The Christmas Spirit: The Three Wise Men

Tonight is the night: The Three Wise Men are coming!

Click here for a different point of view of the arrival of The Three Kings

British English vs. American English

English is not an easy language; sometimes not even speakers from different countries, but with English as their mother tongue, can fully understand each other. This may be due to their pronunciation (or "mispronunciation", from the other speaker´s point of view) or to the vocabulary itself - slang, for instance.

Here is a good example of all those things mentioned before: British actor Hugh Laurie is interviewed by American television host Ellen DeGeneres. In this excerpt of the interview, they question each other about different slang words. If you find the interview difficult to understand (their sense of humour may complicate things a little bit as well), click here and you will be able to watch the interview subtitled in Spanish - the part embedded below starts around minute 6:30.

Start the weekend with a smile!

Current Debate: Freedom vs. Security

A very good way to practise English and learn vocabulary is reading or listening to current pieces of news in English. Why? Because you are familiar with the content so you just have to focus on how it is dealt with. Let´s put this theory into practice in this post.

I am sure you have all heard about the Boston marathon bombing some weeks ago. Here is a good listening exercise related to it. 

This video is a clip of a TV show called "Real Time with Bill Maher." William "Bill" Maher, Jr. is an American stand-up comedian, television host, political commentator, author and actor. In the video  they discuss the role of the police in everyday life nowadays, but focusing on a couple of things related to the Boston bombings: what happened after the bombs exploded and what happened when the police captured suspect  Dzhokhar Tsarnaev alive following a shootout.

Watch the video trying to understand as much as possible from the audio. I think you will need to read the subtitles in Spanish because the rhythm of the conversation is quite fast. That is one of the difficulties you will face in this video, the other one is the irony of some of the guests  and of the host himself.

Before you watch the video, make sure you know the meaning of the following words or expressions: 

• frisk
• mug
• suspect
• to be on the loose

The following concepts will be mentioned in the video: 

• The British police
• a police state
• a military state
• George Orwell´s novel 1984 : a story about government surveillance and mind control where independent thinking is not allowed
• Miranda warning / Miranda rights
• Eighth Amendment

 

What do you think about the debate? Do you agree with any of the people at the table? Why (not)?