TOPICS

BRITISH CULTURE
 Geography
 Living in Britain
 Education
 British Monarchy and Her Majesty’s Government
 Important Events
 Holidays
AMERICAN CULTURE
 Immigration patterns and ethnic compositions
 Brief history
 A diversity education system
 Holidays and celebration
 THE UNITED KINGDOM
OF GREAT BRITAIN AND NOTHERN
IRELAND

AN INTRODUCTION
 WARM - UP

 What do you know about the geography of the United

Kingdom?
 What rivers and lakes of the UK do you know?
 How many languages are spoken in the UK?
 What is the national flag of the UK?
 What are the major industries of the UK?
 What do British people usually talk about when they
meet for the first time?
Geography of Great Britain

The official title:

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and
Northern Ireland
 The UK is made up of:

 Great Britain (the formerly separate realms

of England and Scotland, and the principality
of Wales. )
 Northern Ireland (also known as Ulster)
 Numerous smaller islands including the Isle of
Wight, Anglesey, and the Scilly, Orkney, Shetland,
and Hebridean archipelagos.
 Basic Facts

 The UK is an island in Western Europe just off the

coast of France, separated by the English Channel
 The Channel Tunnel links the UK with France
 Lies between the North Atlantic Ocean and the
North Sea
 How big an area does the UK cover?

 The UK has a total area of approximately 245,000 km²,

almost a quarter-of-a-million square kilometres.

 Interesting Fact
No one in the UK lives more than 120 km (75 miles) from
the sea.
 The UK is bordered by four seas

1/ English Channel - separates it from continental

Europe
2/ to the east by the North Sea
3/ to the west by the Irish Sea
4/ and the Atlantic Ocean
 The Land

 The UK Landscape is very varied, ranging from

the Grampian Mountains of Scotland to the lowland fens of
England which are at or below sea level in places.
 Scotland and Wales are the most mountainous parts of the
UK
 A ridge of hills, the Pennine run down the centre of
northern England
 Coastal areas are low-lying - regularly flood during heavy
rain
 Most of the UK is made up of gently rolling hills such as
Dartmoor (south-west of England) or the Mourne
Mountains (Northern Ireland)
 Topography

 England: it consists of lowland terrain, with some mountainous

terrain in the north-west, north and south-west.
 Scotland: Its geography is varied, with lowlands in the south
and east and highlands in the north and west.
 Wales: It’s mostly mountainous. South Wales is less
mountainous than North and Mid Wales.
 Northern Ireland: It’s mostly hilly.
 Highest point:
Scafell Pike 978 m (part
of the Cumbrian
Mountains in North
West England = known
as Lake District)
 A long coastline of
3,200 km
 Lakes

 The largest lake – Northern

Ireland, -Lough Neagh

Other major lakes:

 Windermere in the English Lake
District
 Loch Lomond in Scotland
 Loch Ness - famous for sightings
of a mythical monster 'Nessie'
 UK Rivers

 Not very long, two longest rivers

 The Severn (354 km) - beginning in Wales
and entering the Atlantic Ocean near
Bristol in England
 The Thames (338 km) which flows
through Oxford and London

 Other major rivers:

 The Trent and Mersey rivers
The population of the United Kingdom in 2006 was

60,587,000!

London metropolitan area has a

population of about 12 million people!
 UK population

Country Population (approxim) percentage

UK 60,000,000 100%

England 50,000,000 84% ↑

Wales 3,000,000 5% ↑

Scotland 5,100,000 9 %↓
Northern Ireland 1,700,000 3%↑
 Population density
(persons per sq km)

Scotland 65
Northern Ireland 125

Wales 141

England 380

London area 4,679

 ETHNICS MINORITY GROUPS

 Ethnic minority groups presents just under 6% of the

population of Great Britain.
 Caribbean on African descent (891,000 pp)
 Indian (840,000 pp)
 Pakistanis and Bangladeshis ( 640,000 pp)

 Ethnic origins are complicated

 Immigration
 Intermarriage
 Relocation
 Social trends
 Long term projections: peak around 2050, then slow fall

 An increasing number of old people (1 in 6 in 2000 aged 65

and over)

 A move away from cities and larger towns,

a decrease in large industrial areas, an increase in rural and suburban areas of
the South (changes in employment opportunities)

 Retired people to the south coast

 A growing multicultural society

(projections: minority ethnic population will double by 2020 - higher birth rate)
 Climate

Main characteristics:
Temperate, with warm summers, cold winters and
plenty rainfall

Three major features:

 Winter fog
 Rainy days
 Instability/changeability
 Climate
 the surrounding sea gives
England a varied climate, in
general mild
 the Gulf Stream (a warm
current of the northern
Atlantic Ocean
 difficult to predict the
weather- climate changing
from day to day
 In general warm summers
and cool winters.
•Summers are cooler
than on the continent,
but the winters are
milder.
• July and August are
normally the warmest
month in England.
• February is normally
the coldest month
 The English Language

 1. Old English
 2. Middle English
 3. Modern English
 4. Standard English
 1. Old English (5th ~ 11th)

Language of Angle-Saxons

Influenced by
 Old Norse
 Latin and Greek words
 Danish words
 2. Middle English (11th ~ 15th )

Status
French replaced English as the official language, and
English became the Language of lower class
 big — pork
 sheep — mutton
 cattle — beef

Development
English increased in importance after the Black
Death
 3. Modern English (15th~ )

 The printing press—brought standardization of

English

 The Industrial Revolution—necessitated the

introduction of new words for new things and
ideas

 The rise of the British Empire or the

Commonwealth of Nations—led to the assimilation
of words from many other languages
 4. Standard English

 based on the speech of the upper class of southeastern

England

 adopted as a broadcasting standard in the British media

 also called as Queen’s English or BBC English

 based on the London dialect

 becoming a universal Lingua Franca—the world language

 See their flags!
Scotland Wales

England Northern Ireland

The Union Jack is the UK Flag

 A Brief Introduction to U.K. Economy

 Britain was the first country to start the industrial

revolution in the 18th century. Britain is a capitalist
country.

 The characteristic of the economic system of

capitalism is that it protects private enterprise.

 Britain began its market economy about 300 years

ago.
 A Brief Introduction to U.K. Economy

 Britain is a trading nation. (Why?)

In Britain, the domestic market is limited. So, it has
to find more markets outside the country. It has to
find more markets in the world.

Rapid economic development and worldwide trade

made Britain the richest nation in the world during
the reign of Queen Victoria in the 19th century.
A Brief Introduction to U.K. Economy

 Two important industries:

 Chemical manufacturing : The UK has one of the
largest chemicals industries in the world
 Energy production : The Uk produces a surplus of
energy
 Economy
 AGRICULTURE: wool, beef cattle, horse
breeding, potatoes, barley, sugar beet, wheat,
oats
 MANUFACTURING: food and beverages,
chemicals and pharmaceuticals, electronic
goods, motor vehicles
 MINING: oil, coal, natural gas
 England
 Capital City: London
 Major Cities: Birmingham,
 the largest country of the UK, Leeds, Liverpool,
covers over 50,000 square Manchester, Sheffield
miles
 only 35 km from France
 mostly low-lying land, with
hills and agricultural land
 the north is mostly covered in
moorland and mountains
(Dartmoor, Exmoor)
 Scotland

 capital is Edinburgh
 a mountainous country
 south - border with England, east -the
North Sea, west - the Atlantic Ocean
 Highest point: Ben Nevis (1,343 m)
 famous for its loch lakes, clans, kilts,
medieval castles
 Major Cities: Aberdeen, Dundee, Glasgow
 Famous Scots: Walter Scott, Robert Louis
Stevenson, Arthur Conan Doyle, David
Hume and the actor Sean Connery.
 Wales

 a mountainous country
 borders – east: England, south: the
Bristol Channel, west: St George's
Channel,north: the Irish Sea
 Capital City: Cardiff
 Highest point: Snowdon 1085
metres
 Longest river:Towy (Tywi) 103 km
 Largest Lake: Bala
 The Northern Ireland

 in the northeast of the

island of Ireland
 Capital City: Belfast
 Highest point: Slieve
Donard mountain 848 m
 Longest river: River Bann
129 km
 Largest Lake: Lough Neagh
 Giant´s Causeway - the
North East coast,
interlocking basalt columns
- result of an ancient
volcanic eruption
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