Ex. 4. Consult the dictionary for the meaning of “community”, and then read the two following paragraphs. Finally, answer the questions at the end.

 

A) I think the essential element in the concept of the community is the interdependence of its various members to form a functioning unit. It is the next distinctive general organizational level above that of the individual and the population. Individuals of the given kind are organized, through their genetic relationships, into populations; but the behavior and history of these specific populations can only be understood in relation to the behavior and history of the other populations with which they occur. The community, it seems to me, might be defined as the smallest group of such populations that can be studied and understood as a more or less self-sufficient unit.

                     Marston Bates        The Nature of the National History

       B) “Community” properly signifies any whole area of social life, such as a village, or town, or country. It is any circle in which a common life is lived, within which people more or less freely relate themselves to one another in the various aspects of life, and thus exhibit common social characteristics. It is inevitable that people who over any length of time enter freely into social relationships should develop social likenesses, should have some common social ideas, common customs, common traditions, and the sense of belonging together. A community may be small or great. A great community, as a nation, will enclose a number of similar communities, localities, and groups with more intense and more numerous common qualities. Small communities are sometimes semi-isolated in the midst of greater ones, especially in countries to which immigrants flock and where they form, as it were, islands of their own peculiar life. Thus it is seen that community is a matter of degree. What we should particularly bear in mind is that community means any circle of common life. Common life is more than organization or relationship. When we use the term “society” we think more particularly of organization, but when we use the term “community” we should think of something greater – the life whence organization springs and of which organization is but the means.

                                     M. MacIver The Elements of Social Science

1 Which of two definitions is more meaningful? Why?

2 Does each of the above paragraphs have a controlling idea? What is it?

3 What use of the basic materials does each author make?

4 What type of order is used in each paragraph?

5 Consider each of these paragraph definitions as complete in itself, independent of the rest of the essay in which it appeared. Now if the purpose of the first writer is to appeal to the readers interested in nature, and that of the second writer to appeal to readers interested in sociology, would your answer to question 1 be different? Why?

 

Ex. 5. Look up one of the following terms in the dictionary. Then write a paragraph of definition in which you combine the dictionary meaning of the word and what the word means to you:

Loneliness, fraternity, boyfriend or girlfriend, alma mater, space age.

 

 Ex. 6. For a foreigner or someone who is not familiar with the term being defined, write a paragraph defining one of the following:

Datcha, maslenitsa, blind date, barbecue.

 

ü Comparison shows the similarity between two or more people, objects, or ideas. There must be a basis for comparison, it means that the things compared belong to the same class or group. The careful writer of a paragraph not only starts with a basis of comparison between the similar things being discussed but also stresses throughout the comparison the specific dominant quality, point, or issue which is applicable to both and which is stated or implied in the controlling idea of the paragraph.

 

Ex. 7. Read the paragraph of comparison and define the topic sentence, its controlling idea, the basic material and the order of paragraph development. Speak about the structure of the paragraph (major and minor statements). Can you say that the paragraph is unified and coherent?

 

They were inseparable – Old Man Mooney and his dog – and alike as two peas popped from the same pod. They had big, rheumy eyes – both of them. You know – that pale, faded, watery kind of blue that makes you want to look somewhere else in a hurry. They were a spindly-shanked, wobbly pair, and both of them lean, hard, and dirty. The old man was bearded, his hair straggly, hanging over his ears. And the dog was also a mess – his dirty, mangy coat hanging in tufted wisps and patches over his lean, scabby body. And friendly – these two were about as friendly as a mother wildcat with a brood of new-born kittens. They were a perfect matched set of the meanest and ugliest dispositions you’d ever find. They even behaved the same way. People knew them both for how miserly they were. The old man hoarded every penny, every scrap of paper, every bit of string he found. And that ugly cur – him too – hoarding every bit of bone, every filthy stick he found.

                                                                                                         

pod – стручок

faded – выцвевший

wobbly – шатающийся

lean – худой, тощий

mangy – грязный, убогий

scabby – страдающий чесоткой

mean – подлый

ugly – безобразный

hoard – тайно хранить

filthy – грязный