Прочтите текст об Австралии с помощью словаря и задайте несколько вопросов

Текст 9(a). Australia

 

An island the size of Europe, which knows every type of climate and almost every kind of foliage. Its birds and animals are strange. Its gaunt, mountains, its red desert, its lonely bush country seem older than history. Terra australis the sea explorers from the Old World call it. Its dark-skinned aboriginal inhabitants hunted and ate the Kangaroos, the Koala bears, the exotic birds. They dreamed their dreams, told their tales around the campfires and lived the Stone Age existence. An unfulfilled land, waiting its destiny. In 1788 there came to this country twelve hundred English convicts and guards who arrived to form the colony of Port Jackson (now Sydney). The deportation of convicts to Australia continued for the following half-century. New settlements were set up along the east and south coasts. The population rose rapidly during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. These descendants of convicts are the present-day Australians of popular imagination.

The “new Australians” came from Central Europe, from Great Britain and the sudden influx of such large numbers of people with different ideas and different customs had its effect upon Australian’s former amused intolerance of things un’Australian. The “old” Australian has to adapt himself to the behaviour of his colleagues, instead of waiting for the newcomers to assimilate the Australian way of life.

 

Population of Australia

 

The total population of Australia is 14.070.000. These figures are exclusive of full-blood Aborigines. There were about 47.000 of them in 1947. Before European settlement the aborigine population of Australia may have been from 150.000 to 350.000. Immigrants of Germany, Italy, Greece, Russia and Great Britain live in Australia.

Capital

 

Canberra is Australia’s National Capital. The most important public building is Parliament House, containing two Chambers for the Senate and the House of Representatives. The Australian National University was founded in 1946 and is devoted to research in physical sciences, medicine, social sciences and Pacific studies. Other notable buildings are the Commonwealth National Library; the home of the Governor general; the School of Forestry; the Australian Institute of Anatomy; the Commonwealth Observatory and Australian War Memorial.

 

Constitution of Australia

 

The Commonwealth of Australia came into existence on the 1^st of January 1901 by virtue of an Act of the Imperial Parliament having as its short title the “Commonwealth of Australia Constitution Act”. Before this date, New South Wales, Victoria, Queensland, South Australia, Western Australia and Tasmania were Separate self-governing colonies-afterwards these colonies became States of the Commonwealth. The Commonwealth Parliament consist of the Senate and the House of Representatives.

Education in Australia

 

Primary and secondary education in Australia is mainly the responsibility of the state governments: they educate ³/₄ of all children of school age. About ¹/₅ go to Roman Catholic schools the remainder go to other private schools. There are 3 types of secondary education – technical, academic and general. There is a university in each of the seven capitals.

Текст 9(b). Australian English

Australian English differs from ordinary English both in vocabulary and in pronunciation. But Australian English is still English, and the vocabulary, even of colloquial conversation, is not very different from that of educated Southern English. A wide difference exists in the section of the vocabulary dealing with specifically Australian things and conditions. Words like geen, valley meadow, wood, dale do not appear in the Australian vocabulary, and the Australian words bush, scrub, paddock and creek have wide and varied meanings. The aborigines gave kangaroo, boomerang. Gold discovered in 1850, gave diggings mullock, fossick.

Differences in a language spoken are much more striking than differences in a language spoken are two types of Australian speech – Broad Australian and Educated Australian. Broad Australian is not cockney. The first element in the Broad Australian pronunciation of “day” is not lowel sound in “but”. Many Australians also tend to avoid the use of broad “a” in such words as “dance”, and in both Broad and Educated Australian the sound of i in it is seldom used in unstressed syllables.

It is inevitable that before very longsome form of Educated Australian will become standard Australian speech.

Прочтите текст о Новой Зеландии и ответьте на следующие вопросы

 

1 How many miles is it from the New Zealand north and south coasts?

2 What sea and ocean wash New Zealand?

3 What is an outstanding feature of the New Zealand topography?

4 What is the New Zealand’s climate?

5 Is agriculture developed in the country?

6 What can you say about the population of New Zealand?

7 Is New Zealand rich in mineral resources?

8 What industries are developed in New Zealand?

9 What country is New Zealand?

10 Who is the head of the New Zealand government?

 

Текст 10(a). New Zealand

 

New Zealand comprises three islands: the North and South Islands and Steward Island, a small land just to the South of the South Island. From north to south the whole territory of New Zealand expends for about 1.000 miles and is washed by the Tasman Sea in the west and by the Pacific Ocean in the east. The South Island is mountainous. Seventeen peaks in the Alps reach a height of more than 10.000 ft, the highest of then, Mount Cook, is 12.349, New Zealand’s highest point. Only one-tenth of the North Island’s area is mountainous and only four peaks exceed 6.000 ft. Two of them are active volcanoes. Almost one-quarter of the country is forest-covered and one-third of the rest is devoted to agriculture. There are areas of the desert-like tracts in the central North Island.

New Zealand’s climate resembles that of the northern Mediterranean.

 

Population and Language

 

The population of New Zealand is over three million.

The differences between New Zealanders and Britons are subtle and not easy to detect. The non-Maori New Zealand has a skin the colour of a white man, he speaks the same language, though with a different accent.

The Maori¹ people make up 7 per cent of the total population. They are concentrated in certain districts such as Northland and the East Coast of the North Island.

Maori, a language of the Polynesian group still is spoken among the Maori population. A large number of people, born and bred in New Zealand, speak English as correctly and with as pure an accent as the best speakers in England. About 8 per cent of the population speaks England with a more or less marked London, or “Cockney” accent.

¹ – Maori – коренное население Новой Зеландии.

 

Economy

 

Although lacking the mineral resources required for most heavy industry, New Zealand has established light foundries and engineering works, and builds locomotives, small ships, coaches, as well as assembling imported motor vehicles and machines.

Light engineering especially in the field of electrical goods has increased since World War II. Other industries include the manufacture of textile and leather goods, fruit and vegetable packing and canning; the production of tyres, tubes and other rubber goods. The pulp and paper industry is now producing a variety of commodities. The clothing and footwear industry must also be mentioned.

About 40 per cent of all goods available in New Zealand are imported from other countries. New Zealand factories rely on overseas countries for heavy machinery and for much of their raw materials, such as iron, steel, and aluminium.

 

Government

 

New Zealand is a self – governing Dominion with a governor – general, an Executive Council to advise him, a General Assembly (Parliament), which is now consist of the Governor – General and the House of Representatives (the Upper House) having abolished since 1951 and the usual local government bodies.

The Queen of the United Kingdom is still Queen of New Zealand. Her personal representative is in New Zealand. There are two political parties resented in Parliament at present: National and Labour.

A General Election is held every three years or when specially called for.

The Governor – General is appointed for three years and has his main residence in Wellington, the capital of New Zealand.