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playwrights who have received recognition at home and overseas include Harold Pinter, Tom Stoppard and some others.

Considerable interest is shown at present for the professional arts festivals which take place each year. The Edinburgh International Festival featuring a wide range of different arts, is the largest of its kind in the world.

It is no surprise that the British Museum, one of the greatest museums in the world, tops the visitors’ charts. It is principally a museum of antiquities. This distinguishes the British Museum from the likes of the Louvre (France), the Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York, USA) and the Hermitage Museum (St. Petersburg, Russia) which are universal museums of art and culture. Founded in 1753, it is also one of the world’s oldest museums, with its contents catalogue covering over 2 million years of the world history and culture. In 1759 it opened its doors to the public.

The Museum is situated in London, Bloomsbury District. It comprises the National Museum of Archaeology and Ethnography and the National Library. The Museum owes its origin to Sir Hans Sloane, a native of Ireland, who practiced as a physician. All his life Sloane was a collector.

In the first place, it is a great library, one of the largest in the world, with several million books. By the UK law, a copy of every book, pamphlet, periodical, including maps and music, published in Britain must be kept at the British Museum. It is known that many outstanding people from all over the world spent a great deal of time in the Museum’s famous Circular Reading Room.

Secondly, it is a great scientific institution, generally known as the Natural History Museum.

Lastly, the British Museum has a wonderful art gallery. It has unique collections of sculpture, ceramics, drawings and paintings of the Egyptians, Greeks, Romans, Chinese, Japanese, Indians and many other peoples. It also has unique collections of the Italian drawings, English and French prints.

The British Museum, with its unique prehistoric collections, is the most important place of archaeological study in the world. Having got the largest collections of unrivalled treasures, it is also one of the

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world’s most comprehensive records of man’s achievements from the prehistoric to modern times.

3.Определите, какое утверждение соответствует содержанию текста:

1.The British Museum is a library and a scientific institution.

2.The British Museum is a library and an art gallery.

3.The British Museum is a library, a scientific institution and an art gallery.

4.The British Museum is an art gallery, a scientific institution and a cinema.

Завершите утверждение согласно содержанию текста.

There was…

1.poor pictorial art in England.

2.a raise in pictorial art in England in the 19th century.

3.a raise in pictorial art in England during and after Tudor epoch.

4.a rich and famous pictorial tradition in England before the Tudor epoch.

Ответьте на вопрос: What can you say about the history of arts in England?

1.England has a rich and long tradition in all kinds of arts, beginning from the Tudor epoch.

2.Cultural life in England wasn’t very rich.

3.All kinds of art were developing equally.

4.England has a rich and long tradition in literature and drama, but painting began to develop only from the Tudor epoch.

Определите основную идею текста

1.William Shakespeare was a great playwright.

2.England has rich and varied cultural life.

3.There were many talented people in England.

4.British Museum covers over 2 million years of the world history and culture.

4.Выпишите новые слова из текста (не более 15). Найдите в словаре их произношение и перевод.

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III

1. Письменно переведите текст на русский язык.

Art and Culture in the USA

Literature: Among famous American writers can be named: Mark Twain, O. Henry and Jack London.

Mark Twain – American writer and humorist, whose best work is characterized by broad, often irreverent humor or biting social satire. Twain’s writing is also known for realism of place and language, memorable characters, and hatred of hypocrisy and oppression. The Adventures of Tom Sawyer (1876) The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1884), the sequel to Tom Sawyer, is considered Twain’s masterpiece.

O. Henry – his credo was – art should be true, democratic and it should address contemporary life and embrace all aspects of life. He was most famous for his stories of city life.

Jack London – American writer, whose work combined powerful realism and humanitarian sentiment. Among his masterpieces – The Call of the Wild, The Sea Wolf, Martin Eden .

Painting: Georgia O’Keeffe (1887–1986) was an original American painter, unconnected with any European movement. Throughout her long creative life, O’Keffe’s imagery was derived from a variety of objects surrounding her.

One of the best of the American scene painters was Edward Hopper (1882–1967). He painted a bleak world made up of dirty streets, gloomy houses, comfortless rooms such as in the «Automate», of 1927.

A representative of the new American painting which matured in the late 1940s and early 1950s, the commanding figure of the Abstract Expressionist movement was Jackson Pollock (1912–1956). By the 1960s Pollock was generally recognised as the most important figure in the most significant movement of this century in American painting.

The Metropolitan, one of the largest art museums in the world, is located in New York. Its permanent collection amounts to nearly 3 million works of art. They were brought from all over the world

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including objects from the Palaeolithic era to modern times. The museum was founded in 1870. The European paintings galleries house 2,500 works. The excellent galleries of American painting are located there too. The Metropolitan Museum contains the Greek galleries, Roman galleries, Egyptian collection, Asian galleries, the Medieval galleries and much more. Although it exhibits roughly only a quarter of its vast holdings at any one time, the museum offers more than can reasonably be seen in one visit.

IV*

1. Письменно переведите текст на английский язык.

Используйте фразы: aspire to, keep and advance a heritage, public transport, the County of the Greater Manchester, to advance interest, local passenger transport system, one of the largest museums, house-museum, number, because of, contain all exhibits, outside the territory, in restoration, trolley buses, extensive collection of archives, old schedules, replenish.

Музей Транспорта в Манчестере

Музей Транспорта в Манчестере – музей, который стремится сохранять и продвигать наследие общественного транспорта Графства Большого Манчестера. Музей был создан, чтобы вызвать интерес к истории и наследию местной пассажирской транспортной системы Большого Манчестера.

Он имеет очень большую коллекцию и является одним из самых больших музеев в Великобритании. Коллекция дома-музея насчитывает около 100 автобусов. Из-за маленького размера здания музей не может вместить все экспонаты, поэтому часть коллекции находится вне территории музея. Некоторые транспортные средства находятся на реставрации и в скором времени они будут показаны. Также в коллекции два троллейбуса корпорации Ashton, опытный образец трамвая Metrolink и Манчестерский трамвай Корпорации 1901 года. В музее находится обширная коллекция архивов, старых расписаний, карт, книг, эмблем, руководства и планы. Коллекция музея постоянно пополняется.

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Part 2. Sports

1.* Ответьте на вопросы: What is your favorite kind of sport? Do you like to watch it or do you go in for this sport? What sports are popular in Russia?

2.Прочитайте текст и выпишите, какие виды спорта популярны в России, Великобритании и США. Есть ли различия?

Sport

A lot of people all over the world are interested in sport. Sport helps people to stay in good shape, keeps them fit, healthy and makes them more organized and better disciplined in their daily activities. The Russians have always paid great attention to sport in schools, colleges and universities. You can hardly find a school without a gym or a sport ground. Every city and town has a few stadiums or swimming pools where local competitions are usually held. It’s been a tradition in Russia to divide sport into professional and amateur. There are different sporting societies and clubs in Russia. Many of them take part in different tournaments and are known all over the world. A great number of world records have been set by Russian sportsmen: gymnasts, weightlifters, tennis players, swimmers, figure skaters, runners, high jumpers. Our sportsmen also participate in the Olympic games and always win a lot of gold, silver and bronze medals. The Olympic Games have a very long history. They began in 777 BC in Greece and took place every four years for nearly twelve centuries at Olimpia. They included many different kinds of sports: running, boxing, wrestling, etc. All the cities in Greece sent their best athletes to Olimpia to compete in the Games. For the period of the Games all the wars stopped. So the Olympic Games became the symbol of peace and friendship.

Over one hundred and fifty countries are represented in the International Olympic Committee now. Summer and Winter Games are held separately. Russia joined the Olympic movement in 1952. Since then it has won a lot of gold, silver, and bronze medals. In 1980 Moscow hosted the Twenty-Second Olympic Games. In 2014 we host Olympic Games again, this time in Sochi.

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Sport in one form or another is an essential part of daily life in

Britain.

One of the most British games is cricket. It is often played in schools, colleges, universities and by club teams all over the country. But as almost everywhere else in the world, the game which attracts the greatest attention is Association football, or soccer. There are plenty of professional and amateur soccer clubs all over Britain. International football matches and the Cup Finals take place at Wembley. Rugby football is also very popular, but it is played mainly by amateurs.

Next to football, the chief spectator sport in British life is horseracing. A lot of people are interested in the races and risk money on the horse which they think will win. The Derby is perhaps the most famous single sporting event in the whole world.

Britain is also famous for motor-car racing, dog-racing, boatracing, and even races for donkeys. The famous boat-race between the teams of Oxford and Cambridge attracts large crowds of people.

A great number of people play and watch tennis. Tennis tournaments at Wimbledon are known all over the world.

Americans’ interest in sports seems excessive to many foreign visitors. Television networks spend millions of dollars arranging to telecast sports events. Publications about sports sell widely. In the US professional athletes can become national heroes.

Sports are associated with educational institutions in a unique way. High schools have coaches as faculty members, and school teams compete with each other. College sports, especially football, are conducted in an atmosphere of intense excitement and pageantry. Games between teams attract nationwide television audiences.

The sport that is most popular in most parts of the world – soccer – is not well known in the US. The most popular sports are American football and baseball, games that are not played in large number of countries. Sports play such an important role in American life that the sociology of sports, sports medicine, and sports psychology have become respectable specializations. Many Americans jog every day, or play tennis or bridge two or three times a week.

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3. Ответьте на вопросы:

1.What is the history of the Olympic Games?

2.How did Russia participate in the Olympic Games?

4. Подготовьте презентацию о любом известном человеке (в культуре или спорте) из Великобритании или США. Расскажите о его биографии, карьере и достижениях. Также вы можете добавить дополнительные факты, которые показались вам интересными.

Unit 4. The Environmental Preservation

I. Прочитайте новые слова и их перевод:

1.Работая в группах, выберите 5 слов и дайте их определения. Запишите только определения и обменяйтесь списком с другими группами. По определениям догадайтесь, какие слова выбрала другая группа. Пример: Trend – a general direction in which something is developing or changing

2.Перед прочтением текста обсудите следующие вопросы:

Can you see ecological problems in the world around you? What are they?

Name the main ecological problems in your region.

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3. Прочитайте текст и составьте его план.

The Ecological Crisis: A Myth or Reality

The planet Earth is only a tiny part of the universe, but it’s the only place where human beings can live. People always polluted their surroundings. But until now pollution was not such a serious problem. People lived in uncrowded rural areas and did not have pollution caused by machines. With the development of crowded industrial cities, which created huge amounts of pollutants, the problem has become more important. Today our planet is in serious danger. Acid rains, global warming, air and water pollution, and overpopulation are the problems that threaten human life on Earth. Our forests are disappearing because they are cut down or burnt. If this trend continues, one day we won’t have enough oxygen to breathe.

The seas are in danger. They are filled with poison: industrial and nuclear wastes, chemical fertilizers and pesticides. The Mediterranean is already nearly dead; the North Sea is following its fate. The Aral Sea is about to disappear. Every ten minutes one kind of animal, plant or insect dies out forever. If nothing is done about it, one million species that are alive today may soon become extinct. Air pollution is another serious problem. In Cairo just breathing the air is dangerous – equivalent to smoking two packs of cigarettes a day. The same holds true for many Russian cities.

Factories emit tons of harmful chemicals. These emissions have disastrous consequences for our planet. They are the main reason for the greenhouse effect and acid rains.

And even greater threat are nuclear power stations. We all know how tragic the consequences of the Chernobyl disaster are.

Fortunately, it’s not too late to solve these problems. We have the time, the money and even the technology to make our planet a better, cleaner and safer place. We can plant trees and create parks for endangered species. We can recycle litter. Individuals and groups of people can work together to persuade enterprises to stop polluting activities.

People are beginning to realize that environmental problems are not somebody else’s. They join and support various international

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organizations and green parties. If governments wake up to what is happening – perhaps we’ll be able to avoid the disaster that threatens the natural world and all of us with it.

4.* Работа в группах по три человека. Обсудите каждую из перечисленных проблем по данным вопросам. Сделайте краткие записи. Обменяйтесь мнениями с другими группами.

1.What problems are connected with these matters?

2.What would be the best way to solve these problems? 1) cities; 2) forests and seas; 3) nuclear power stations.

Используйте фразы: Firstly/first of all; secondly, thirdly; For

instance/for example; In short; In conclusion/To sum up; In my opinion/view…; To my mind…; It seems to me that…; I think that…

Unit 5. Taking Decisions on Worldwide Humanity Problems

I. Прочитайте новые слова и их перевод:

1.* Выберите 3–5 слов и найдите в словаре их синонимы.

Пример: Imbalance-disproportion

2. Перед прочтением текста ответьте на вопрос:

What is your opinion, what can be reasons of global problems?

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3. Прочитайте текст и найдите причины глобальных проблем человечества.

Taking Decisions on Worldwide Humanity Problems

In recent years the world has witnessed considerable economic development. But the process of generating wealth and prosperity has been very uneven, to such a degree, that economic imbalances are now seen to aggravate the social problems and political instability almost in every region of the Globe.

Undoubtedly, all contemporary global problems find their roots in the consequences of rapid scientific and technological progress. However, despite all our constant efforts and attempts to solve these problems, the best we have now are just modest results. Mankind seems to stand, as it were, at some civilization crossroad.

The tangle of the most pressing problems keeps on growing like a snowball. Humanity today faces many challenges:

–Violent conflicts within and among various nations.

–Population growth.

–Organized crimes and drugs.

–New epidemic diseases.

–Global warming.

–Environmental pollution and ecological decay.

–Poverty of the masses, especially in the so-called Third World which constitutes about 2/3 of the Earth population.

–Threat of the global nuclear war.

–Terrorism and possible demographic disaster.

All these «end-products» of the current age of the industrialization and militarism are taking the world to the global catastrophe. Today’s civilization state may be featured as «a disease» that, if it keeps on progressing, will lead us to self-destruction.

The world still remains divided into the advanced and underdeveloped or backward countries, with the gap between them ever widening.

Only one sixth of our planet inhabitants currently enjoys high standard of living. Most people live in poverty and see no prospects for themselves.

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