- •Contents
- •Preface
- •Part I. Print media Unit 1 mass media: general notion
- •Control Questions
- •Practical Tasks
- •It’s wrong to portray fathers as domestic incompetents – but women still
- •Unit 2 newspaper headlines and their linguistic peculiarities
- •Control Questions
- •Practical Tasks
- •Unit 3 lexical features of newspaper articles
- •Names of some organisations, establishments, parties
- •Abbreviations
- •Acronyms
- •Neologisms
- •Colloquial words
- •Shortened words
- •Control Questions
- •Practical Tasks
- •Former Mandela Fund Official Says Model Gave Him Diamonds
- •The International Herald Tribune, August 6, 2010
- •A. Too many clichés, at the end of the day
- •B. Social class affects white pupils’ exam results more than those of ethnic minorities – study
- •C. Blair’s job was done by 1997: to numb Labour, and to enshrine Thatcherism
- •In Downing Street, Blair never fulfilled his early promise and let Brown in.
- •Question time in Oldham Data profiling is helping Oldham police analyse the work of its community support officers
- •Airport and station get walk-in nhs centres
- •People's peers take back seat in the Lords
- •Not off to uni? What an excellent idea...
- •VIII Welsh Assembly launches £44m learning grants
- •4. Three men jailed for rape in Oxford after victim sees film on mobile.
- •Unit 4 grammatical and syntactical properties of newspaper articles
- •Control Questions
- •Practical Tasks
- •Cronyism alert on plan for more people’s peers
- •Revealed: Queen’s dismay at Blair legacy
- •Victim / radiation / in £50m drugs / cancer / is denied
- •Unit 5 feature articles: essence, structure, lexical means, stylictic properties
- •Control Questions
- •Practical Tasks Task 1. Read Article a and comment on its genre. What sphere of public life does it reflect? a. After 40 years, the terrorists turn to politics
- •In the East Belfast Mission hall, the uvf, uda and Red Hand Commando announced they had put weapons “beyond use”
- •С. A slice of Middle England Ruaridh Nicoll journeys in search of the perfect pork pie and finds himself seduced by the olde worlde charms of... Leicestershire
- •D. Gordon Brown: There is life after No 10
- •In his first major interview since losing the election, the former Prime Minister tells Christina Patterson why he’s thriving as a constituency mp – and happily living without the trappings of power
- •Unit 6 analytical genres of print media: editorial, op-ed, column, lte
- •I. Editorial
- •III. Сolumn
- •IV. Letters to the editor
- •Control Questions
- •Practical Tasks
- •How Not to Fight Colds
- •The New York Times, October 4, 2010
- •Clean and Open American Elections
- •It’s our class, not our colour, that screws us up
- •Task 12. Read the two ltEs below. What motive was behind writing those letters?
- •I. Giving an Edge to Children of Alumni
- •The New York Times, October 4, 2010
- •II. Childhood misery
- •Task 13. Read the two letters again, and observe the difference between them. What arguments does the author of first letter put forward to drive his message across?
- •Unit 7 print media: revision
- •Task 3. Read the article below and define its genre. What are the constituent parts of the text? House prices: Heading south
- •I was a terrible teenage drinker – I couldn't get hold of alcohol How do young people drink so much today? And how do they get served, asks Michael Deacon
- •Task 7. Read the article below and say what genre it is. Translate the italicised words and word combinations, analyse them. Twitter: Bad sports
- •Test 1. Print media
- •Variants 1-16.
- •Part II. Broadcast media Unit 8 learning to understand broadcast media texts
- •Control Questions
- •Practical Tasks
- •Unit 9 learning to differentiate broadcast media news and analytical genres
- •The press conference and the statement are an integral part of the live reporting and are not accompanied by the news presenter’s comments.
- •Fragments of the press-conference, the statement, as well as the parliamentary debate could be quoted in the video brief news, the report and the commentary that are part of the news bulletin.
- •Control Questions
- •Practical Tasks
- •Audio Track 6
- •Audio Track 7
- •Bonfire of the quangos? It’s more like a barbecue: Despite all the fanfare, just 29 will be completely abolished
- •Control Questions
- •Practical Tasks
- •A shot in the arm – поиск наркотика; стимул (перен.) a soft touch – обходительный человек; pie in the sky – журавль в небе, пустые посулы
- •He wants the Scottish government to give a shot in the arm to the tourist industry (Sky News)
- •A flop – unsuccessful film or play gazumping – cheating a potential buyer of a house
- •Nifty – very good or attractive (nifty fifties – «золотой возраст»)
- •Some examples of former slang words to booze – to drink alcohol
- •Control Questions
- •Practical Tasks
- •Unit 12 stylistic and syntactical peculiarities of broadcast media discourse
- •Control Questions
- •Control Questions
- •Practical Tasks
- •Hungarians battle to hold back toxic sludge spill from Danube
- •Vessel mishap
- •Test 2. Lexical and syntactical propertires of broadcast media discourse
- •Variants 1-16.
- •In class:
- •In class:
- •Unit 13 grammatical properties of broadcast media discourse
- •Control Questions
- •Practical Tasks
- •Uk’s official economic growth estimates revised down
- •Austerity won’t trigger double-dip recession, economists say
- •Ireland’s economic outlook worsens
- •Ireland’s economic outlook worsened on Monday as the country’s central bank
- •Unit 14 learning to work with broadcast media texts
- •Sun turns its back on Labour after 12 years of support
- •General election 2010: did it really happen?
- •The coalition government: Sweetening the pill
- •Test 3. Morphological properties of broadcast media discourse
- •Variants 1-16.
- •In class:
- •Unit 15 regional accents of british broadcast media (scottish, welsh, irish)
- •Control Questions
- •Practical Tasks
- •Unit 16 broadcast media: revision
- •Murder rate at lowest for 20 years
- •Rogue Trader at Société Générale Gets Jail Term
- •The Guardian, October 5, 2010 Task 9. Find special terms in the second half of the material (they are not marked). Read the piece again, find clichés and idioms in it.
- •Task 38. Read the article below and say what crime is reflected in it. What are its underlying reasons?
- •Sham marriages on “unprecedented scale”
- •Final test on mass media discourse
- •Variants 1-16.
- •In class:
- •In class:
- •References
- •Учимся понимать и интерпретировать медийные тексты на английском языке
Control Questions
What is genre?
What are the two major groups of broadcast genres?
What is the difference between a genre and a format?
What is a news bulletin and what are its structural parts?
5. What is the difference between soft and hard news?
Practical Tasks
Task 1. Listen to Audio Track 1 and Audio Track 2 (Folder Unit 8) to get a general idea of the material. What is the media focus in Audio Track 1 and in Audio track 2? If there is any difference, why is it so? Be warned that the radio programmes in question went on air on two different radio channels. They were recorded at the same hour but with a 5-minite delay.
Task 2. Listen to Audio Track 1 and:
a) count the number of news items being broadcast;
b) name the countries in the media spotlight.
Task 3. Listen to Audio Track 2 and:
a) count the number of news items being broadcast;
b) say what events are in the spotlight.
Y
public
sector retirement age marksman inquest
jury
barrister
lawfully sludge
ambulance
to
admit
to murder
The final salary scheme – the amount of one’s pension on his retirement is equal to his last salary in work.
Labour peer – a member of the Labour party elevated to peerage for his service to the nation. He is entitled to sit in the House of Lords as life peer.
First Minister – a post set up in the process of devolution. Equals to the UK Prime Minister but relates to the UK four constituent parts.
(British) Commonwealth Games – sporting event held every four years by the British Commonwealth countries. In 2010 India hosted the Games.
Task 3. Listen to Audio Track 1 closely.
Determine the three key words of Headline No 1.
What organisations are mentioned in Headlines No 2 and No 3. Recall the events they refer to
3. What is the general idea of Headline No 4 and No 5 is. Try to identify the key word in each headline.
Task 4. Now listen to Audio Track 2. Say what each headline tells you.
Task 5. Watch Video 8 (BBC News headlines). The bulletin went on air on the same day as news bulletins featured in Audio Track 1 and Audio Track 2.
Is there any difference in television and radio news coverage? If so, what is it?
Task 6. Study the realia below, watch Video 9 (Sky News headlines). The bulletin was broadcast on the same day as BBC News headlines (Video 8).
Shadow Cabinet Shadow Chancellor
Is there any difference in Video 8 news headlines and in Video 9 headlines?
Task 7. What is the difference between news headlines in Video 9 and in Audio Track 2?
Task 8. Watch Video 10. It contains two video news briefs. Highlight the briefs by unravelling the 5W and 1H pattern.
Task 9. Watch Videos 11-13 that feature different news channels’ headlines.
What events does each channel predominantly focus on?
Prior to watching make sure you know the following word combinations and names.
to run amock (amuck) – 1) обезуметь; быть вне себя, неистовствовать;
2) в ярости набрасываться на всякого встречного
to make gains – получать выгоду
for good – навсегда
Big Apple – New York
Nick Clegg – Leader of the UK Liberal Democratic Party
Task 10. Watch Videos 11-13 again and fill in the grid below with headlines in full. The headlines in question are reported by either Sky News, EuroNews or BBC World News. Only two of the news channels stated above feature the same headline at a time.
Headline in brief |
Headline in full (featured by one TV channel) |
Headline in full (featured by another TV channel) |
1. Victory for nationalists in Sweden |
|
|
2. Tragic events in Germany |
|
|
3. The end of BP’s saga in the Gulf of Mexico |
|
|
Task 11. Count the Genitives in Videos 11 - 13 and fill in the blanks:
a) Video 11 ……….
b) Video 12 ……….
c) Video 13 ……….
What conclusion do you arrive at on the matter?
Task 12. Watch Videos 11- 13 again. Headlines of what channel are most difficult to perceive, in your view? Why is it the case?
Task 13. Listen to Audio Track 3, get ready to compare its contents with Video 11.
Fill in the grid below with headlines highlighting the same news headlines as in Video 11 and in Audio Track 3:
Video 11 headlines (in full) |
Audio Track 3 headlines (in full) |
1.
|
|
2.
|
|
3.
|
|
Task 14. Analyse the difference in the wording of television and radio news scripts (Video 11, Audio Track 3). What conclusion do you come to?
Task 15. Make sure you know the meaning of the expressions in the box below. Pay attention to the underlined word combinations. They are either idioms or phrasal verbs from Audio Track 4 and Video 14.
Audio Track 4
to make ascentry to parliament (ascent – восхождение, подъем)
to play on fears (of voters)
a veneer of respectability
to distance itself from its neo-Nazi connections
xenophobic
a blot on the political landscape
Video 14
a country’s name has taken a battering
the mainstream blocks / parties
a safe pair of hands
He has to court other parties to push through some issues
a surge of votes
the Sweden Democrats have honestly touched a nerve with voters
unhappy with…
Task 16. Watch Video 14 and listen to Audio Track 4. Answer the questions.
1. Which piece is lengthier?
2. Which piece is more informative? Do you come to any conclusions?