Practice 3
A newspaper is much more than a business; it is an institution. It reflects and influences the life of a community; it may affect even wider destinies.
It is, in its way, an instrument of government. It plays on the minds and consciences of man. It may educate, stimulate, assist, or it may do the opposite. It has, therefore, a moral as well as a material existence, and its character and influence are in the main determined by the balance of these two factors. It may make profit or power its first object, or it may conceive itself as fulfilling a higher and more exacting function.
Character is a subtle affaire, and has many shades and sides. It is not a thing to be much talked about, but rather to be felt. It is the slow deposit of past actions and ideas.
At the perils of its soul, a newspaper must see that the news it supplies is not tainted. Neither in what it gives, nor in what it does not give, nor in the mode of presentation, must the unclouded face of truth suffer wrong. Comment is free, but facts are sacred. “Propaganda,” so called, by this means is hateful. The voice of opponents no less than that of friends has a right to be heard. Comment also is justly subject to a self-imposed restraint. It is well to be frank; it is even better to be fair. This is an ideal. Achievement in such matters is hardly given to man. Perhaps none of us can attain to it in the desirable measure. We can but try, ask pardon for shortcomings, and there leave the matter.
One of the virtues, perhaps the chief virtue, of a newspaper is its independence. Whatever its position or character, it should have a soul of its own.
That is the path of self-respect—it is also the path of success. And what a work it is! How multiform, how responsive to every need—and every incident of life! What illimitable possibilities of achievement and of excellence!
To the man, whatever his place on the paper, nothing should satisfy short of the best. It is here that ability counts and that character counts, and it is on these that a newspaper, if it is to be worthy of its power and duty, must rely.
Practice 3
Tea, that most quintessential of English drinks, is a relative latecomer to British shores. Although the custom of drinking tea dates back to the third millennium BC in China, it was not until the mid-17th century that the beverage first appeared in England.
The use of tea spread slowly from its Asian homeland, reaching Europe by way of Venice around 1560, although Portuguese trading ships may have made contact with the Chinese as early as 1515.
It was the Portuguese and Dutch traders who first imported tea to Europe, with regular shipments by 1610. England was a latecomer to the tea trade, as the East India Company did not capitalize on tea’s popularity until the mid-18th century.
Coffee Houses Curiously, it was the London coffee houses that were responsible for introducing tea to England. One of the first coffee house merchants to offer tea was Thomas Garway, who owned an establishment in Exchange Alley. He sold both liquid and dry tea to the public as early as 1657. Three years later he issued a broadsheet advertising tea at £6 and £10 per pound (ouch!), touting its virtues at “making the body active and lusty”, and “preserving perfect health until extreme old age”.
Tea gained popularity quickly in the coffee houses, and by 1700 over 500 coffee houses sold it. This distressed the tavern owners, as tea cut their sales of ale and gin, and it was bad news for the government, who depended upon a steady stream of revenue from taxes on liquor sales. By1750 tea had become the favored drink of Britain’s lower classes.
Taxation on Tea Charles II did his bit to counter the growth of tea, with several acts forbidding its sale in private houses. This measure was designed to counter sedition, but it was so unpopular that it was impossible to enforce it. A 1676 act taxed tea and required coffee house operators to apply for a license.
This was just the start of government attempts to control, or at least, to profit from the popularity of tea in Britain. By the mJd-18th century the duty on tea had reached an absurd119%. This heavy taxation had the effect of creating a whole new industry-tea smuggling.
Smuggling Tea Ships from Holland and Scandinavia brought tea to the British coast, then stood offshore while smugglers met them and unloaded the precious cargo in small vessels. The smugglers, often local fishermen, snuck the tea inland through underground passages and hidden paths to special hiding places. One of the best hiding places was in the local parish church!
Even smuggled tea was expensive, however, and therefore extremely profitable, so many smugglers began to adulterate the tea with other substances, such as willow, licorice, and sloe leaves. Used tea leaves were also retried and added to fresh leaves.
Practice 2
What exactly does globalization mean? Concepts related to globalization include “internationalization”, “multidomestic marketing”, and “multinational or transnational marketing”, suggesting that the basic criterion is transactions across national boundaries. In the marketing and strategic management literature, globalization is conceptualized as a means to gain competitive advantage by locating different stages of production in different geographic regions according to the particular region's comparative advantage. This conceptualization focuses only on the economic aspects of globalization; social, cultural and political factors are only considered in the context of achieving economic advantage. Thus, being “culturally sensitive” in global markets is being able to sell one's product with enough ingenuity to avoid possible pitfalls arising from the seller's ignorance of local customs. International marketing textbooks discuss such cultural pitfalls in great detail; however, the cultural contest of globalization is always framed by the economy.
Broader conceptualization of globalization can be found in other disciplines such as sociology and anthropology. Waters defined globalization as “a social process in which the constraints of geography on social and cultural arrangements recede and in which people become increasingly aware that they are receding.” This conceptualization with its much broader scope, allows for the examination of a number of consequences of globalization, not jut economic but social, cultural and political ones.
Practice 1 Directions: Read the following text(s) and write an essay to 1) summarize the main points of the text(s), 2) make clear your own viewpoint, and 3) justify your stand. In your essay, make full use of the information provided in the text(s). If you use more than three consecutive words from the text(s), use quotation marks (“ ”). You should write 160—200 words on the ANSWER SHEET. There was a heated discussion on whether to require every student to wear a uniform. The following are arguments from supporters of uniforms and their competitors. Supportive arguments: There are those who say that wearing a uniform gives a person or a seller of identification with a larger, more important concept. They say that the practice of making persons wear uniforms, say in a school, eliminates all envy and competition in the matter of dress, such a poor person who cannot afford good quality clothing is not to be belittled by a wealthy person who wears expensive quality clothing. They also say it is helpful to build up team work ability, enhance the school's entire public image, and boost up the honor of collectiveness by wearing school uniform. Opposite arguments: Others say no one should be forced to wear a uniform under any circumstance. Uniforms are demanding to the human spirit and totally unnecessary in a democratic society. Uniforms tell the world that the person who wears one has no value as all individuals but only lives to function as a part of a whole. If all persons were to wear the same clothing, why would anyone strive to be better? When this happens, all incentive to improve one’s life is removed. Why world parents bother to work hard so that their children could have a better life than they had when they know that their children are going to be forced to have exactly the same life that they had? Uniforms also hurt the economy. Right now, billions of dollars are spent on the fashion industry yearly. Thousands of persons are employed in designing, creating and marketing different types of clothing. If everyone were forced to wear uniforms, artistic personnel would be unnecessary. Sales persons would be superfluous as well; why bother to sell the only items that are available?
Practice 6 ● In your company twenty employees receive, at the company’s expense, a personal copy of a daily financial newspaper, which they collect from reception each day. There have been disputes with the newspaper deliveryman about the correct number that should be delivered.
● Your manager has asked you to investigate and you have discovered:
● Employees who are not entitled to newspapers take them from reception.
● The newspapers are delivered. And taken, before the receptionist arrives for work.
● There are spare copies when employees are absent or away on business trips.
● Write a short report of 200—250 words to your manager suggesting how to make sure that the correct number of newspapers is delivered each day and that the right person receive them.
Practice 4 ● Your manager is keen to improve work efficiency among the staff. He has asked you to introduce to your fellow staff members practices to improve time management.
● Write the report for your manager, including the following information:
● the importance of planning work time effectively,
● practices to improve time management,
● steps to follow in carrying out the practices.
Practice 2Imagine that an Irish marketing firm is doing research in your country. You have agreed to participate in a telephone interview about vegetables in your diet.Question: What are your favorite vegetables?
Practice 3 Directions: Read the text below. Write an essay in about 120 words, in which you should summarize the key points of the text and make comments on them. Try to use your own words. All of us should keep a kitchen diary, showing how much food is left uneaten as garbage. In China, enough food is wasted in restaurants every year to feed 200 million people. In the United States, 40 percent of food is wasted from farm to fork. Each year, the amount of food thrown away in rich countries is almost the same as that produced in sub-Saharan Africa. This raises some important questions. In developing countries, food is lost because farmers do not have appropriate cooling, storage or market access for their crops. Their grains, fruits and vegetables dry up and rot away. In developed countries, the picture is different, and food is wasted in supermarkets, restaurants and at home. China faces both problems, significant losses in farms, as well as at the sale and consumption stages. And the amount of food wasted by Chinese consumers is rapidly increasing. Consumer culture has filled China and urban residents can get quality food from anywhere in the country and from across the planet. Chinese consumers are as particular about their food as those in other countries. In supermarkets, they refuse to buy vegetables that don’t look fresh or have an irregular shape, or milk and other products close to their expiry (失效) date. Should Chinese consumers take more responsibility for the waste they create? Everyone deserves to have enough food to eat. Despite China’s impressive success in reducing hunger over the past three decades, the job is not completed yet.
Practice 2
Practice 2
Task:
Identifying oneself; identifying things/people; passing on information.