I. Read the article and write T (for True) or F (for False) to each of the statements.

THE “MELTING POT”

The United States has long been known as a “melting pot”, because many of its people are descended from settlers who came from all over the world to make their homes in the new land, which was sparsely populated by native Indian tribes. The first immigrants in American history came from England and the Netherlands. Attracted by reports of great economic opportunities and religious and political freedom, immigrants from many other countries flocked to the United States in increasing numbers, the flow reaching a peak in the years 1880-1914. Between 1820 and 1979, the United States admitted more than 49 million immigrants – 73 per cent of them from Europe – but many came also from Latin America, Asia, Africa, Australia and Canada.

Some 1,534,000 Indians, Eskimos and Aleuts, descendants of North America’s first inhabitants, now reside in the United States. Most live in the West, but many are in the South and the north central area. Of more than 300 separate tribes, the largest is the Navaho in the Southwest.

Black people were first brought to America from Africa as slaves. Abraham Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation in 1863 declared the slaves free, but slavery was not abolished irrevocably until ratification of the 13^th Amendment to the Constitution in 1865, after the Civil War Blacks currently make up more than 11 per cent of the population. They once lived mainly in the agricultural South but now are scattered throughout the nation. In the Midwest city of Chicago, for example, there are 1.2 million black residents – more than three times as many as in 1940. New York State has the largest black population – 2,402,000, an increase of close to one million in 20 years.

Hispanics and Asians constitute two of the fastest growing segments of the United States today, now numbering 14,606,000 and 3,615,000 respectively, or 6.5 per cent of the population.

In the Hawaii, more than a third of the residents are of Japanese descent, a third are Caucasians, about 15 per cent are of Polynesian background, and the others are mainly of Filipino, Korean, and Chinese descent.

Every 10 years the U.S. Census Bureau makes a complete count, or census of its people and industries. When the first census was taken in 1790, then new nation had fewer than 4 million people, almost all living along the East Coast. Today there are more than 232.6 million. In the past 20 years many people have moved to the western and southern parts of the country. California, on the Pacific Coast, now has the nation’s largest population, and the Atlantic Coast state of New York is second. Another western state, Colorado, is growing almost twice as fast as the nation as a whole. Some other western states have had spectacular population booms: Arizona has more than doubled its population since 1960, while Nevada has almost tripled its population in the same period. The southern state of Florida, known for its pleasant climate, has almost twice the number of residents it had in 1960.

The population of the United States is growing older. In 1960 35.7 per cent of the population was under 18; today that figure has shrunk to 27.1 per cent. In 1960 there were 16,560,000 persons 65 or older; in 1982 – 25,824,000.

The American people are always on the move – from one part of the country to another, from one city to another, from farm to city, from the city to the suburbs. 17 per cent of all Americans move to new homes every year, searching for job opportunities, a better climate, or for other reasons. Many industries have scattered their factories far from the parent plant, and many of their workers have decided to try the new locations.

1) The first immigrants in American history came from Holland and England.

2) Immigrants were attracted to America by large territories and a good climate.

3) Most of the immigrants came from Latin America as it is geographically closer than Europe.

4) The largest Indian tribe in the USA is the Navaho in the Northwest.

5) Slaves were brought to America from Africa.

6) It was Abraham Lincoln who abolished slavery.

7) Almost one in ten is a black resident in the USA today.

8) The U.S. Census Bureau has to make a census every five years as the population is growing rapidly.

9) Among the states with a constantly increasing population are Nevada, Arizona, Florida, and Colorado.

10) The American people are always on the move because of unemployment.

II. Correct the misspelled words:

opportunitys, througout, inhabitents, Nethelands, imigrants, ratifikation, geografically, imancipation, buroau, religous, milion.

III. Write the following in words.

1) 240,000

2) 14 1/3

3) 18-7+4=15

4) $ 11.61

5) 1993

III. Complete the sentences with words from the box.

somewhere everywhere no one everything anything anyone

1) If there’s _____ I can do for you, just let me know.

2) I can’t find my car. I’ve looked ____ for it.

3) There’s_____ here apart from me.

4) Sylvia’s_____ outside in the garden.

5) If ____ knows the answer, it will be John!

6) They left the bag but stole ____ else.

IV. Rewrite the following sentences, using the Complex Object.

1) He is an honest man. Everybody knows it.

2) Somebody help him with English. He expects it.

3) It’s a safe way out, I believe.

4) You must not talk about it. I don’t like it.

5) We believe it is a mistake.

6) She wants a new toy. Go to the shop and buy a doll.

V. Supplementary reading. Write a summary of the article.

UNITED STATES CULTURE

United States culture was created through a blending of the many different people that live in the country. Throughout American history, immigrants from all over the world have come to the United States, each contributing to U.S. culture.

The American people, like all peoples, create a culture – a word that used most broadly includes everything related to a people organized in a society: the communities they build, the buildings they construct, the food they eat, the clothes they wear, their sports and recreation, celebrations, and holidays.

American culture has been influenced by the goal of E pluribus unum and by the democratization of American society. The people who came to the United States brought their culture with them and once here, they borrowed from each other. As the United States became the favored destination of people leaving their homelands in search of a new country, American culture became a rich and complex blending of cultures from around the world. Generation by generation, decade by decade, American culture has received infusions of new elements from Europe, Africa, Asia, and Latin America. African Americans, for instance, brought forth the improvisational music and rhythms of blues and jazz that became the nation’s most globally popular cultural form. An American can savor the flavors and foods of many parts of the world and can hardly read a novel that does not partake of regional culture or immigrant backgrounds.

Democracy has also influenced American culture, as indicated by the gradual merging of elite and popular cultures. Nowhere has this merging had greater importance than in education. Before World War II, only a minority of Americans completed high school, and very few graduated from college. Today, graduation from high school is nearly universal, and a majority of young Americans intend to go to college. With the dramatic increase in the amount of education they receive, Americans have become enormous consumers of books, museums, and concerts.

At the end of the 20th century, elite no longer controls cultural expression in the United States. Artists of various kinds argue that formal boundaries between fine art and popular art have always been artificial, and they have dismantled older, European-based traditions in painting, sculpture, music, dance, and literature. Many people now contribute to a myriad of cultural forms from cartoons to public-access television programs. With creativity arising from unexpected places, American culture now reaches out to all the nation’s diverse peoples. This change has paralleled the extension of political rights to more people, including women and African Americans.

Just as the American economy and American political institutions have assumed an unprecedented position on the world scene, American cultural forms – from music and movies to football and fast food to blue jeans and blues – have become international in reach. No longer bound by geography, American culture has become an ambassador, enabling people of different nations, different religions, and different forms of government to find something in common.

 

UNIT 10