Big Ben

Big Ben is the name of the huge clock on the Clock Tower of the Houses of Parliament. One can get a good view of the Tower from Westminster Bridge. The Clock Tower is 313 feet high and 41 feet square. The present clock was made by Mr. Dent. It first came into service in 1859, and, except for a few stoppages, it has run continuously ever since.

When the great bell was cast in a London foundry in 1858, the question of its name was discussed in Parliament. One member said, “Why not call it Big Ben?” There was much laughter among the members because the Chief Commissioner of Works at that time was Sir Benjamin Hall, a very tall stout man, whose nickname was 'Big Ben’. From that time, the bell has been known as Big Ben.

The Clock has four dials each 22 feet in diameter. The Bell weighs 13.5 tons. It has four little Bens round him. Big Ben strikes only once an hour but the other four tell the quarters and the half hours. At the side of Big Ben there is a huge hammer weighing over 200 kilograms. The faces of the clock are very large. The minute hands are 14 feet long, the hour hands 9 feet, and the figures are 2 feet long.

People are allowed to get inside the tower if they wish to see the work of Big Ben. There is no lift in the Tower and there are three hundred and forty steps up to Big Ben.

Above the clock is an iron lantern, which is lit after sunset when the House is sitting.

UNIT 9

TAPESCRIPT 9A

Universities

British universities are not open to everyone. To get a place, you normally apply in your last year at school, before you have taken your A levels. The university makes you an offer; for example, it will give you a place if you get at least one grade A and two Bs in your A levels. The offer depends on market forces; for popular, high-prestige courses, the university will ask for very good A level results.

The number of students on a particular course (for example, Economics at Cardiff University) is strictly limited. The system does not allow students to follow full-time courses in a casual way, having a job or living in another town as they study. Students are quite closely monitored, and have to see their teachers regularly. Consequently, drop-out and failure rates are low.

The negative side of the system was that, compared with other countries, a rather small percentage of British school-leavers actually went on to university. But there has been a dramatic improvement; the numbers have doubled over the last 20 years. One explanation of this is that in the 1980s many polytechnics and higher education colleges were given university status. As a result, many cities now have two universities – an old one and a new one. For example, in Bristol there is Bristol University and the University of the West of England; in Oxford there is Oxford University and Oxford Brookes University.

Officially, all universities in the country are equal in status. But they differ greatly in reputation and public image. In general, the older a university is, the higher its status. So the most prestigious are the ancient ones – Oxford and Cambridge – followed by long-established ones such as London, Manchester and Edinburgh.

Some of this is just based on tradition and snobbery. In fact, each university has strengths and weaknesses, and sensible students make their choices according to their own particular needs and priorities.

About half of British students go away to university, rather than attend the one closest to home. This is an expensive thing to do; the government used to give grants (money to live on during studies), whereas now students have to borrow money or get their parents to pay. But still many students find that combining study and family life is impossible.

British universities are very popular with overseas students. There are about 70,000 – mostly from Africa, the Arab world and Far Eastern countries such as Malaysia and Indonesia. The Erasmus programme arranges exchanges (from three months to one year) for students and teachers between universities in 24 countries including all the members of the European Union. In fact, the UK is the most popular destination, receiving over 25 per cent of all Erasmus students.

TAPESCRIPT 9B

MODERN UNIVERSITIES

With the advance of industrialization in the nineteenth cen­tury and the growth of manufacture the government needed tech­nicians and scientists. The older universities did not produce them. Therefore, the government organized science classes in in­dustrial centres and they developed into either technical colleges or the “Modern Universities”, e.g. London, Durham, Manchester, Birmingham, Leeds, Sheffield, etc.

Every university is autonomous and responsible only to its governing body. The regulations differ from university to university. While there are similarities between them, they all differ considerably from Oxford or Cambridge, where there is a number of separate colleges, each with their own regulations and courses of study. The new, so-called “redbrick” universities which have various faculties, e. g. Faculty of Arts, Faculty of Science, Faculty of Social and Economic Studies, etc., differ from university to university. In each faculty there may be a number of departments dealing with separate subjects.

The University of Stirling is the first new university built in Scotland. There are more eight new universities that appeared in Britain after the war.

The University of Sussex at Brighton is probably the best known modern one. The University of York, in contrast, is conser­vative and adopted many of the traditions of older universities.

Among professional educationalists the new Universities pro­vide an opportunity for a wide experiment in teaching methods, and an outlet for the energies and enthusiasms of young and revolutionary teachers: Sussex, East Anglia, and Essex experi­ment with multi-subject schools of studies instead of the tradi­tional single-subject departments. At Sussex, for example, all students take a preliminary course in philosophy and history as well as their major subject. York, on the other hand, believes that most students will still want single-subject courses, but it intro­duces a completely new way of studying music at the university.

They also experiment with the social side of university life. At Sussex, for instance, tutors follow students at meals and live in a common room with the students. At most of the universities the students are themselves largely responsible for discipline.

The British government does not think to build more new universities. There is a tendency to expand the older ones and make colleges of technology into universities. An old university can take 3,000 more students by adding staff and laboratories whereas a completely new university for 3,000 students costs up to 15 million pounds. Even at Stirling where the Government al­ready owns the site, the buildings alone cost about 8 million pounds, not including halls of residence. There are thir­teen subject departments not to mention the cost of building libraries and buying other equipment. One must mention that many educationalists say that it is better to enlarge the older universities.

We know that the entrance examinations at British universi­ties are very strict. However, at the University of Sussex and some others one can see some relaxation at entrance exams, for the British government needs a large number of capable scien­tists.

UNIT 10

TAPESCRIPT 10A

New Orleans

New Orleans, at the mouth of the Mississippi River, is the largest city in Louisiana and second most important seaport after New York City. At different times in its history, the area was occupied by the Spanish and the French.

There is still a French-speaking community – the Cajuns. They are descended from French Canadians who went from another French colony called Acadia to Louisiana in the eighteenth century. They became known as Acadians, and the word was shortened to Cajuns.

The music and food of the area is a combination of many influences. Jazz originated in New Orleans as a blend of French and Spanish music, blues, brass-band music, and African slave songs. Cajun music is played on a guitar, accordion, and washboard, and blends French dance tunes, Caribbean music, and the blues.

A typical Louisiana dish, jambalaya, is made of rice and shrimp or chicken, something like a Spanish paella but spicier. Gumbo, a soup or stew, takes its name from a West African word for okra, one of its ingredients.

TAPESCRIPT 10B