeping position. Raise the head of your bed with a brick, or tie something uncomfortable into the back of your pyjamas to encourage you to sleep on your side. Both of these will help to alter the angle of your throat as you sleep, and may thus make breathing easier for you. It is also important to keep your nasal passage clear and unblocked. Allergies, colds and hay fever can temporarily cause you to snore; nasal decongestants may help, but you are not advised to use such remedies for long periods. Nasal strips, as worn by sportspeople, have been proven to reduce nasal airway resistance by up to 30 per cent, so consider these as a long-term alternative. If this fails, then you may wish to look at the varied snoring aids that are on the market. They range from neck collars that stop your neck tilting, through to mandibular-advancement devices (such as gumshields)

which reduce upper airway resistance, and tongue-retaining devices. You can also buy essential-oil products that are added to warm water and infused or consumed before bedtime. They claim to tone up your palate and unblock your nasal passage. Finally, if your symptoms persist, visit your GP or contact the British Snoring and Sleep Apnoea Association (01737 557 997) for advice. If you do not, your partner might. (Mark Irving, Esquire, March 1999) Exercise 2 Look at the following text about growing cotton in India. The paragraphs have not been printed in the correct order. Arrange the paragraphs in the correct order. Remember that the topic of one paragraph should follow logically from the topic of the last paragraph and should lead on to the topic of the next paragraph. Pesticide suicide Most of the farmers are extremely poor. Attracted by cheap loans from pesticides traders and the prospect of a quick buck, they borrowed heavily to raise cotton on small plots of land. According to the Ministry of Agriculture, the crop losses and destruction in Andhra Pradesh arose from the repeated application of excessive amounts of chemicals - a practice actively encouraged by pesticides traders. The suicide of Samala Mallaiah in Nagara village grabbed media headlines. He owned one acre of land, leased two more and grew cotton on all three. After making a loss in the first year, he leased yet more land in an attempt to recover. Confronted with falling prices, mounting debts and pest attacks, he committed harakiri. Cotton has given us shattered dreams, said one old farmer in Nagara village. As many as 60,000 small farmers in the region of Andhra Pradesh, southern India, have taken to farming cotton instead of food crops. Some 20 of them have recently committed suicide by eating lethal doses of pesticide. Whitefly, boll weevils and caterpillars multiplied and destroyed their crops, despite the constant application of pesticides. The average yield of cotton fields in Andhra Pradesh fell by more than half in just one year. Now the farmers are in no position to repay the loans or feed their families. Nearly half the pesticides used in India go into protecting cotton, the most important commercial crop in the country. However, pests have shown increased immunity to a range of pesticides. Last year there were heavy crop losses due to leaf-curl, which is caused by the dreaded whitefly. This nondescript, milky-white fly sucks sap from the

cotton leaves, making them curl and dry up. The fly struck first in Pakistan and northwestern India. Then it turned south. (New Internationalist, June 1998, p. 13)

Reporting: Summary
Exercise 2

Sum up in one sentence the author's feelings about the value of his education, according to the passage. School and life In my experience the problem of what to do in life was not made any easier by those who were entrusted with my education. Looking back, it seems most odd that never once in all the years that I was at school was there any general discussion about careers. As presumably the main object of going to school is to prepare for after life, it surely would have been very easy and relevant to organise lectures or discussions designed to give boys a broad view of the enormous variety of occupations open to men of average intelligence? Of course many boys were destined from birth to follow their fathers careers, but even these would have benefited by glimpse of a wider horizon. Often and often in after life I have come across people doing jobs that I had never dreamed of before, and which would have thrilled me had I been told about them at school. I suppose the reason for this extra-ordinary omission is that so many schoolmasters had themselves such a restricted view. Spending all their time working to a rigid curriculum, the passing of examinations by their pupils gradually became the whole object of their working life. I recognize the importance of being made to learn things that one does not like, but surely it was not good to give the young mind the impression that all education was a form of mental gymnastics. For example, I used to find geometry rather fun, and, when I still had the nave idea that what I was being taught might have some practical value, I asked what geometry was for. The only answer I ever got was that it taught one how to solve problems. If, instead, I had been told the simple fact that the word was derived from the Greek ge, the earth, and metron, a measure, and that the meaningless triangles that I was asked to juggle with formed the basis of geographical exploration, astronomy and navigation, the subject would immediately have assumed a thrilling romance, and, what is more, it would have been directly connected in my mind with the things that most appealed to me. My experience in this connection may have been unfortunate, but it was by no

means unique; many of my friends who went to different schools confess to a similar experience, and complain that when they had completed their school education they had not the remotest idea of what they wanted to do. Moreover I do not think that this curiously detached attitude towards education was confined to schools. It had been intended that I should go to one of the great universities. I was tepid about the idea myself, for I had developed a dislike for the very thought of educational establishments. However, the prospect of three extra seasons in the Alps was a considerable incentive, and by dint of an enormous mental effort I succeeded in cramming sufficient Latin into my head to pass (at my second attempt) the necessary entrance examination. In due course I went to be interviewed by the master of my prospective college. When I was asked what subject I propose to take when I came up to the university, I replied, somewhat diffidently, that I wanted to take Geology diffidently, because I still regarded such things as having no reality in the hard world of work. The answer to my suggestion confirmed my fears. What on earth do you want to do with Geology? There is no opening there unless you eventually get a first and become a lecturer in the subject. A first, a lecturer I, who could not even learn a couple of books of Horace by heart! I felt that I was being laughed at. In fact I am sure I was not, and that my adviser was quite sincere and only trying to be helpful, but I certainly did not feel like arguing the matter. I listened meekly to suggestions that I should take Classics or Law, and left the room in a state of profound depression. Oh Lord, I thought, even here I won't be able to escape from Kennedy's Latin Primer, with which I had been struggling for ten years. (From Upon that Mountain by Eric Shipton)

Reporting: Summary
Exercise 3

In two or three sentences, explain what Carol Bergman thinks is important in preparing reading materials for black pupils. Helping black teenagers to read There have been substantial numbers of black children in Britains secondary schools for many years now, but most of the reading material available to them is still directed at the white majority. Carol Bergman, a young American who taught remedial reading classes for the Inner London Education Authority from 1968 until last year, believes that the lack of material to appeal directly to black students is part of the reason many of them need remedial reading at

secondary level. She has therefore written three short books for Heinemann Educational Books, in which the heroes are black children in situations which will be familiar to many black pupils. Although weak on plot in the conventional sense, the books are packed with incident. In one a schoolgirl runs away from home when she discovers she is pregnant. In another the hero, a teenager who cannot read, is suspended from school for pushing a teacher over. Mrs Bergman thinks realism and honesty are important if the books are to fulfil their purpose. Thus there is a scene in one of them in which a black and a white boy, both in the same class, go to see the careers officer. The white boy is given a chit for a job interview, but when the black boy goes he is told the job market is bad. This is one of the factors contributing to his anger and his assault on the teacher. This happens, Mrs Bergman told me. There is much higher unemployment among black school-leavers than white. It doesnt help to lie about the fact that there is discrimination and that it's harder for black kids. In the same way she thinks she has been honest about the schoolgirls pregnancy. I make no moral statement about pregnancy, she said. I leave it deliberately open-ended. People are going to get pregnant no matter what you do. I hope it will stimulate discussion about what the girl should do. The important thing is that she goes back to her mother to discuss it and try to sort out what she should do. It will be resolved within the family. In the book about the violent boy - based on one of her former pupils - the headmaster is shown as sympathetic to him, trying to find the reason for his anger. Mrs Bergman, however, finds this comparatively rare among teachers in real life. The teachers do not try to find out what is troubling them. They treat the symptoms, not the causes. Children get angry and they don't know why, and sometimes this anger interferes with their ability to read. Teachers have come up to me very often and said: How do I begin to talk to these kids? Thats very odd. They come to me, a white American, and ask how to talk to West Indians. She hopes the books will lead children on to reading more solid stuff from the school library. I don't think to have them reading about their immediate background is the be-all and end-all of the educational process. But you have to start somewhere, and you may as well start where they are. Mrs Bergman is now a part-time tutor with the Open University, working at home to look after her year-old child. She does not plan any further similar books. It was a freak that I did these, she said. I only did it because I became

impatient at the lack of suitable materials. Now the time has come for publishers to approach black teachers to write this sort of book. (From a report in The Times)

Reporting: Summary
Exercise 4

Sum up in one sentence the writers advice to people who want to stop violence,according to the passage. Violence Now, if you want to stop violence, if you want to stop wars, how much vitality, how much of yourself, do you give to it? Isnt it important to you that your children are killed, that your sons go into the army where they are bullied and butchered? Dont you care? My God, if that doesnt interest you, what does? Guarding your money? Having a good time? Taking drugs? Dont you see that this violence in yourself is destroying your children? Or do you see it only as some abstraction? All right then, if you are interested, attend with all your heart and mind to find out. Dont just sit back and say, Well, tell us all about it. I point out to you that you cannot look at anger nor at violence with eyes that condemn or justify and that if this violence is not a burning problem to you, you cannot put those two things away. So first you have to learn; you have to learn how to look at anger, how to look at your husband, your wife, your children; you have to listen to the politician, you have to learn why you are not objective, why you condemn or justify. You have to learn that you condemn and justify because it is part of the social structure you live in, your conditioning as a German or an Indian or a Negro or an American or whatever you happen to have been born, with all the dulling of the mind that this conditioning results in. To learn, to discover, something fundamental you must have the capacity to go deeply. If you have a blunt instrument, a dull instrument, you cannot go deeply. So what we are doing is sharpening the instrument which is the mind - the mind which has been made dull by all this justifying and condemning. You can penetrate deeply only if your mind is as sharp as a needle and as strong as a diamond. It is no good just sitting back and asking, How am I to get such a mind? You have to want it as you want your next meal, and to have it you must see that what makes your mind dull and stupid is this sense of invulnerability which has built walls round itself and which is part of this condemnation and justification. If the mind can be rid of that, then you can look, study, penetrate,

and perhaps come to a state that is totally aware of the whole problem. To investigate the fact of your own anger you must pass non-judgemental on it, for the moment you conceive of its opposite you condemn it and therefore you cannot see it as it is. When you say you dislike or hate someone that is a fact, although it sounds terrible. If you look at it, go into it completely, it ceases, but if you say, I must not hate; I must have love in my heart, then you are living in a hypocritical world with double standards. To live completely, fully, in the moment is to live with what is, the actual, without any sense of condemnation or justification - then you understand it so totally that you are finished with it. When you see clearly the problem is solved. But can you see the face of violence clearly - the face of violence not only outside you but inside you, which means that you are totally free from violence because you have not admitted ideology through which to get rid of it? This requires very deep meditation, not just a verbal agreement or disagreement. You have now read a series of statements but have you really understood? Your conditioned mind, your way of life, the whole structure of the society in which you live, prevent you from looking at a fact and being entirely free from it immediately. You say, I will think about it; I will consider whether it is possible to be free from violence or not. I will try to be free. That is one of the most dreadful statements you can make, I will try. There is no trying, no doing your best. Either you do it or you dont do it. You are admitting time while the house is burning. The house is burning as a result of the violence throughout the world and in yourself and you say, Let me think about it. Which ideology is best to put out the fire? When the house is on fire, do you argue about the colour of the hair of the man who brings the water? (From Freedom from the Known by J. Krishnamurti)

Reporting: Summary
Exercise 6

Read the text carefully, and try to sum up (in one sentence if possible) the two or three main points, which the writer is making. Gun control A student of the gun control issue will readily perceive the arena is indeed a broad one, in which we must struggle to preserve the right to keep and bear arms. It is a struggle which will test whatever there might be of genius in any of us and it is one which will merit the devoted efforts of every citizen who in the broadest sense can perceive the relationships which our Bill of Rights

liberties bear one to another. I suggest we begin our affirmative role immediately in the area of crime control. The truth is that gun control does not equate with crime control. We have an advantage in this fact which we have neither exploited nor advanced convincingly. It is demonstrable that in those sections of the country where gun possession is most prevalent, crime is least. Encouragingly, many moderate and reasonable men among our opponents are beginning to see that our problem is crime control and that gun control is not going to have much, if any, effect upon it. Of course, for reasons of their own, some of them still say gun control is desirable. For these people we can only wonder, as would any good citizen, what it is they have in mind for us that our possession of guns makes them so nervous. As long as we concur that any measure of gun control equates with some measure of crime control we are in agreement with those who would eliminate our rights. We would then again be backed into our defensive position, held for forty years, always losing a little here and a little there until finally nothing would be left us. No group of good citizens has ever struggled more conscientiously along the narrow pathway, between hope and moderation on one hand, and the cold facts of efforts to abolish our rights on the other, than the leaders of the National Rifle Association. Every gun owner in America should applaud the action taken by the Executive Committee of the NRA in Washington, D.C. on July 12, 1974: ...the NRA opposes any proposed legislation, at any level of government, which is directed against the inanimate firearm rather than against the criminal misuse of firearms. A reasonable degree of order in society must prevail first. Criminals must be controlled first. We are the decent people. We try to be reasonable and we are not fools even though we have so often made mistakes in the past 40 years. Many people turn to England as an example for crime control. The fact is that in England, for hundreds of years, a man found guilty of any one of number of crimes was promptly hanged. Now that a more humanistic generation of Englishmen has lately abolished these stern but effective methods, crime including armed crime - is sky-rocketing. Recently armed Englishmen, amid a hail of their own bullets, attempted to kidnap the eldest daughter of the reigning Queen of England! Unbelievable! (From an article in Guns and Ammo by Harlan Carter)

Reporting: Summary

Exercise 7

Why, in the writer's view, do people seek personal possessions? Freedom and selfishness It is always the problem of how to change an ideal into reality that gets in the way of both the leaders and the people. A thought is not a deed and never will be. We are not magic men. We cannot imagine something into existence especially a change of behaviour. Just as we have been conditioned to be what we are now - greedy, competitive, stingy, mean - so we need to learn to love, to learn to be free. Freedom is a difficult thing to handle. How many people given the complete freedom to do whatever they like would die of boredom? No structure, no rules, no compulsion to work from nine to five, no one telling us when to do this, do that - it sounds great until we try it. We've learned to be directed by so many others - by mommy, daddy, teacher, principal, boss, policeman, politician, bureaucrat, etc. - that freedom from all this could be overwhelming. Imagine: making love, eating, sleeping, playing ... and ... ho, hum, now what? Where do you go and what do you do when the trip ends? Give people freedom and they'll do all the things they thought they never had a chance to do. But that won't take very long. And after that? After that, my friend, it'll be time to make your life meaningful. Can you do it if you're free? Can you do it if others no longer require you to do what they say is best? Authority is only necessary for those who need it. Most of us need it because we've been taught to believe that we have to be concerned about others. For instance: 'You're selfish if you think of yourself,' or even: 'Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country.' Sorry friends, but that's all Christian, authoritarian, manipulative bullshit. You've got to get in touch with what your real needs are before you can begin to be of value to others. The other-directedness of Americans that is promoted by mom, God, and the flag has pushed us to the precipice of Fascism in this country. We are no longer able to think for ourselves, we think for the 'good' of others. 'Who am I?', 'What do I really want out of life?' These are considered selfish questions. So a whole society goes down the drain. So it is with communes, whose members are too eager to help their curious 'brothers,' who find it remarkably easy to create all kinds of physical and figurative mess and then leave it for the members to clean up. Challenges to this traditional, other-directed, do-gooder mystique are met with admonitions and scoldings: 'Why are you so selfish, all the time thinking only

about yourself? Don't you have any regard for the rights of others?' (The intent and frequent effect of such a question is to make one feel guilty and consequently willing to conform to the 'altruistic' wishes of others.) And because we have become so confused about what is really important to us as individuals, we believe these admonitions - and with good reason. Our demands are indeed 'selfish'. As we are no longer capable of knowing who we really are, we are compelled and desire to be like someone (everyone) else. We feel we must have money, a new car, power, position, prestige, and an all too material sense of personal worth. (From Communes USA by Richard Fairfield)

Reporting: Summary
Exercise 8

What does the author think are the personal and social effects of this kind of speech-training? Teaching speech At the roots of much of our cultural thinking is our actual experience of speech. In Britain the question of good speech is deeply confused, and is in itself a major source of many of the divisions in our culture. It is inevitable, in modern society, that our regional speech-forms should move closer to each other, and that many extreme forms should disappear. But this should be a natural process, as people move and travel and meet more freely, and as they hear different speakers in films, television, and broadcasting. The mistake is to assume that there is already a correct form of modern English speech, which can serve as a standard to condemn all others. In fact public-school English, in the form in which many have tried to fix it, cannot now become a common speech-form in the country as a whole: both because of the social distinctions now associated with its use, and because of the powerful influence of American speech-forms. Yet many good forms of modified regional speech are in practice emerging and extending. The barriers imposed by dialect are reduced, in these forms, without the artificiality of imitating a form remote from most peoples natural speaking. This is the path of growth. Yet in much speech training, in schools, we go on assuming that there is already one correct form over the country as a whole. Thousands of us are made to listen to our natural speaking with the implication from tile beginning that it iswrong. This sets up such deep tensions, such active feelings of shame and resentment, that it should be no surprise that we cannot discuss

culture in Britain without at once encountering tensions and prejudices deriving from this situation. If we experience speech training as an aspect of our social inferiority, a fundamental cultural division gets built in, very near the powerful emotions of self-respect, family affection, and local loyalty. This does not mean that we should stop speech training. But we shall not get near a common culture in Britain unless we make it a real social process - listening to ourselves and to others with no prior assumption of correctness - rather than the process of imitating a social class which is remote from most of us, leaving us stranded at the end with the two-language problem. Nothing is more urgent than to get rid of this arbitrary association between general excellence and the habits of a limited social group. It is not only that there is much that is good elsewhere. It is also that, if you associate the idea of quality with the idea of class, you may find both rejected as people increasingly refuse to feel inferior on arbitrary social grounds. (From Communications by Raymond Williams)

Reporting: Summary
Exercise 9

According to the writer, what changes are taking place in the position of Received Pronunciation? Received pronunciation Most of us have an image of such a normal or standard English in pronunciation, and very commonly in Great Britain this is Received Pronunciation, often associated with the public schools, Oxford, and the BBC. Indeed, a pronunciation within this range has great prestige throughout the world, and for English taught as a foreign language it is more usually the ideal than any other pronunciation. At the same time, it must be remembered that, so far as the English-speaking countries are concerned, this Received Pronunciation approaches the status of a standard almost only in England: educated Scots, Irishmen, Americans, Australians, and others have their own, different images of a standard form of English. Even in England it is difficult to speak oaf standard in pronunciation. For one thing, pronunciation is infinitely variable, so that even given the will to adopt a single pronunciation, it would be difficult to achieve. The word dance may be pronounced in a dozen ways even by people who do not think of themselves as dialect speakers: there is no sure way of any two people saying the same word with precisely the same sound. In this respect, pronunciation much more

closely resembles handwriting than spelling. In spelling, there are absolute distinctions which can be learnt and imitated with complete precision: one can know at once whether a word is spelt in a standard way or not. But two persons handwriting and pronunciation may both be perfectly intelligible, yet have obvious differences without our being able to say which is better or more standard. Moreover, while the easy and quick communications of modern times have mixed up and levelled dialectal distinctions to a great extent, and encouraged the spread of neutral, normal pronunciation, the accompanying sociological changes have reduced the prestige of Received Pronunciation. When Mr Robert Graves returned to Oxford in October 1961 to take up the Professorship of Poetry, The Times reported him as saying, Only the ordinary accent of the undergraduate has changed. In my day you very seldom heard anything but Oxford English; now there is a lot of north country and so on. In 1920 it was prophesied that the Oxford accent would overcome all others. But the regional speech proved stronger. A good thing. (From Use of English by Randolph Quirk)

Reporting: Summary
Exercise 10

Explain in one short sentence why the author believes that MOST children fail. How children fail. Most children in school fail. For a great many this failure is avowed and absolute. Close to forty per cent of those who begin high school drop out before they finish. For college the figure is one in three. Many others fail in fact if not in name. They complete their schooling only because we have agreed to push them up through the grades and out of the schools, whether they know anything or not. There are many more such children than we think. If we raise our standards much higher, as some would have us do, we will find out very soon just how many there are. Our classrooms will bulge with kids who cant pass the test to get into the next class.

But there is a more important sense in which almost all children fail: except for a handful, who may or may not be good students, they fail to develop more than a tiny part of the tremendous capacity for learning, understanding, and creating with which they were born and of which they made full use during the first two or three years of their lives. Why do they fail? They fail because they are afraid, bored, and confused. They are afraid, above all else, of failing, of disappointing or displeasing the many anxious adults around them, whose limitless hopes and expectations for them hang over their heads like a cloud. They are bored because the things they are given and told to do in school are so trivial, so dull, and make such limited and narrow demands on the wide spectrum of their intelligence, capabilities, and talents. They are confused because most of the torrent of words that pours over them in school makes little or no sense. It often flatly contradicts other things they have been told, and hardly ever has any relation to what they really know - to the rough model of reality that they carry around in their minds. How does this mass failure take place? What really goes on in the classroom? What are these children who fail doing? What goes on in their heads? Why dont they make use of more of their capacity? This book is the rough and partial record of a search for answers to these questions. It began as a series of memos written in the evenings to my colleague and friend Bill Hull, whose fifth-grade class I observed and taught in during the day. Later these memos were sent to other interested teachers and parents. A small number of these memos make up this book. They have not been much rewritten, but they have been edited and rearranged under four major topics: Strategy; Fear and Failure; Real Learning; and How Schools Fail. Strategy deals with the ways in which children try to meet, or dodge, the demands that adults make on them in school. Fear and Failure deals with the interaction in children of fear and failure, and the effect of this on strategy and learning. Real Learning deals with the difference between what children appear to know or are expected to know, and what they really know. How Schools Fail analyses the ways in which schools foster bad strategies, raise childrens fears, produce learning which is usually fragmentary, distorted, and short-lived, and generally fail to meet the real needs of children.

These four topics are clearly not exclusive. They tend to overlap and blend into each other. They are, at most, different ways of looking at and thinking about the thinking and behaviour of children. It must be made clear that the book is not about unusually bad schools or backward children. The schools in which the experiences described here took place are private schools of the highest standards and reputation. With very few exceptions, the children whose work is described are well above the average in intelligence and are, to all outward appearances, successful, and on their way to good secondary schools and colleges. Friends and colleagues, who understand what I am trying to say about the harmful effect of todays schooling on the character and intellect of children, and who have visited many more schools than I have, tell me that the schools I have not seen are not a bit better than those I have, and very often are worse. (From How children fail by John Holt, 1965, pp. 9-11)

Reporting: Synthesis
Exercise 27

Read the articles below and, in a paragraph of not more than 250 words, discuss the advantages and disadvantages of globalisation.
Globalisation is the tendency for the world economy to work as one unit, led by large international companies doing business all over the world. Some of the things that have led to globalisation are the ending of trade barriers, the free movement of capital, cheap transport and the increased use of electronic systems of communication such as the Internet. (From: Longman business English dictionary, published in London by Longman in 2000.)

These new channels of communication have helped spread a homogenous and largely commercial culture. Disney movies are children's food the world over. Barbie dolls, fastfood restaurants, hip-hop music and corporate-driven, American-style youth culture attract millions of new converts from the bidonvilles of Abidjan, Cte d'Ivoire, to the wealthy suburbs of Sydney. Alternatively you can now find a dazzling variety of 'ethnic' foods - including Thai, Szechwan, Mexican and Indian - throughout Europe, North America and Australia. In fact, many residents and visitors to Britain believe globalisation and the resulting 'fusion' of cuisine is the best thing to happen to English

cooking in the past 500 years. There is every reason to believe this global exchange of people, products, plants, animals, technologies and ideas will continue into the future. The process of change is unstoppable. And that is not such a bad thing. In many ways it is a positive process containing the seeds of a better future for all the world's people. Globalisation cannot help but be a positive force for change if we come to recognize the common thread of humanity that ties us together. . However, gaps between rich and poor are widening, decision-making power is concentrated in fewer and fewer hands, local cultures are wiped out, biological diversity is destroyed, regional tensions are increasing and the environment is nearing the point of collapse. That is the sad reality of globalisation, an opportunity for human progress whose great potential has been thwarted. Instead we have a global economic system which feeds on itself while marginalizing the fundamental human needs of people and communities. (From an article by David Ransome called Globalisation - an alternative view. It was in the magazine: New Internationalist, in 1997. It was in volume 296, and the article was on pages 7-10. This quotation was from page 8.)

Globalisation is a new word which describes an old process: the integration of the global economy that began in earnest with the launch of the European colonial era five centuries ago. But the process has accelerated over the past quarter century with the explosion of computer technology, the dismantling of trade barriers and the expanding political and economic power of multinational corporations. (This is from a book called: The no-nonsense guide to globalisation by Wayne Ellwood. It was published in London by Verso in 2001. The quotation is from page 12.)

Globalisation is increasing inequality and poverty worldwide as national governments lose the ability to control their development strategies and policies. Political solutions are needed to reinvigorate democratic control both North and South. But political reforms need to be combined with particular mechanisms for structural reform. In combination these should put meaningful employment and human rights at the heart of economic policy, boost local control and decision-making, and restore the ecological health and natural capital of our planet. (This is also from: The no-nonsense guide to globalisation. This quotation is from page 107.)

As close as a group can get to global Most of us would look at Brazil, Belgium and Bangladesh and see three different cultures. Al Zeien, chief executive of Gillette, the US razor maker, simply sees a lot of people in need of a shave. He believes Gillette is a "global" company in the way few corporations are. "A multinational has operations in different countries," he says. "A global company views the world as a single country. We know Argentina and France are different, but we treat them the same. We sell them the same products, we use the same production methods, we have the same corporate policies. We even use the same advertising, in a different language, of course." The company's one-size-fits-all strategy has been effective. The group makes items almost everyone in the world buys at one time or another, including shavers, batteries and pens. It aims to dominate the markets it operates in: its share of the worldwide shavers market, for example, is 70 per cent, which the company hopes to increase by the launch next week of a new razor for men. To make sure managers worldwide are on the same wavelength, Mr Zeien insists they move from country to country and division to division. Being moved around places them in the role of "idea ambassadors" who can transfer concepts. "I believe in diagonal promotions," he says. "You don't move up in a nice progression through one area or country." Managers joining Gillette should expect to be geographically relocated three or four times in their first dozen years. During the last few years, Mr Zeien has concentrated on increasing the number of Americans in overseas posts, and the time foreign managers spend in the US. There are problems with his approach, he admits. Being transferred from country to country can be hard on staff. People in dual-career marriages, he says, probably should not work for Gillette. The company's commitment to standardisation, moreover, costs it customers in niche markets within countries. Mr Zeien long ago decided the drawbacks were worth suffering. "I tell my workers all the time that we'll only be in markets where we can be number one," he says. "Focus is what gives us bang for the buck." (This was by the journalist Victoria Griffith. It was published in the Financial Times on 7th April 1998, p. 10.)

Reporting: Summary

Exercise 16

Sum up the most important points of the passage in a paragraph of around 100 words. Hypnosis There are many methods of producing hypnosis; indeed, almost every experienced hypnotist employs variations differing slightly from those of others. Perhaps the most common method is something along these lines. The hypnotist tries to obtain his subjects co-operation by pointing out to him the advantages to be secured by the hypnosis, such as, for instance, the help in curing a nervous illness to be derived from the patients remembering in the trance certain events which otherwise are inaccessible to his memory. The patient is reassured about any possible dangers he might suspect to be present in hypnosis, and he may also be told (quite truthfully) that it is not a sign of instability or weakness to be capable of being put in a hypnotic trance, but that, quite on the contrary, a certain amount of intelligence and concentration on the part of the subject is absolutely essential. Next, the subject is asked to lie down on a couch, or sit in an easy-chair. External stimulation is reduced to a minimum by drawing the curtains and excluding, as far as possible, all disruptive noises. It is sometimes helpful to concentrate the subjects attention on some small bright object dangled just above eye-level, thus forcing him to look slightly upwards. This leads quickly to a fatigue of the eye-muscles, and thus facilitates his acceptance of the suggestion that he is feeling tired and that his eyes are closing. The hypnotist now begins to talk to the subject in a soft tone of voice, repeating endlessly suggestions to the effect that the subject is feeling drowsy, getting tired, that his eyes are closing, that he is falling into a deep sleep, that he cannot hear anything except the hypnotists voice, and so on and so forth. In a susceptible subject, a light trance is thus induced after a few minutes, and the hypnotist now begins to deepen this trance and to test the reactions of the subject by giving suggestions which are more and more difficult of execution. Thus, he will ask the subject to clasp his hands together, and tell him that it is impossible for him to separate his hands again. The subject, try as he may, finds, to his astonishment, that he cannot in actual fact pull his hands apart. Successful suggestions of this kind are instrumental in deepening the hypnotic trance until, finally, in particularly good subjects, all the phenomena which will be discussed presently can be elicited. Having induced a reasonably deep hypnotic trance in our subject, what types of phenomena can be elicited? The first and most obvious one, which, indeed, may be responsible in large measure for all the others, is a tremendous

increase in the subjects suggestibility. He will take up any suggestion the hypnotist puts forward and act on it to the best of his ability. Suggest to him that he is a dog, and he will go down on all fours and rush around the room barking and yelping. Suggest to him that he is Hitler, and he will throw his arms about and produce an impassioned harangue in an imitation of the raucous tones of the Fhrer! This tremendous increase in suggestibility is often exploited on the stage to induce people to do foolish and ridiculous acts. Such practices are not to be encouraged because they go counter to the ideal of human dignity and are not the kind of way in which hypnosis ought to be used; nevertheless, they must be mentioned because it is probably phenomena such as these which are most familiar to people from vaudeville acts, from reading the papers, and so forth. It would not be true to say, however, that all suggestions are accepted, even in the very deepest trance. This is particularly true when a suggestion is made which is contrary to the ethical and moral conceptions held by the subject. A well-known story may be quoted to illustrate this. Charcot, the great French neurologist, whose classes at one time were attended by Freud, was lecturing on hypnosis and was demonstrating the phenomena of the hypnotic trance on a young girl of eighteen. When she had been hypnotized deeply he was called away, and handed over the demonstration to one of his assistants. This young man, lacking the seriousness of purpose so desirable in students of medicine, even French ones, suggested to the young lady that she should remove her clothes. She immediately awakened from her trance, slapped his face, and flounced out of the room, very much to his discomfiture. (Abridged from Sense and Nonsense in Psychology by H. J. Eysenck)

Reporting: Summary
Exercise 10

In a paragraph of not more than 100 words, sum up the changes that took place in music around 1966-7, according to the passage. The new music The new music was built out of materials already in existence: blues, rocknroll, folk music. But although the forms remained, something wholly new and original was made out of these older elements - more original, perhaps, than even the new musicians themselves yet realize. The transformation took place in 1966-7. Up to that time, the blues had been an essentially black medium. Rocknroll, a blues derivative, was rhythmic, raunchy, teen-age

dance music. Folk music, old and modern, was popular among college students. The three forms remained musically and culturally distinct, and even as late as 1965, none of them were expressing any radically new states of consciousness. Blues expressed black soul; rock, as made famous by Elvis Presley, was the beat of youthful sensuality; and folk music, with such singers as Joan Baez, expressed anti-war sentiments as well as the universal themes of love and disillusionment. In 1966-7 there was a spontaneous transformation. In the United States, it originated with youthful rock groups playing in San Francisco. In England, it was led by the Beatles, who were already established as an extremely fine and highly individual rock group. What happened, as well as it can be put into words, was this. First, the separate musical traditions were brought together. Bob Dylan and the Jefferson Airplane played folk rock, folk ideas with a rock beat. White rock groups began experimenting with the blues. Of course, white musicians had always played the blues, but essentially as imitators of the Negro style; now it began to be the white bands own music. And all of the groups moved towards a broader eclecticism and synthesis. They freely took over elements from Indian ragas, from jazz, from American country music, and as time went on from even more diverse sources (one group seems recently to have been trying out Gregorian chants). What developed was a protean music, capable fan almost limitless range of expression. The second thing that happened was that all the musical groups began using the full range of electric instruments and the technology of electronic amplifiers. The twangy electric guitar was an old country-western standby, but the new electronic effects were altogether different - so different that a new listener in 1967 might well feel that there had never been any sounds like that in the world before. The high, piercing, unearthly sounds of the guitar seemed to come from other realms. Electronics did, in fact, make possible sounds that no instrument up to that time could produce. And in studio recordings, multiple tracking, feedback and other devices made possible effects that not even an electronic band could produce live. Electronic amplification also made possible a fantastic increase in volume, the music becoming as loud and penetrating as the human ear could stand, and thereby achieving a total effect, so that instead fan audience of passive listeners, there were now audiences of total participants, feeling the music in all of their senses and all of their bones. Third, the music becomes a multi-media experience; a part of a total environment. In the Bay Area ballrooms, the Fillmore, the Avalon, or Pauley Ballroom at the University of California, the walls were covered with fantastic changing patterns of light, the beginning of the new art of the light show. And the audience did not sit, it danced. With records at home, listeners imitated

these lighting effects as best they could, and heightened the whole experience by using drugs. Often music was played out of doors, where nature - the sea or tall redwoods - provided the environment. (From The Greening of America by Charles Reich)

Reporting: Summary
Exercise 12

In a paragraph of not more than 100 words, sum up the various things a mother of small children can do (according to the writer) in order not to be trapped and oppressed by her family. Dilemma of the working mother Living with children is one of the few situations where virtue is rewarded. Though it sounds intolerably priggish to say so, parents who think first whats best for the children really do have an easier, more comfortable life than those who do what they like and make the children fit in. The key decision is: should both parents go out to work? Dr Spock takes the standard line: if a mother realises how vital her care is to a young baby it may make it easier for her to decide that the extra money she might earn, or the satisfaction she might receive from an outside job, is not so important after all. The evidence is, as usual, more confused. All research agrees on consistent loving care and a high level of stimulation as essential ingredients in optimal child development. But theres increasing doubt that the 24 hours a day, seven days a week mum is the best way to provide it. Two recent, as yet unpublished, London studies have quite independently come up with the same result: 40 per cent of mothers who stay at home with children under five are clinically depressed, although the depression is not necessarily caused by staying at home. Dr Michael Rutter, of the Maudsley Hospital, and Dr G. Stewart Prince, among others, have shown that depressed mothers produce depressed, neurotic and backward children. There are many other mothers who, without being depressed, are oppressed by the unending repetitive task of caring for a young baby, or the unceasing chatter of a toddler, and so get less pleasure from their children than they might. Extra money is not to be despised. It buys automatic washers, tumble driers, dish-washers to make life easier and give more real attention-time to the children. It buys time off excursions, holidays. It may make the difference

between a town flat and a house with a garden, a better environment for bringing up children. For professional women there is another difficulty. To give up or even work part-time, probably means climbing painfully back on to the bottom rung of the ladder at 35 or 40 in galling subordination to younger and perhaps less able men. Assuming the still-normal situation - mother at home - there are ways to guard against the imprisoned feeling. Any arrangement will do as long as its regular and doesnt involve renegotiation every time. For instance, once a week, a completely free day and evening during which the mother is relieved of all responsibility. She can visit friends, or go to a museum, spend all morning buying a pair of shoes and neednt come back until she feels like it. The only rule is she must go out, not hang around catching up on household jobs. Its best of all if combined with a regular night out for parents together. You can employ another woman to stand in for the day, set up a reciprocal arrangement with another family, or make it a Saturday when Father can take over - but thats less good. The split Saturday works well for some families. Father has morning off, Mother afternoon, to do what they like unencumbered by children. Much nicer for them, too, than the family shopping expedition, which soon makes small children tired and fractious. Child-free weekends every few months are very restorative, and well worth the money. Family exchanges are fun for older children. Advertise if you dont know a suitable family, but get well acquainted before you go off. A word of caution: work which can be done at home is superficially attractive Rhona and Robert Rapports book Dual-Career Families describes several households coping with this situation. But there is good evidence that withdrawal of attention is more harmful to children than physical absence which is one reason why the switch-off phenomenon associated with maternal depression is so damaging. Anyone with a toddler knows how he will play happily while you cook, wash up or make beds, but no sooner do you sit down with a book, pick up a complicated piece of knitting or take out your violin than he becomes demanding and tiresome. In our house Mum's writing an article is a signal for unusual gloom, whereas Mums off for the weekend is excellent news. (But its not a good idea to leave a child for very long between the ages of 9 months and 2.) (Article in The Observer Magazine)

Reporting: Summary

Exercise 14

In a paragraph of not more than 100 words, sum up what the writer says about the causes of conflict. The causes of conflict The evidence taken from the observation of the behavior of apes and children suggests that there are three clearly separable groups of simple causes for the outbreak of fighting and the exhibition of aggressiveness by individuals. One of the most common causes of fighting among both children and apes was over the possession of external objects. The disputed ownership of any desired object - food, clothes, toys, females, and the affection of others - was sufficient ground for an appeal to force. On Monkey Hill disputes over females were responsible for the death of thirty out of thirty-three females. Two points are of particular interest to notice about these fights for possession. In the first place they are often carried to such an extreme that they end in the complete destruction of the objects of common desire. Toys are torn to pieces. Females are literally torn limb from limb. So overriding is the aggression once it has begun that it not only overflows all reasonable boundaries of selfishness but utterly destroys the object for which the struggle began and even the self for whose advantage the struggle was undertaken. In the second place it is observable, at least in children, that the object for whose possesion aggression is started may sometimes be desired by one person only or merely because it is desired by someone else. There were many cases observed by Dr Isaacs where toys and other objects which had been discarded as useless were violently defended by their owners when they became the object of some other childs desire. The grounds of possessiveness may, therefore, be irrational in the sense that they are derived from inconsistent judgments of value. Whether sensible or irrational, contests over possession are commonly the occasion for the most ruthless use of force among children and apes. One of the commonest kinds of object arousing possessive desire is the notice, good will, affection, and service of other members of the group. Among children one of the commonest causes of quarrelling was jealousy - the desire for the exclusive possession of the interest and affection of someone else, particularly the adults in charge of the children. This form of behaviour is sometimes classified as a separate cause of conflict under the name of rivalry or jealousy. But, in point of fact, it seems to us that it is only one variety of possessiveness. The object of desire is not a material object - that is the only difference. The object is the interest and affection of other persons. What is wanted, however, is the exclusive right to that interest and affection -

a property in emotions instead of in things. As subjective emotions and as causes of conflict, jealousy and rivalry are fundamentally similar to the desire for the uninterrupted possession of toys or food. Indeed, very often the persons, property which is desired, are the sources of toys and food. Possessiveness is, then, in all its forms a common cause of fighting. If we are to look behind the mere facts of behaviour for an explanation of this phenomenon, a teleological cause is not far to seek. The exclusive right to objects of desire is a clear and simple advantage to the possessor obit. It carries with it the certainty and continuity of satisfaction. Where there is only one claimant to a good, frustration and the possibility floss is reduced to a minimum. It is, therefore, obvious that, if the ends of the self are the only recognized ends, the whole powers of the agent, including the fullest use of his available force, will be used to establish and defend exclusive rights to possession. Another cause of aggression closely allied to possessiveness is the tendency for children and apes greatly to resent the intrusion of a stranger into their group. A new child in the class may be laughed at, isolated, and disliked and even set upon and pinched and bullied. A new monkey may be poked and bitten to death. It is interesting to note that it is only strangeness within a similarity of species that is resented. Monkeys do not mind being joined by a goat or a rat. Children do not object when animals are introduced to the group. Indeed, such novelties are often welcomed. But when monkeys meet a new monkey or children a strange child, aggression often occurs. This suggests strongly that the reason for the aggression is fundamentally possessiveness. The competition of the newcomers is feared. The present members of the group feel that there will be more rivals for the food or the attention of the adults. Finally, another common source of fighting among children is a failure or frustration in their own activity. A child will be prevented either by natural causes such as bad weather or illness or by the opposition of some adult from doing something he wishes to do at a given moment - sail his boat or ride the bicycle. The child may also frustrate itself by failing, through lack of skill or strength, to complete successfully some desired activity. Such a child will then in the ordinary sense become naughty. He will be in a bad or surly temper. And, what is of interest from our point of view, the child will indulge in aggression - attacking and fighting other children or adults. Sometimes the object of aggression will simply be the cause of frustration, a straightforward reaction. The child will kick or hit the nurse who forbids the sailing of his boat. But sometimes - indeed, frequently - the person or thing that suffers the aggression is quite irrelevant and innocent of offence. The angry child will stamp the ground or box the ears of another child when neither the ground nor

the child attacked is even remotely connected with the irritation or frustration. Of course, this kind of behaviour is so common that everyone feels it to be obvious and to constitute no serious scientific problem. That a small boy should pull his sisters hair because it is raining does not appear to the ordinary unreflecting person to be an occasion for solemn scientific inquiry. He is, as we should all say, in a bad temper. Yet it is not, in fact, really obvious either why revenge should be taken on entirely innocent objects, since no good to the aggressor can come of it, or why children being miserable should seek to make others miserable also. It is just a fact of human behaviour that cannot really be deduced from any general principle of reason. But it is, as we shall see, of very great importance for our purpose. It shows how it is possible, at the simplest and most primitive level, for aggression and fighting to spring from an entirely irrelevant and partially hidden cause. Fighting to possess a desired object is straightforward and rational, however disastrous its consequences, compared with fighting that occurs because, in a different and unrelated activity, some frustration has barred the road to pleasure. The importance of this possibility for an understanding of group conflict must already be obvious. (From Personal Aggressiveness and War by E. F. M. Durbin and John Bowlby)
Attitudes to Learning

Read the text on the left and summarise it in your own words in the box on the right. Guess the words one at a time. Type a word in the box, then press "Check" to see if it is right. You can ask for a hint, but you'll lose a point if you do. Attitudes to learning. It has often been shown that controversial material is more readily learnt if it fits in with existing beliefs and attitudes. For example, pro-communist students learnt more readily than anti-communist students a list of statements favourable to the U.S.S.R. That material is most easily learnt which conforms to existing opinions. The recall of controversial material may also be selective: for instance, theistic students remembered better than atheistic students statements favourable to religion and vice versa. This suggests some resistance to learning and retaining material which is not acceptable to us. Conversely we are very ready to learn from certain sources to which we are favourably inclined, such as a political weekly or a particular author whose work we admire. Even in factual subjects, in which there may not seem to be

much room for controversy, there may be parts of the subject which you regard as old-fashioned or dead wood. Once you begin to develop enthusiasms for certain approaches to your subject, as every active and spirited person does, it becomes rather too easy to dismiss other approaches as worth-less and not to bother to learn about them. The hard fact is, however, that if you have to cover a syllabus, you probably cannot afford to neglect any part of it because you think it is unimportant or because you don't like the way it is taught. How to Study, Maddox (Pan) Paraghraph Exercise 2 Look at the following text about growing cotton in India. The paragraphs have not been printed in the correct order. Arrange the paragraphs in the correct order. Remember that the topic of one paragraph should follow logically from the topic of the last paragraph and should lead on to the topic of the next paragraph. Pesticide suicide Most of the farmers are extremely poor. Attracted by cheap loans from pesticides traders and the prospect of a quick buck, they borrowed heavily to raise cotton on small plots of land. According to the Ministry of Agriculture, the crop losses and destruction in Andhra Pradesh arose from the repeated application of excessive amounts of chemicals - a practice actively encouraged by pesticides traders. The suicide of Samala Mallaiah in Nagara village grabbed media headlines. He owned one acre of land, leased two more and grew cotton on all three. After making a loss in the first year, he leased yet more land in an attempt to recover. Confronted with falling prices, mounting debts and pest attacks, he committed harakiri. Cotton has given us shattered dreams, said one old farmer in Nagara village. As many as 60,000 small farmers in the region of Andhra Pradesh, southern India, have taken to farming cotton instead of food crops. Some 20 of them have recently committed suicide by eating lethal doses of pesticide. Whitefly, boll weevils and caterpillars multiplied and destroyed their crops, despite the constant application of pesticides. The average yield of cotton fields in Andhra

Pradesh fell by more than half in just one year. Now the farmers are in no position to repay the loans or feed their families. Nearly half the pesticides used in India go into protecting cotton, the most important commercial crop in the country. However, pests have shown increased immunity to a range of pesticides. Last year there were heavy crop losses due to leaf-curl, which is caused by the dreaded whitefly. This nondescript, milky-white fly sucks sap from the cotton leaves, making them curl and dry up. The fly struck first in Pakistan and northwestern India. Then it turned south. (New Internationalist, June 1998, p. 13) Exercise 3 Identify the topic sentences in the following paragraphs. Paragraph 1 The maintenance of order in prestate societies is rooted in a commonality of material interests. The greater the amount of common interests, the less need there is for lawand-order specialists. Among band-level cultures law and order stem directly from the relations between people and the natural habitat from which subsistence is derived. All adults usually have open access to this habitat: the rivers, lakes, beaches, oceans; all the plants and animals; the soil and the subsoil. In so far as these are basic to the extraction of life-sustaining energy and materials they are communal "property." (Marvin Harris, (1975), Culture, people nature, p. 356) Paragraph 2 Though the United States has spent billions of dollars on foreign aid programs, it has captured neither the affection nor esteem of the rest of the world. In many countries today Americans are cordially disliked; in others merely tolerated. The reasons for this sad state of affairs are many and varied, and some of them are beyond the control of anything this country might do to try to correct them. But harsh as it may seem to the ordinary citizen, filled as he is with good intentions and natural generosity, much of the foreigners' animosity has been generated by the way Americans behave. (Edward Hall, (1973), The silent language, p. xiii) Paragraph 3

Anthropology is the study of humankind, especially of Homo sapiens, the biological species to which we human beings belong. It is the study of how our species evolved from more primitive organisms; it is also the study of how our species developed a mode of communication known as language and a mode of social life known as culture. It is the study of how culture evolved and diversified. And finally, it is the study of how culture, people, and nature interact wherever human beings are found. (Marvin Harris, (1975), Culture, People Nature, p. 1) Exercise 4 Look at the following text about Leonardo da Vinci. The first sentence of each paragraph has been removed. The sentences are listed in the box below the text. Match them with the correct paragraphs. The Genius of Leonardo. 1. He was the illegitimate son of a Florentine lawyer and property owner. His artistic bent obviously appeared at an early age for when he was 15 he was apprenticed to the painter Verocchio. In 1472 he was accepted in the painters guild in Florence, where he remained until 1481. 2. And among his early drawings were many sketches of mechanical apparatus and weapons, evidence of his interest in, and knowledge of things mechanical. 3. His artistic achievements in Milan reached their peak with the mural The Last Supper completed in 1497. 4. In the 1490s he began monumental treatises on painting, architecture, human anatomy and mechanics. He set down his observations on these themes in voluminous notes and sketches, which he would later assemble in his notebooks. There remain of his notebooks a prodigious 7000 pages, all in characteristic mirror-writing. 5. He then went back to Milan and entered the service of the French King Louis XII. Later he was to work in Rome with Raphael and Michelangelo on designs for the new church of St Peter. In 1516 he settled in France, at Cloux, near Amboise, where he died three years later.

6. He was no mere theorist advancing fanciful ideas. He was a practical man, who designed things that would work, because he could see how they would work. 7. There is no evidence that Leonardo actually built the machines and mechanical devices he sketched and described. And in many cases their practical importance remained unrealised and unrealisable for centuries. There was neither the demand for them nor the technology. (Pears Encyclopaedia, 1987, p. 342) Match the following sentences with the correct paragraphs. a. Leonardo returned to Florence in 1499, where he painted that most famous painting 'The Mona Lisa' (1503). b. Between 1482 and 1499 he was employed in the service of the Duke of Milan, to whom he was painter, sculptor, musician and technical adviser on military and engineering matters. c. In whatever subject he studied, Leonardo laid absolute faith in the evidence of his eyes. d. Leonardo da Vinci was born in 1452 in Vinci, a small village in Tuscany. e. And it is in his 'things', his machines, that we are interested in this book. f. By then Leonardo's expertise with paint brush and palette, pen and pencil was already well advanced. g. But his creative energies now were turning more and more to scientific and literary pursuits. Identifying and supporting topic sentences Exercise 5 Put the following sentences in the correct order in produce well organised paragraphs.

Paragraph 1 - Click here for an interactive version of this exercise. a. For a lightweight poster or sign, you can use either offset book stock or cover stock. b. You'll probably have to take your publication to a commercial printer, however, since bristol won't feed through most desktop printers or copy machines. c. The type of paper you choose for a poster or a sign depends on how it will be reproduced and how it is going to be used. d. If you need to create a more durable poster or sign, or create packaging, bristol stock is your best choice. (Microsoft publisher CD deluxe companion, p. 185) Paragraph 2 - Click here for an interactive version of this exercise. a. It's rare, but not unheard of, for mail to go astray. b. And many corporate mail servers have had growing pains, too, experiencing holdups and the odd deletion. c. On the whole though, you can assume email will arrive. d. However during 1997, AOL and Microsoft Network - to name just the big players had severe mail outages resulting in the delay, and in some cases loss, of email. e. In general Internet email is considerably more reliable than the postal service. (The Internet and world wide web: The rough guide, (1997), p. 15) Paragraph 3 - Click here for an interactive version of this exercise. a. Time may indicate the importance of the occasion as well as on what level an interaction between persons is to take place. b. The same applies for calls after 11:00 P.M. c. Different parts of the day, for example, are highly significant in certain contexts. d. Our realisation that time talks is even reflected in such common expressions as, "What time does the clock say?"

e. In the United States if you telephone someone very early in the morning, while he is shaving or having breakfast, the time of the call usually signals a matter of utmost importance and extreme urgency. f. A call received during sleeping hours is apt to be taken as a matter of life and death, hence the rude joke value of these calls among the young. (Edward Hall, (1973), The silent language, p. 2) Paragraph 4 - Click here for an interactive version of this exercise. a. But modern anthropology stands opposed to the view that anatomy is destiny. b. Men are taller, heavier, and stronger than women; hence it is "natural" that hunting and warfare should be male specialities. c. Men have higher levels of testosterone; hence they are "naturally" more aggressive, sexually and otherwise, and are "naturally" dominant over women. d. Since differences in the anatomy and physiology of human males and females are so obvious it is easy to be misled into believing that sex-linked roles and statuses are primarily biological rather than cultural phenomena. e. As the underlying demographic, technological, economic, and ecological conditions to which these sex-linked roles are adapted change, new cultural definitions of sexlinked roles will emerge. f. Moreover since women menstruate, become pregnant, and lactate, they "naturally" are the ones to stay at home to care for and feed infants and children. g. Nor are women born with an innate tendency to care for infants and children and to be sexually and politically subordinate. h. Rather it has been the case that under a broad but finite set of cultural and natural conditions certain sex-linked specialities have been selected for in a large number of cultures. i. Males are not born with an innate tendency to be hunters or warriors or to be sexually and politically dominant over women. (Marvin Harris, (1975). Culture, people, nature, p. 610) Exercise 6

Write the topic sentences for each of the following paragraphs. Paragraph 1

Firstly, they live in or on a host, and do it harm. The depth to which they penetrate the host varies, as indeed does the damage. Fleas, leeches and lice live on the surface and cause superficial injury. Athlete's foot is a skin disease caused by a fungus living in the surface layers of the foot. The parasite of sleeping sickness is found in the host's blood wriggling between blood corpuscles. Secondly, parasites show some simplification of body structures when compared with free-living relatives. Sacculina (a relative of the crab) shows loss of limbs and is reduced to a mass of reproductive tissue within the abdomen of its crustacean host. Dodder, a plant parasite, lacks leaves, roots and chlorophyll. Thirdly, although all organisms show adaptations to their way of life, in the case of parasites they are often associated with a complex physiological response, e.g. the ability to survive in regions almost devoid of available oxygen, such as adult liver flukes, or the hooks and suckers of adult tapeworm. Lastly, parasites exhibit a complex and efficient reproduction, usually associated in some way with the physiology of the host, e.g. rabbit fleas are stimulated by the level of sex hormone in their host. (J. Hard, (1975). Biology, p. 57) Paragraph 2

In 1920 an average of 2.75 pounds of waste were produced each day by each individual in the United States. Today the quantity of waste produced is 53 pounds per person, and by 1980 it is estimated that this will rise to 8 pounds per person. One year's rubbish from 10,000 people covers an acre of ground to the depth of 10 feet. In one year Americans throw away 48 thousand million cans, 26 thousand million bottles, 430 million tons of paper, 4 million tons of plastic and 100 million tyres which weigh almost a million tons. (John W Klotz, (1972). Ecology crisis, p. 197) Paragraph 3

That it might be experienced in any other way seems unnatural and strange, a feeling which is rarely modified even when we begin to discover how really differently it is handled by some other people. Within the West itself certain cultures rank time much lower in over-all importance than we do. In Latin America, for example, where time is treated rather cavalierly, one commonly hears the expression, "Our time or your time?" "Hora americana, hora mejicana?" (Edward Hall, (1973), The silent language, p. 6) Paragraph 4

From the late 1870s onwards, cheap American corn began to arrive in the country in large quantities, along with refrigerated meat and fruit from Australia and New Zealand, and in a period when both farmers and businessmen were complaining of depression, standards of living rose higher than they had ever done. The change began each day, as Victorian writers frequently pointed out, with the food on the breakfast table - with eggs and bacon as staple fare for the middle classes - and went on through tea, high or low, to multi-course dinners or fish-and-chip suppers. The poor were eating better as well as the rich. The annual per capita consumption of sugar, which had increased from 18 lb. to 35 lb. between the Queen's accession and 1860, rose to 54 lb. in 1870-99 and 85 lb. in 1900-10; that of tea, which along with beer had now become a national drink, went up from 1 lb, first to 4 lb and then to 6 lb. (Asa Briggs, (1983). A social history of England, p. 246) Paragraph 5

The first is the way in which living cells develop an energy currency. This, like ordinary money, can be used to exchange one vital commodity for another. The second is the use of substances called enzymes as go-betweens to reduce the amount of energy needed to make many chemical reactions essential to life take place fast enough. (The sciences: Michael Beazley Encyclopaedias (1980), p. 136) Paragraph 6

At first it was little more than a trickle. For a long time the Norman conquerors did not mix much with their Saxon subjects. There are plenty of indications of this; for the languages, too, moved side by side in parallel channels. The custom of having one name for a live beast grazing in the field and another for the same beast, when it is killed and cooked, is often supposed to be due to our English squeamishness and hypocrisy. Whether or not the survival of this custom through ten centuries is due to the national characteristics in question it would be hard to say, but they have certainly nothing to do with its origin. That is a much more blame-less affair. For the Saxon neatherd who had spent a hard day tending his oxen, sheep, calves and swine, probably saw little enough of the beef, mutton, veal, pork and bacon, which were gobbled at night by his Norman masters. There is something a little pathetic, too, in the thought that the homely old word, stool, could be used to express any kind of seat, however magnificent, until it was, so to speak, hustled into the kitchen by the smart French chair. Even the polite, however, continued to use the old word in the idiom to fall between two stools. Owen Barfield: History in English Words (Faber, 1954) Exercise 7 The information contained within a paragraph is based on the topic sentence of a paragraph. The topic sentence is generally the first sentence and expresses the main idea to be developed within the paragraph. a) Look at the topic sentences below and discuss what kinds of information you would expect to follow. 1. The government of the United States of America consists of three main branches. 2. The world-wide increase in road transport is a serious threat to the natural environment. 3. Deforestation has a direct effect on food supplies. 4. Although development in the Third World is intended to increase self-reliance, the actual result is often increased dependence on the West. 5. There is a mistaken idea that, because of pocket calculators, children no longer need to learn how to do basic arithmetic. 6. When it comes to the arts, there is a clear case for subsidy.

7. There are no grounds for subsidising the arts. 8. The British attitudes towards food are very different from the attitudes in my own country. 9. My grandfather/grandmother is/was very easy/difficult to get on with. 10. There are no justifications for any country possessing nuclear weapons. 11. There are a number of reasons to justify a country possessing nuclear weapons. b) With two or three other students, discuss your answers. c) Take one of the sentences a write a paragraph.
Flow of information in paragraphs

Identify the ways of organising the information in the the following paragraphs. The inventor of the diode valve was Fleming. He made use of the fact, first noticed by Edison, that an electric current could be made to flow across the empty space between the hot filament of an electric lamp and another metal electrode placed inside the evacuated bulb. This effect depends upon the thermionic emission of electrons from the heated metal filament. (W. P. Jolly, (1972). Electronics, p. 61) Hemp's environmental credentials are indisputable. It grows better in organic systems than in conventional ones. It smothers weeds and controls pests, clearing the land for other crops. It improves the structure of the soil, with strong roots to prevent erosion. If processed in the field, it returns nutrients to the land and purports to 'clean up' soil contaminated with heavy metals. It is one of a minority of textile-fibre crops that can be grown in temperate climates. So why, given its potential, is so little hemp used today? (New Internationalist, June 1998, p. 14)

Exercise 9 In the following paragraphs, the first and last sentences are correct. Rewrite the middle sentences of to put the theme at the beginning and the rheme at the end of the sentences. Paragraph 1 Atoms of all elements consist of a central nucleus surrounded by a "cloud" containing one or more electrons. We can think of these electrons as occupying a series of well-defined shells. The number of electrons in its outermost shells determines the behaviour of a particular element. Other factors, such as the total number of electron shells, also play a part in determining behaviour but it is the dominance of the outer electron configuration that underlies the periodic law and justifies the grouping of the elements into groups or families. Paragraph 2 Every substance contains a certain amount of heat, even a relatively cold substance such as ice. The substance's molecules are in continual motion and, by this motion, possess kinetic energy which produces heat. The average kinetic energy of the molecules are measured by temperature. Cooling to the point at which molecular movement ceases completely should thus be possible. Scientists are very interested in this point, absolute zero, but it is in practice unattainable. At temperatures close to absolute zero some materials exhibit remarkable properties, such as superconductivity and superfluidity. Paragraph 3 Nauru is so small that the plane lands in what is best described as the capital's main street. To stop cars when planes are landing the seaward side of the runway has traffic lights at each end. Well-fed and brightly clothed Naurans cowd the tiny air terminal with their smart cars. The only hotel, the luxurious Menen, is a 10-minute drive half way round the island and is where new arrivals are driven off in Japanese minibuses. The well-paved road passes rows of neat, modern houses, set among the trees.

(David Lascelles, The Financial Times) Paragraph 4 The most striking example of value rigidity I can think of is the old south Indian Monkey Trap, which depends on value rigidity for its effectiveness. A hollowed-out coconut chained to a stake makes the trap. A monkey can put its hand though a small hole in the coconut and grab some rice inside. The monkey can put its hand into the hole but cannot take its fist out with rice in it. The monkey's value rigidity traps it when it reaches in. The rice cannot be revalued. He cannot see that freedom without rice is more valuable than capture with it. (Robert Pirsig, Zen and the art of motorcycle maintenance) Exercise 10 Identify the signalling words in the following paragraph. Because language plays such an important role in teaching, Bellack and his colleagues chose to examine in some detail the "language game" in the classroom. They contended that "teaching is similar to most games in at least two respects. It is a form of social activity in which the players (teachers and students) fill different but complementary roles. Furthermore, teaching is governed by certain ground rules that guide the actions or moves made by the participants" (p. 4). By studying the language game, then, Bellack et al. intended to identify the various types of verbal moves made by teachers and students and the rules they followed in making these moves. As a result, they could investigate the functions these verbal moves served and examine the meanings that were being communicated. (Lorin Anderson & Robert Burns (1989) Research in classrooms, p. 278) Exercise 11 Identify and classify the signalling words in the following paragraph. To begin with, it is necessary to consider the long-term implications of the decision to increase our dependence on permanent staff in our restaurants. For example, let us say we do go ahead. In this case, our reliance on hourly-paid staff will decrease. As

a result, costs will reduce, as permanent staff are cheaper than hourly-paid staff. In fact, it is not necessarily the case, especially as there is no way of knowing what the relative costs of hourly-paid staff and permanent staff will be in ten years' time. However, as a rule hourly permanent staff are more reliable than full-time staff and this is a genuine advantage. As a consequence of these two advantages, permanent staff would seem to be a better option. In other words, they are cheaper and more reliable so they are better. In that case, it is not necessary to hesitate. Naturally, nothing is so simple. In short, cost is an unknown factor and the most economical choice is not known. Exercise 12 In the following article on Nuclear Hazards the signalling words and phrases are missing. Replace them and check your answers. There are three separate sources of hazard related to the use of nuclear reactions to supply us with energy. __________, the radioactive material must travel from its place of manufacture to the power station. __________ the power stations themselves are solidly built, the containers used for the transport of the material are not. __________, there are normally only two methods of transport available, __________ road or rail, and both of these involve close contact with the general public, __________ the routes are bound to pass near, or even through, heavily populated areas. __________, there is the problem of waste. All nuclear power stations produce wastes which in most cases will remain radioactive for thousands of years. It is impossible to de-activate these wastes, and __________ they must be stored in one of the ingenious but cumbersome ways that scientists have invented. __________ they may be buried under the ground, dropped into disused mineshafts, or sunk in the sea. __________ these methods do not solve the problem; they merely store it, __________ an earthquake could crack open the containers like nuts. __________ there is the problem of accidental exposure due to a leak or an explosion at the power station. As with the other two hazards, this is extremely unlikely and __________ does not provide a serious objection to the nuclear programme, __________ it can happen, as the inhabitants of Harrisburg will tell you. Separately, and during short periods, these three types of risk are no great cause for

concern. Taken together, __________, and especially over much longer periods, the probability of a disaster is extremely high.
Exercise 13: Cohesion. Reference

Identify the references in the following texts: Exercise a Every organization, as soon as it gets to any size (perhaps 1,000 people), begins to feel a need to systematize its management of human assets. Perhaps the pay scales have got way out of line, with apparently similar-level jobs paying very different amounts; perhaps there is a feeling that there are a lot of neglected skills in the organization that other departments could utilize if they were aware that they existed. Perhaps individuals have complained that they don't know where they stand or what their future is; perhaps the unions have requested standardized benefits and procedures. Whatever the historical origins, some kind of central organization, normally named a personnel department, is formed to put some system into the haphazardry. The systems that they adopt are often modelled on the world of production, because that is the world with the best potential for order and system. Exercise b We all tend to complain about our memories. Despite the elegance of the human memory system, it is not infallible, and we have to learn to live with its fallibility. It seems to be socially much more acceptable to complain of a poor memory, and it is somehow much more acceptable to blame a social lapse on 'a terrible memory', than to attribute it to stupidity or insensitivity. But how much do we know about our own memories? Obviously we need to remember our memory lapses in order to know just how bad our memories are. Indeed one of the most amnesic patients I have ever tested was a lady suffering from Korsakoff's syndrome, memory loss following chronic alcoholism. The test involved presenting her with lists of words; after each list she would comment with surprise on her inability to recall the words, saying: 'I pride myself on my memory!' She appeared to have forgotten just how bad her memory was'.

Substitution and ellipsis

Identify examples of substitution and ellipsis in this text: Exercise c The human memory system is remarkably efficient, but it is of course extremely fallible. That being so, it makes sense to take full advantage of memory aids to minimize the disruption caused by such lapses. If external aids are used, it is sensible to use them consistently and systematically - always put appointments in your diary, always add wanted items to a shopping list, and so on. If you use internal aids such as mnemonics, you must be prepared to invest a reasonable amount of time in mastering them and practising them. Mnemonics are like tools and cannot be used until forged. Overall, however, as William James pointed out (the italics are mine): 'Of two men with the same outward experiences and the same amount of mere native tenacity, the one who thinks over his experiences most and weaves them into systematic relations with each other will be the one with the best memory.' Exercise d This conflict between tariff reformers and free traders was to lead to the "agreement to differ" convention in January 1932, and the resignation of the Liberals from the government in September 1932; but, until they resigned, the National Government was a genuine coalition in the sense in which that term is used on the continent: a government comprising independent yet conflicting elements allied together, a government within which party conflict was not superseded but rather contained - in short, a power-sharing government, albeit a seriously unbalanced one. Exercise e The number of different words relating to 'camel' is said to be about six thousand. There are terms to refer to riding camels, milk camels and slaughter camels; other terms to indicate the pedigree and geographical origin of the camel; and still others to differentiate camels in different stages of pregnancy and to specify in-numerable other characteristics important to a people so dependent upon camels in their daily life (Thomas, 1937)

Exercise f There were, broadly, two interrelated reasons for this, the first relating to Britain's economic and Imperial difficulties, the second to the internal dissension in all three parties.
Conjunction

Identify examples of conjunction in the following texts: Exercise g These two forms of dissent coalesced in the demand for a stronger approach to the Tory nostrum of tariff reform. In addition, trouble threatened from the mercurial figure of Winston Churchill, who had resigned from the Shadow Cabinet in January 1931 in protest at Baldwin's acceptance of eventual self-government for India. Exercise h These two sets of rules, though distinct, must not be looked upon as two co-ordinate and independent systems. On the contrary, the rules of Equity are only a sort of supplement or appendix to the Common Law; they assume its existence but they add something further.
Lexical cohesion

Identify examples of lexical cohesion in the following texts: Exercise i The clamour of complaint about teaching in higher education and, more especially, about teaching methods in universities and technical colleges, serves to direct attention away from the important reorientation which has recently begun. The complaints, of course, are not unjustified. In dealing piece-meal with problems arising from rapidly developing subject matter, many teachers have allowed courses to become over-crowded, or too specialized, or they have presented students with a number of apparently unrelated courses failing to stress common principles. Many, again, have not developed new teaching methods to deal adequately with larger numbers of students, and the new audio-visual techniques tend to remain in the province of relatively few enthusiasts despite their great potential for class and individual teaching.

Exercise j When we look closely at a human face we are aware of many expressive details - the lines of the forehead, the wideness of the eyes, the curve of the lips, the jut of the chin. These elements combine to present us with a total facial expression which we use to interpret the mood of our companion. But we all know that people can 'put on a happy face' or deliberately adopt a sad face without feeling either happy or sad. Faces can lie, and sometimes can lie so well that it becomes hard to read the true emotions of their owners. But there is at least one facial signal that cannot easily be 'put on'. It is a small signal, and rather a subtle one, but because it tells the truth it is of special interest. It comes from the pupils and has to do with their size in relation to the amount of light that is falling upon them.
Exercise 14. Reference

Identify the references in the following text: The Troubles of shopping in Russia A large crowd gathered outside a photographic studio in Arbat Street, one of the busiest shopping streets in Moscow, recently. There was no policeman within sight and the crowd was blocking the pavement. The centre of attraction - and amusement - was a fairly well-dressed man, perhaps some official, who was waving his arm out of the ventilation window of the studio and begging to be allowed out. The woman in charge of the studio was standing outside and arguing with him. The man had apparently arrived just when the studio was about to close for lunch and insisted upon taking delivery of some prints which had been promised to him. He refused to wait so the staff had locked the shop and gone away for lunch. The incident was an extreme example of the common attitude in service industries in the Soviet Union generally, and especially in Moscow. Shop assistants do not consider the customer as a valuable client but as a nuisance of some kind who has to be treated with little ceremony and without concern for his requirements. For nearly a decade, the Soviet authorities have been trying to improve the service facilities. More shops are being opened, more restaurants are being established and the press frequently runs campaigns urging better service in shops and places of

entertainment. It is all to no avail. The main reason for this is shortage of staff. Young people are more reluctant to make a career in shops, restaurants and other such establishments. Older staff are gradually retiring and this leaves a big gap. It is not at all unusual to see part of a restaurant or a shop roped off because there is nobody available to serve. Sometimes, establishments have been known to be closed for several days because of this. One reason for the unpopularity of jobs in the service industries is their low prestige. Soviet papers and journals have reported that people generally consider most shop assistants to be dishonest and this conviction remains unshakeable. Several directors of business establishments, for instance, who are loudest in complaining about shortage of labour, are also equally vehement that they will not let their children have anything to do with trade. The greatest irritant for the people is not the shortage of goods but the time consumed in hunting for them and queuing up to buy them. This naturally causes illfeeling between the shoppers and the assistants behind the counters, though often it may not be the fault of the assistants at all. This too, damages hopes of attracting new recruits. Many educated youngsters would be ashamed to have to behave in such a negative way. Rules and regulations laid down by the shop managers often have little regard for logic or convenience. An irate Soviet journalist recently told of his experiences when trying to have an electric shaver repaired. Outside a repair shop he saw a notice: 'Repairs done within 45 minutes.' After queuing for 45 minutes he was asked what brand of shaver he owned. He identified it and was told that the shop only mended shavers made in a particular factory and he would have to go to another shop, four miles away. When he complained, the red-faced girl behind the counter could only tell him miserably that those were her instructions. All organisations connected with youth, particularly the Young Communist League (Komsomo1), have been instructed to help in the campaign for better recruitment to service industries. The Komsomol provides a nicely-printed application form which is given to anyone asking for a job. But one district head of a distribution organisation claimed that in the last in years only one person had come to him with this form. 'We do not need fancy paper. We do need people!' he said. More and more people are

arguing that the only way to solve the problem is to introduce mechanisation. In grocery stores, for instance, the work load could be made easier with mechanical devices to move sacks and heavy packages. The shortages of workers are bringing unfortunate consequences in other areas. Minor rackets flourish. Only a few days ago, Pravda, the Communist Party newspaper, carried a long humorous feature about a plumber who earns a lot of extra money on the side and gets gloriously drunk every night. He is nominally in charge of looking after 300 flats and is paid for it. But whenever he has a repair job to do, he manages to screw some more money from the flat dwellers, pretending that spare parts are required. Complaints against him have no effect because the housing board responsible is afraid that they will be unable to get a replacement. In a few years' time, things could be even worse if the supply of recruits to these jobs dries up altogether. Cohesion: Reference
Gap-fill exercise
Read the text and fill in the gaps to make the reference clear. Then press "Check" to check your answers. Use the "Hint" button to get a free letter if an answer is giving you trouble. Note that you will lose points if you do! The Liberals, also, by August 1931 were beginning to crumble. Lloyd George's attempt to wrest the initiative for election. party by a bold espousal of Keynesian economics had failed in the 1929 general strategy of seeking an accommodation with Labour was bitterly opposed by many

Liberals. In March 1931, Sir John Simon spoke of socialism as "a poisonous doctrine" and declared that would not close his mind to tariffs as a method of dealing with the economic crisis. In June

1931, Simon and two other prominent Liberals resigned the parliamentary whip. It was generally believed that that were proposing to seek an electoral pact with the Conservatives, so as to ensure would hold their seats against what was expected to be a Conservative landslide at the next

general election.