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Text 43
Sixty years after Big Ears first said hello to Noddy(一种电视剪辑技术), are the rest of us now ready to say goodbye? David Kermode, editor of Five News, reckons it is time to push him off our TV screens. But before you start to write in, in an effort to save Blyton's beloved character, the "noddy" that Kermode banned last week from his bulletins is a television editing technique. His decision reprents a bid to improve viewers' trust in television and he believes other news organisations will swiftly follow his example.
A few words of explanation. The noddy is a decades-old technique ud to cover up an edit in a televisi
on news report. The producer wants to jump from one part of an interviewee's words to another, but wants to avoid a sudden jolt(震惊)on screen. So once the interview is in the can, the reporter is filmed nodding and the footage(电影胶片)is inrted into the middle.
"It's lazy, cliched(陈腐的)and cheating," says Kermode. From now on, Five News viewers will not have edits hidden from them. The noddy and other related bits of TV trickery have gone. In their place will be short dissolves or flashes. In an email to staff ordering the changes, Kermode wrote: "I'd like us to take a bold step to help restore viewers' trust in TV news, by ridding the output of tho traditional - and rather hackneyed(不新奇的)- tricks that have been ud for years."
Other banned techniques include: the over-the-shoulder cut-away(切掉), in which the viewer is shown the face of the interviewer and the back of the interviewee's head; the staged or rever question, where a reporter who has finished an interview is filmed asking his questions again - though this time to an empty chair (which is, of cour, not shown); the contrived t-up shot, where an interviewee is filmed walking up some stairs or at his desk pretending to talk on the phone. (This is ud to give a reporter pictures to talk over while he explains who the interviewee is and why they're part of the story.)
Kermode wrote: "I genuinely believe that if we lead the way by stopping some of the tired old
'showbiz' shortcuts(捷径), we can help restore trust in our medium and make our programmes more creative too ... If it is not 'real', we should avoid [it]."
Note the quotation marks around the word "real". For, as even Kermode admits, it is impossible to sweep all artifice away. So how did his reporters and producers react to the ringmaster confiscating all their best t circus(马戏团)ricks?
Kermode says: "It's not just the next gimmick(暗机关)from the news rvice that brought us the woman who perched(栖息)on a desk. I genuinely think it's quite important. It's time for an update of what we deem acceptable in TV news-making."
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Key Words:
reckon[ˈrekən]
vt. 1. 猜想; 估计2. 〈非正〉思忖; 设想3. 考虑; 认为4. 〈正〉计算
vi. 1. 料想;预计;指望
beloved[bi5lQvd, bi5lQvid]
adj.心爱的;n.所爱的人, 爱人
bulletin[ˈbulitin]
n. 1. 公告, 新闻快报,(电台或电视台的)新闻简报2. 小报, 期刊,(机构或组织的)简报,公告,布告bid [bid]
n. 1. 企图,试图;尝试;努力;争取2. 喊价, 出价, 投标3. 努力争取
vt. & vi. 出价, 投标
国产服装品牌
vt. 1. 命令, 吩咐2. 说(问候话); 致意3. (某些牌戏中)叫牌4. 宣布,公开表示5. 祝;表示(祝福、祝贺、祝愿、欢迎等);告(别)6. 邀请7. 恳求,哀求,乞求,请求
swiftly [ˈswɪftlɪ]
adv. 迅速地,敏捷地
招商引资工作情况汇报restore /rɪst'ɔr/
vt. 恢复, 使回复, 归还, 交还, 修复, 重建
contriv e/kəntr'ɑɪv/
v.发明, 设计, 图谋
genuinely /dʒ'ɛnjəwənli/
adv.真诚地, 诚实地
artifice/'ɑrtəfɪs/
n.技巧
confiscate /k'ɑnfəsk,et/
vt. 没收, 充公, 查抄, 征用
adj. 被没收的
爱国古诗词
update/əpd'et/
vi. 使现代化, 修正, 校正, 更新
n. 现代化, 更新
deem /d'im/
vi. 认为, 相信
Uful Expressions:
Text 44
Girls Going Mild
Consider the following style tips for girls: skirts and dress should fall no more than four fingers above the knee. No tank tops without a sweater or jacket over them. Choo a bra that has a little
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padding to help disgui when you are cold. The fashion hints may sound like the prim(循规蹈矩的)mandates(正式命令)of a 1950s "health" film.
胎教的最佳时间
But they are from the Web site of Pure Fashion, a modeling and etiquette(礼仪)program for teen girls who goal is "to show the public it is possible to be cute, stylish and modest." Pure Fashion has
put on 13 shows in 2007 featuring 600 models. National director Brenda Sharman estimates there will be 25 shows in 2008. It is not the only newfangled(新奇的)outlet for old-school ideas about how girls should dress: , all advocate a return to styles that leave almost everything to the imagination. They cater to what writer Wendy Shalit claims is a growing movement of "girls gone mild"—teens and young women who are rejecting promiscuous(男女乱交的)"bad girl" roles embodied by Britney Spears, Bratz Dolls and the nameless, shirtless thousands in "Girls Gone Wild" videos. Instead, the girls cover up, insist on enforced curfews (宵禁)on college campus, bring their moms on their dates and pledge to st
ay virgins until married. And they spread the word: in Pennsylvania, a group of high-school girls "girlcotted(使受妇女的联合抵制)" Abercrombie & Fitch for lling T shirts with suggestive slogans (WHO NEEDS BRAINS WHEN YOU HAVE THESE?). Newly launched Eliza magazine bills itlf as a "modest fashion" magazine for the 17- to 34-year-old demographic(人口统计学的). Macy's has begun carrying garments by Shade clothing, which was founded by two Mormon women wanting trendy, but not-revealing, clothes. And Miss Utah strode the runway of the 2007 Miss America pageant(盛装的游行)in a modestly cut one-piece swimsuit. (She didn't win the crown.) According to Shalit, who new book "Girls Gone Mild" was published last month, this "youth-led rebellion" is a welcome corrective to our licentious(放荡的), overxed times. But is the new modesty truly a revolution, or is it merely an inevitable reaction to a culture of incread female xual empowerment, similar to the backlash against flappers in the 1920s and cond-wave feminists in the 1970s?
This is not the first time women have been asked to make the choices. During a century of tumult over the roles and rights of women, fashion and xual expression have remained lightning rods for controversy. The forward-thinking women of the 1920s who cut their hair, threw out their corts and dared to smoke in public were the Britney Spears and Paris Hiltons of their day, says Joshua Zeitz,
author of "Flapper: A Madcap Story of Sex, Style, Celebrity, and the Women Who Made America Modern." "Everything is relative—girls weren't wearing thongs(皮带)or getting bikini waxes, but they were coming to school in knee-length skirts, wearing lipstick and smoking," Zeitz says. "The concern at the time was that the culture was xualizing young girls. The backlash(强烈反应)came during the Great Depression, when you e a movement to get women back into the home, in part to correct this culture of licentiousness."
Key Words:
hint /h'ɪnt/
vt. & vi. 暗示, 示意
n. 1. 暗示, 示意2. 细微的迹象, 少许, 微量3. 建议, 有益的劝告4. 征兆;迹象5. 秘诀;窍门
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cute [kju:t]
adj. 1. 漂亮的, 娇小可爱的2. 聪明伶俐的, 精明的3. 有性吸引力的;性感的4. 装腔作势的;假装老实的;矫揉造作的;忸怩作态的5. 非常好的;最高的;有魅力的
estimate ['estimeit]
n. 1. 估计, 估价2. 报价3. (对人或物的品质特性的)意见,看法;判断;评价4. 估计的成本5. (对距离、价值、数目、大小、重量、费用等的)估计,估算,估价;估计量,估计数,估计值;预算6. (承包人的)估价单;成本估计单;投标;vt. & vi. 估计; 评价, 评估
outlet ['autlet]
n. 1. 出口, 出路2. 发泄的途径,(感情、思想、精力发泄的)出路;表现机会3. 批发商店
mild[maild]
adj. 1. 温柔的, 温和的, 和善的2. 轻微的, 不严重的3. 温暖的, 暖和的(天气,尤指冬天)4. (味道)不浓的;淡味的
embody[imˈbɔdi]
vt. 1. 表现, 象征, 具体表现2. 包括; 包含
insist[ inˈsist]
vt. & vi. 1. 坚决宣称, 坚持认为,坚持说,固执己见2. 坚决要求
campus[ˈkæmpəs]
n. 1. (大学)校园2. 大学或其分校
7dogslogan[ˈsləuɡən]
成人教育自我鉴定
n. 1. 标语, 口号, 广告语
virgin[ˈvə:dʒin]
n.1. 处女,童男2. 童贞玛利亚(耶稣之母)
adj. 1. 处女的; 纯洁的2. 原始的; 未使用的3. (采矿)未开采的4. (采矿)未开采的
garment [ˈɡɑ:mənt]n. (一件)衣服
rebellion [riˈbeliən]
n. 1. 对政府的(尤指武装)反抗; 造反; (对权威的)反抗, 不服从2. 背叛行为, 谋反, 叛乱, 反叛3. 不顺从;叛逆任礼
inevitable [inˈevitəbl] adj. 不可避免的, 必然的
Controversy [ˈkɔntrəvə:si] n. 公开辩论, 论战
empowerment[emˈpaʊəmənt] n.授权
Uful Expressions:
lightning rods
n. 焦点、热点
Text 45
We must value education for itlf, not just to get a job
Oscar Wilde’s definition of a cynic was someone who knew the price of everything and the value of nothing. His epigram(警句)applies to the way we talk about education nowadays, focusing on wha
t it can
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do for the economy. That is indeed important, but it does not capture the real value of education. It is almost as if people are afraid of saying education is a good thing in itlf. That comes from a loss of confidence in the importance of transmitting a body of knowledge, a culture, ways of thinking, from one generation to the next. It is a crucial obligation we have to the next generation and we are failing to discharge it.
The latest example of this loss of confidenc e in education is the titles of the departments created by splitting the Department for Education in two. We have the Department of Innovation, Universities and Skills and we have the Department for Children, Schools and Families. The key word that is missing in tho two lists is education. It is almost as if the government has lost confidence in the value of education, as distinct from other worthwhile aims such as helping families or raising our levels of innovation.
For the government, science is no longer about evidence and reason, it is a lever for increasing productivity. Foreign languages are not a means of appreciating the culture of another people; they are a means of improving trade. Yet people do not become teachers becau they aspire to raising the rate of growth; they wish to pass on a love of their subjects. There is a paradox here. If we e education as a way of imparting a body of knowledge, we will do better at the functionalist side of education as well. Like happiness, it can be achieved only as a byproduct of something el.
Real education means real subjects with a history, shape and rigour, together with the intellectual curiosity to challenge and renew them. Our body of knowledge must be rooted in a tradition, but must also be open to questioning. Indeed, what we know changes all the time – when Einstein was at Oxford in the 1930s, he t a physics paper with the same questions for two years running. When his colleagues challenged him, he replied that although the questions were the same the answers were different. That is part of the excitement of intellectual endeavour.
Of cour, skills matter too. But often they are best mastered through learning stuff. Look at what has gone wrong with history. We expect school-children to compare different primary sources and learn the analytical(分析的)tools of the historian, but we will not allow them the sheer excitement of learning what happens next in a narrative history of our own country.
Several subjects now face the vicious spiral of not enough people emerging from university who have studied the subject to provide the teachers to keep it going in schools. We cannot just solve this problem by passing a law or tting yet another target. We need a smarter policy than this that understands the role of a proud profession in living up to its own standards, and the power of choice by parents and students.
There are problems with the national curriculum but even more important is the intricate relationship between the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority and the examining boards. This is the source of the dumbing down and predictability of exams.
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