标准美国英语口语 15 Talking about languages

Unit 15 Talking about languages

281.A person who speaks two languages is bilingual.

282.A person who speaks three languages is trilingual.

283.How many languages do you speak?

284.Can you speak Mandarine?

285.Can you understand your American teacher?

286. In class, how much do you understand your English teacher?

287. He speaks English with a strong accent.

288. What's your native language?

289.My mother tongue is Italian.

290.John is a native peaker-English.

291.David is a linguist¹, he knows many languages.

292.I have a lot of trouble with English pronunciation.

293.My English sounds awful.

294.Your English is getting better and better evry day.

295.How can I improve my English?

296.Read easy and interesting English stories that have tapes or CDs.

297. Learning² a language takes a lot of time and effort.

298.What are the differences between British English and American English?

299.She is studying English as a second language.

230.Jane has been teaching³ for ESL for many years.

Conversation 1 Can you understand your Spanish teacher?

Can you speak French? Yes, but not very well.Can you understan your Spanish teacher? More or less. How well do you understand your Chinese teacher, Mr. Wang?

About 40 percent, if he speaks slowly.When he speaks fast, I can only catch a word here and there. Mr. Wang is an excellent Chinese teacher.With his help, my Chinese is getting better and better every day.

Conversation 2 Going down town on a snowy day.

It's really snowing hard. Thanks for the ride. I'm really glad not to be out there waiting for the bus and it's rotten⁴ weather. You're welcome.May I ask you how many languages you speak? Three. What are they? Italian, English and Spanish.I'm also studying Chinese now. Wow, what is your native language? Italian. I was born in Italy.

We moved to Spain when I was seven and we moved to South Africa when I was twelve.How many languages does your teacher Mr. Wang speak? He speaks five languages, Chinese, English , Japanese, Spanish and Russian. Chinese is his mother tongue.Wow, he must have majored in linguistics⁵. For sure. How many languages do you speak? Me? Only English and Swedish⁶.I moved here eight years ago.I live with my uncle's family.Your English is excellent. In Sweden I started learning English in the kindergarten. Do you want to learn another language like Chinese? I'm not sure. Chinese might be too difficult for me. How with Mr. Wang to Chinese class? Not bad. I like him a lot. Hey, let me tell you a joke that Mei told me in Chinese class today.Sure.

What do you call a politician⁷ that speaks two languages? Bilingual. What do you call a politican that speaks three languages? Trilingual. Then, what do you call a politician who speaks only one language? An American. Hey, how did you know? Mei told everyone that joke when she came from Nigeria.That was two years ago. I think she misses Nigeria. I miss South Africa. I miss Sweden. But welcome to America.It isn't perfect, but it is a new home. Guess so.

Conversation 3 Learning a language takes a lot of time and effort

I give up. I can’t learn Chinese. Don’t give up. Keep trying. Learning a language is not easy. It takes a lot of time and effort. I can’t do it. Remember an old saying, time on task, work at it. you’ll get better. I have difficulty⁸ with four tones⁹. No matter how hard I try, my pronunciation stinks¹⁰. My Chinese sound awful. Try, try, and never say die. Listen to simple songs and ……. Read easy and interesting Chinese stories that have tapes or CDs. You will learn to speak Chinese. That’s a promise. Will you help me? We’re friends and that’s what are friends for. Don’t worry.

Conversation 4 Differences between American English and British English

Why is there difference between American English and British English? It seems so crazy. Basically¹¹, they are the same. But they do have a lot of differnces in spelling, pronunciation and usage¹². When I just came from India, I sometimes wondered wheather American spoke¹³ English. Could you refresh¹⁴ my brain? OK. Here are some examples. The American say, “she is in the hospital.” The British say, ‘she is in hospital.” The American say, “I’ll talk to him tomorrow.” The British say. “ I’ll have a word with him tomorrow.” The American say, “his family is going to the movie.” The British would say, “his family are going to the movie.” I’m beginning to remember it.Tell you what You give American expression and I give the British expression. Good idea. May I please have some whole-wheat bread?. May I please have some brown bread? The post office is five blocks away. The post office is five streets away. He has a nice apartment. He rents a nice flat.

He is fond of math. He is fond of maths. It looks like it’s going to rain. It looks as if it’s going to rain. He looked at me real strange. He looked at me really strangely. Pretty good. You must have read a lot of British novels. When I was younger. But now I mostly read American books and magazines. I figure your American English is far or more useful. That’s probably true. There are about sixteen million British people while the American’s number is about three hundred million, so the Brits are a number 5 to 1. And America creates out so many movies and songs every year that it seems like American’s only English language.Maybe so, and that’s it again, maybe not. Around two billion people speak English as a second language. You mean lots. Right, a lot of people like us make movies or write songs that produce in America. But really, we are not Americans. No, we are not American. I want to go back to Iceland after my master degree. I’ll be a high school English teacher and get married to a good man and have a few healthy children.That’s an excellent plan. How many childrn do you want to have? Three. Wow, I’m impressed. I think having children is the most thing we do. More power to you. Don’t let anyone change your thinking.

1 linguist   

n.语言学家；精通数种外国语言者

参考例句：

• I used to be a linguist till I become a writer.过去我是个语言学家，后来成了作家。
• Professor Cui has a high reputation as a linguist.崔教授作为语言学家名声很高。

2 learning   

n.学问，学识，学习；动词learn的现在分词

参考例句：

• When you are learning to ride a bicycle,you often fall off.初学骑自行车时，常会从车上掉下来。
• Learning languages isn't just a matter of remembering words.学习语言不仅仅是记些单词的事。

3 teaching   

n.教学，执教，任教，讲授；(复数)教诲

参考例句：

• We all agree in adopting the new teaching method. 我们一致同意采取新的教学方法。
• He created a new system of teaching foreign languages.他创造了一种新的外语教学体系。

4 rotten   

adj.腐烂(朽)的；令人不愉快的；糟糕的

参考例句：

• The book was pretty rotten.这本书糟透了。
• Rotten eggs give off a bad smell.臭蛋散发出难闻的气味。

5 linguistics   

n.语言学

参考例句：

• She plans to take a course in applied linguistics.她打算学习应用语言学课程。
• Linguistics is a scientific study of the property of language.语言学是指对语言的性质所作的系统研究。

6 Swedish   

n.瑞典人，瑞典语；adj.瑞典的，瑞典人的，瑞典语的

参考例句：

• From his looks I'd say he was Swedish.从他的相貌上看，我敢说他是瑞典人。
• He is going after that pretty Swedish girl.他正在追求那位美丽的瑞典女郎。

7 politician   

n.政客，政治人物，政治家

参考例句：

• The job of a politician is to serve the whole community.政治家的职责是为全体大众服务。
• You need to be a bit of a politician to succeed.你要获得成功，就需要有一点政客的手腕。

8 difficulty   

n.困难，费劲；难事，难题；麻烦，困境

参考例句：

• If there is any difficulty,please let us know promptly.倘有困难，请迅速通知我们。
• A little difficulty like this is nothing to us.这点困难算不了什么。

9 tones   

音( tone的名词复数 )； 色调； 腔调； 全音 （英式英语）

参考例句：

• his clipped military tones 他那短促的军人音调
• His name was always mentioned in almost reverential tones. 人们每次提起他的名字，语调中几乎总是充满了敬意。

10 stinks   

v.散发出恶臭( stink的第三人称单数 )；发臭味；名声臭；糟透

参考例句：

• The whole scheme stinks to high heaven—don't get involved in it. 整件事十分卑鄙龌龊——可别陷了进去。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The soup stinks of garlic. 这汤有大蒜气味。 来自《现代英汉综合大词典》

11 basically   

adv.基本上，从根本上说

参考例句：

• His heart is basically sound.他的心脏基本上健康。
• Basically I agree with your plan.我基本上同意你的计划。

12 usage   

n.惯用法，使用，用法

参考例句：

• I am clear about the usage of this word at last.这个词的用法我算是弄明白了。
• The usage is now firmly established.这种用法现已得到确认。

13 spoke   

n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说

参考例句：

• They sourced the spoke nuts from our company.他们的轮辐螺帽是从我们公司获得的。
• The spokes of a wheel are the bars that connect the outer ring to the centre.辐条是轮子上连接外圈与中心的条棒。

14 refresh   

v.使...生气蓬勃，提起精神，恢复精神

参考例句：

• I looked at the map to refresh my memory of the road.我看看地图以唤起对这条路的回忆。
• I think I'll just refresh myself with a cup of tea before I go to meet the children.我想在见孩子们之前先喝杯茶来恢复一下精神。