NODIRA SABIROVA GULMIRA ATAKHANOVA

PREFACEThis text book is intended for the students of higher educational establishments. The aim of the book is to

give information about the UK and the USA to students studying English. The text book covers The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and the United States of America. The texts deals with territories, history, population, state system, cities, places of interest, education system, universities, holidays of the above mentioned countries.

Information about Great Britain is given under the following headlines:

I. The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.

II. The history of the United Kingdom.

III. The State System of Great Britain.

IV. The Educational System of Great Britain.

V. Traditions and customs of Great Britain.

VI. Artistic and cultural life in the UK.

Information about the USA is given under the following headlines.

VII. The geography of the United States of America.

VIII. History, policy and economy of the USA.

IX. The educational system of the USA.

X. Culture, leisure, entertainment, sports, holidays.

Surely it is difficult to give full information about two English speaking countries in this text book. We have tried to give most indispensable, interesting information about two English speaking countries.

Texts in the text book are intended to give readers a chain to read at home without anybody’s help. Here readers’ attained knowledge of the language in the secondary and higher schools as vocabulary, grammar, pronunciation, speech habits is taken into account. We have tried to remove lexical, grammatical, reading and pronunciation difficulties to make the texts easier for readers to read and understand them.

Some assignments precede the texts. There are also some exercises to make sure whether texts are understood as well as exercises for a teacher to check up.

The text book ends with the list of the literature used.

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland (usually shortened to the United Kingdom or UK) is the political name of the country which is made up of England, Scot land, Wales and Northern Ireland. Several is lands off the British coast are also part of the United Kingdom (for example, the Isle of Wight, the Orkneys, Hebrides and Shetlands, and the Isles of Scilly), although the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man are not. However, all these islands do recognize the Queen.

Formation How was the United Kingdom formed? This took centuries, and a lot of armed struggle was involved. In the 15th cen tury, a Welsh prince, Henry Tudor, became King Henry VII of England. Then his son, King Henry VIII, united England and Wales under one Parliament in 1536. In Scotland a similar thing happened. The King of Scotland inherited the crown of England and Wales in 1603, so he became King James I of England and Wales, and King James VI of Scot land. The Parliaments of England, Wales and Scotland were united a century later in 1707. The United Kingdom is a name which was introduced in 1801 when Great Britain became united with Ireland. The whole of Ireland was united with Great Britain from 1801 up until 1922. In that year the independent Republic of Ireland was formed in the South, while Northern Ireland became part of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.

 

The Union Jack

The flag of the United Kingdom, known as the Union Jаcк, is made up of three crosses. The upright Red Cross is the cross of St. George, the patron saint of England. The white diagonal cross (with the arms going into the corners) is the cross of St. Andrew, the patron saint of Scotland. The red diagonal cross is the cross of St. Patrick, the patron saint of Ireland. St. David is the patron saint of Wales.

Location

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is an island state: it occupies the territory of the British Isles and is composed of some 5,500 islands, large and small. The two main islands are: Great Britain (in which are Eng land, Wales and Scotland) to the east and Ireland (in which are Northern Ireland and the independent Republic of Ire land) to the west. They are separated by the Irish Sea.

The UK is one of the world's smaller countries (it is twice smaller than France or Spain), with an area of some 244,100 square kilometers. However, there are only nine other countries with more people, and London is the world's seventh biggest city. The UK is situated off the northwest coast of Europe between the Atlantic Ocean on the north and northwest and the North Sea on the east and is sepa rated from the European continent by the English Channel (or la Manche) and the Strait of Dover (or Pas de Calais).

Geographically, the island of Great Britain is subdivided into two main regions—Lowland Britain and Highland Britain. Lowland Britain comprises southern and eastern England. Highland Britain consists of Scotland, most of Wales, the Pennines, and the Lake District. The Pennine Chain extends southward from the Cheviot Hills into the Midlands, a plains region with low hills and valleys. England is separated from Scotland by the Cheviot Hills, running from east to west.

The highest mountains are in Scotland and Wales: Ben Nevis is 1,343 meters and Snowdon is 1,085 meters. Of course, these are very small compared with other moun tains in the world—Everest, the highest mountain in the world, is 8,839 meters.

In fact everything in the United Kingdom is rather small—the longest rivers are the Severn (354 kilometers), flowing along the border between England and Wales, tributaries of which include the Avon, famed by Shakespeare, and the River Thames (346 kilometers), which flows eastward to the port of London. Compare these with the River Amazon in South America which is 6,751 kilometers long! The swiftest flowing river in the British Isles is the Spay. There are many lakes in Great Britain. On the north-west side of the Pennine system

lies the Lake District, containing the beautiful lakes which give it its name. This district is widely known for its association with the history of English literature and especially with the name of William Wordsworth (1770—1850), the founder of the Lake School of poets.

The largest cities of Great Britain are: London, Birming ham, Glasgow, Liverpool, Manchester, Sheffield, Bristol, Leeds and Edinburgh. The most important ports are: London, Liverpool, Southampton, Belfast, Glasgow and Cardiff.

Climate

Britain is as far north as Siberia. For example Edinburgh is 56 degrees north of the equator; the same latitude as Mos cow, yet its climate is generally mild and temperate because of the Gulf Stream, which brings warm water and air across the Atlantic from the Gulf of Mexico. The climate in the UK is usually described as cool, temperate and humid. The weather is so changeable that the English often say that they have no climate but only weather. Therefore it is natural for them to use the comparison "as changeable as the weather" of a person who often changes his mood or opinion about something. The weather is the favorite topic of conversation in the UK. As the weather changes with the wind, and Britain is visited by winds from different parts of the world, the most characteristic feature of Brit ain's weather is its variability. The English also say that they have three variants of weather: when it rains in the morning, when it rains in the afternoon, or when it rains all day long. Sometimes it rains so heavily that they say "It's raining cats and dogs". Rainfall is more or less even throughout the year. The wind brings rain from the Atlantic to the hills of the west. This means that the western parts of Britain are wetter than the east, which is fairly sheltered. London is drier than continental cities such as Hamburg. Its weather may be un-predictable; but it is not particularly wet the northern mountains have much more rain and snow. More generally, the southern part of England and Wales are a little warmer, sunnier and less misty than the rest. The driest period is from March to June and the wettest months are from October to January. During a normal summer the tempera ture sometimes rises above 25 degrees in the south. Winter temperatures below 5 degrees are rare. It seldom snows heavily in winter, snow does not remain for: long, except in the Scottish mountains, where skiing is possible; frost is rare. January and February are usually the coldest months, July and August the warmest.

Still the wind may bring winter cold in spring or summer. Sometimes it brings the whirlwinds or hurricanes. Droughts are rare.

So, we may say that the British climate has three main features: it is mild, humid and changeable. That means that it is never too hot or cold, too wet or dry. This humid and mild climate is good for plants. The trees and flowers begin to blossom early in spring.

In the British homes there has been no central heating up till recently. The fireplaces are often used, but the coal is not used as it's very expensive. Britain has no good coal now and imports it. Many schools and universities have no central heating either, and the floors there are made of stone. The British bedroom is especially cold; sometimes electric blankets or hot-water bottles are used.

 Vegetation and Wildlife

 The humid and mild climate of Great Britain is good for plants and flowers. Some of them have become symbols in the UK. Probably you know that the poppy is the symbol of peace, the red rose is the national emblem of England, and the thistle is the national emblem of Scotland and the Ed inburgh International Festival. The daffodils and the leek are the emblems of Wales; the shamrock (a kind of clover) is the emblem of Ireland. The UK was originally a land of vast forests, mainly oak and beech in the Lowlands and pine and birch in the High lands, with great stretches of marshland arid smaller areas of moors. In the course of time, much forest land was cleared and almost all the Lowlands outside the industrial areas were put under cultivation. Today only about 6 percent of the total land area remains wooded. Extensive forests remain in eastern and northern Scotland and in southeastern and western England. Oak, elm, ash, and beech are the commonest trees in England, while. Scotland has much pine and birch. The Highlands with their thin soil are largely moorland with heather and grasses. In the cultivated areas that make up most of Britain there are many wild flowers, flowering plants and grasses. The fauna or animal life of the UK is much like that of northwestern Europe. Many larger mammals such as bear, wolf have been hunted to extinction, others are now pro tected by law. About 50 land mammals are still found in the UK. There are many foxes. Otters are common along rivers and streams, and seals live along much of the coast. Hedgehogs, hares, rabbits, rats and mice are numerous. Deer live in some of the forests in the Highlands of Scotland and England. There are several small lizards, two or three kinds of snakes and several kinds of frogs and toads. Some 230 kinds of birds live in the UK, and another 200 are regular visitors, many are songbirds. The most numer ous are blackbirds, sparrows and starlings. Robin Redbreast is the national bird of the UK.

The number of ducks, geese and other water fowl has diminished during recent years. Partridges, pheasants and other large and rare birds are protected by law. Gulls, geese and other sea birds nest near the coast.

There are many threats to wildlife and ecological bal ance around the coast. The biggest threat to the coastline is pollution. More than 3,500 million tons of industrial waste is pumped into the North Sea every year. "We cannot con tinue to use our seas as a dustbin and expect our coastline to survive", says Greenpeace. Many other ecological prob lems may be caused by privatization of the coast. The qual ity of rivers has also declined. Many of them are "biologi cally dead", i. e. unable to support fish and wildlife.

Population The population of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland over 57 million people.

The population lives mostly in towns and cities and their suburbs. Four out of every five people live in towns. The distribution of the population is rather uneven. Over 46 million people live in England, a little over 5 million live in Scotland, over 3 million in Wales and about 1,5 million in Northern Ireland. Although Britain is densely populated, there are large areas which contain fewer than 100 people per square kilometer (for example, most of the mountainous parts of the UK including much of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland). Densities of more than 500 people per square kilometer are only found in the main industrial areas (such as the Midlands and South-East England). London's population is 7 million. There are only five cities with popu lations over 500,000, although Manchester, Liverpool and Newcastle also exceed this figure if neighboring towns are included.

The UK is inhabited by the English, the Scottish, the Welsh, and the Northern Irish, who constitute the British nation. What makes them different from each other? The British are the descendants of different peoples who settled in the British Isles at different times.

About 2,000 years ago the British Isles were inhabited by the Celts who originally came from continental Europe. During the next 1,000 years there were many invasions. The Romans came from Italy in 43 A.D. and in calling the country "Britania", gave Britain its name. The Angles and Saxons came from Germany, Denmark, and the Nether lands in the 5th century, and England gets its name from this invasion (Angle-land). The Vikings arrived from Den mark and Norway throughout the 9th century, and in 1066 the Normans invaded from France. These invasions drove the Celts into what is now Wales and Scotland, and they remained, of course, in Ireland.

The English, on the other hand, are the descendants of all the invaders, but are more Anglo-Saxon than anything else. These various origins ex plain many of the differences to be found between England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland differences in education, re ligion and the legal systems, but most obviously, in lan guage. The Celts spoke Celtic which survives today in the form of Welsh, Scottish Gaelic and Irish Gaelic. Less than a quarter of all Welsh people (600,000 out of 2,800,000) speak Welsh. Scottish Gaelic and Irish Gaelic are still spoken, al though they have suffered more than Welsh from the spread of English. However, all the three languages are now officially encouraged and taught in schools. English developed from Anglo-Saxon and is a Germanic language. However, all the invading peoples, particularly the Norman French, influenced the English language and you can find many words in English which are French in origin. Nowadays all Welsh, Scottish and Irish people speak English (even if they speak their own language as well), but all the countries have their own special accents and dialects, and their people are easily recognizable as soon as they speak. Occasionally, people from the four countries in the UK have difficulty in understanding one another because of these different accents. A southern English accent is gen erally accepted to be the most easily understood, and is the accent usually taught to foreigners.

There have been many waves of immigration into Brit ain. Now there are many people of all colors and races in the UK. These are mostly former inhabitants of the former British colonies. These people, called "the colored", came to the UK in search of better living standards as their own countries had been impoverished by centuries of the British colonial oppression. Nowadays the policy is to encourage these new immigrant communities to continue speaking their own languages as well as English. The children of im migrants are often taught their own languages in school, and there are special newspapers, magazines, and radio and television programs for these communities.

The latest wave of immigrants from the West Indies, India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Hong Kong has of course caused problems. There is certainly racial tension and racial prejudice in Britain today. In spite of laws passed to protect them, there is still discrimination against Asian and black people, many of whom are unemployed or in low-paid jobs. However, the atmosphere is improving and the different races are slowly learning to trust one another. In a wide educational program white school-children, teachers, po licemen and social workers are learning about the problems and customs of their new neighbors.

Glossaryaccent - individual, local or national way of pronouncing

AD - (Anno Dominic) in the year of the Lord

adventurous - fond of, eager for, adventures; full of danger and excitement

cheque - written order to a bank to pay money

circulation - state of going round continuously, moving from place to place freely

coin - (piece of) metal money

colony - country, territory, controlled, administered, and (often)

developed by another

continent - one of the main land masses

continental - the part of Europe that excludes the British Isles

currency - money that is actually in use in a country

decline - 1) say "no", reject; 2) continue to become smaller, weaker, lower

density- the qualify of being crowded together in great numbers

diagonal - a line going from one comer of a rectangle to the opposite corner dialect - form of a language (grammar, vocabulary, pronunciation) used in a part of a country or by a class of peoplediscrimination - treating someone differently because of their color, race, religion or sexdrought - continuous period of dry weather; want of rainenrich - make rich; improve in quality, flavorextinction - making, being, becoming, extinct, i.e. no longer in existence; having died outheather - variety of low evergreen shrub with small light-purple or white flowers, common in Scotland humid - damphurricane - violent windstormimmigrate - to come and live in a new countryimpoverish - cause to become poor; take away good qualitiesinherit - receive property, a title, as heirinvader - a person or thing that enters a country with armed forces in order to attackisland - piece of land surrounded by waterlegal tender - a form of money which must, by law, be accepted as paymentmammal - any of the class of animals which feed their young with milk from the breastmarsh - (area of) low-lying, wet landmoor - (area of) open, uncultivated land, esp. if covered with heathernote - written or printed promise to pay none.oppression - ruling unjustly or cruelly; keeping down by unjustor cruel governmentpatron saint - a saint who is strongly associated with о particular countrypollution - making dirty, destroying the purityprejudice - thinking badly of people without really knowing themrace - any of several subdivisions of mankind sharing certain physical

characteristics, esp. color of skin, color and type of hair, shape of eyes and nose ragaae - West Indian pop music with a strong rhythm

rare - unusual, uncommon, not often seen, etcsurvive - continue to live or exist; remain alive aftertemperate - free from extremes of heat and coldunite - make or become one; joinwhirlwind - swift circling current of air in a funnel-shaped column Tasks1. The English come from England, the Scots from Scotland, and the Welsh from Wales and the Irish

from Ireland. Think of as many European countries as you can. What are the people called? What language do they speak?

2. Explain the differences between these expressions: Great Brit ain, the United Kingdom, the Republic of Ireland, and the British Isles. What did "the United Kingdom" originally refer to?

3. Which of these people are British: an Englishman, a citizen of the Irish Republic, a Scot, and a Welshman?

4. Which of these capital cities are the capitals of independent states: Edinburgh, Belfast, Dublin, Cardiff, and London?

5. Which of these expressions describe highland Britain: drier, more difficult to reach, more thinly populated, better for farming, more mountainous?

6. Which countries in Western Europe are bigger than Britain?7. What parts of your country have the highest and the lowest; densities of population? Why?8. What do you know about the flag of your country?9. What is the climate of your country? How does it differ from

the climate of the United Kingdom? Are there any plants and animals in your country that have become symbols?

10. What do you know about the monetary system of your country? How does it differ from that of the United Kingdom?