Activity 7. Before reading the text given below try to answer the following questions:

I /7~> 1. What American city do you think is called «the art capital of the world»?

2. Why do you think American mass culture influences practically all the countries in the world?

3. Most young people in Ukraine now know more names of American film and pop stars than the names of American writers, artists and composers. What about you?

4. Some people criticize American films, others think that they are the best. What is your opinion?

5. If you could go to a Broadway theatre, which would you choose: a musical, an opera, a modern ballet, a symphony concert or a variety show? Explain why.

6. Do you know any musical trend that was first rejected and later extremely popular?

7. Are, in your opinion, American people very interested in art?

Cultural life in the usa

The key word to American culture is diversity. America is not one place, or one people, or one culture. It is huge, various, diverse and different from place to place. But nobody will argue that the center of American cultural life is New York. Let's be honest: New York often irritates'people in the rest of America and a good many people in the rest of the world as well. New Yorkers take for granted that their city is the financial, business, as well as news and commercial center of the world. But it is also called «the art capital of the wprld», «the great modern dance and ballet metropolis)),

«a place whereactors outnumber beggars» and «the home of the Metropolitan Opera», the Met, as New Yorkers call it.

In New York alone there are more than 12,000 artists and sculptors who are supporting themselves from their work. There are about 400 art galleries and hundreds of exhibitions and shows each season. Then there are great museums, such as the Museum of Modern Art which houses the most complete collection of modern art in the world, comparable only with the British Museum and the Louvre.

New York's famous Broadway with its 40 professional stages and more than 350 off-Broadway experimental theaters, gives this city the status of the biggest theatrical center.

But New York is just the major, not the only cultural center in the US. The fact that three times as many Americans attend symphony concerts as go to baseball games, can be explained by the fact that there are about 1,500 orchestras throughout the country. Five American symphony orchestras are included into the world's top ten, they are from New York, Boston, Chicago, Cleveland and Philadelphia.

When people speak about America's cultural influence in the world, they probably mean popular culture. Regardless of why it is spread, it is usually quite rapidly adopted and then adapted in many countries, and as a result, American roots are often quickly forgotten. For example, the American source of the song «Happy birthday to you» is often not remembered..

The situation with American pop music is more complex because in the beginning, when it was still clearly American, it was often strongly resisted. Jazz was once thought to be a great danger to youth and their morals and was outlawed in several countries. Rock'n'roll and all its variations, blues, soul and most recently country and western music, all have more or less similar histories. They were first resisted - often in America as well - as being low-class musical trash and a danger to the nation's youth. And then the music became accepted, extended and developed, and later commonly exported back to the USA.

Activity 8. Fill in the blanks with a suitable preposition.

A huge country full (1) contrasts, different races, different languages and differ- ent lifestyles, America's cultural influence (2) the world is undeniable. (3)

many people (4) the other side of the Atlantic and the Pacific Oceans, American

culture has become too popular. The British seem to be most sensitive (5) the strong