The Jurassic Coast

Language Level: Advanced
Source: Speak Up


Standard: British Accent 

Dorse, Devon and Dinosaurs

At low tide, large numbers of people come onto the beaches around Lyme Bay in Dorset, in the South of England. Instead of licking ice creams or making sandcastles, most of them search along the freshly exposed shoreline, eyes cast firmly downwards. Some carry hammers and chisels, while others wear bulging rucksacks on their backs. Schoolchildren scrabble among the rocks, their cries of delight rising above the noise of the sea as they show their discoveries to teachers and friends. Everybody here is looking for fossils.

Paleontologist Steve Davis, curator of the “Dinosaurland” museum in Lyme Regis, explains:

Steve Davis

Standard: British Accent

There are many good places for fossils around the world, in this country, but  I few of them really match up to the quality, the abundance and the diversity of the fossils that you get here. And, I mean, it’s dead easy for… I mean, you’re an expert you can go out there and find fossils, but much better than that, come along tomorrow morning at nine O’ clock, and I’m taking millions of little kiddies, you know, who are that big, out fossils-hunting. And they’ll all find fossils with ease, and that’s why, you know, Lyme is so good for the fossils and why it’s so important for them.

Steve Davis specializes in microfossils and, before opening his museum, he travelled the world as a paleontologist for an oil company.

Hydrocarbons, I mean, underpins the entire world economy: oil is a a commodity worth more, in terms of all the other commodities put together. And to explore for hydrocarbons, you’ve got to use microfossils.

Paleontology underpins all of that; how you go exploring and producing the hydrocarbons. Well, the pioneering work that underpins all of that was done on the cliffs out there, at Lyme, and no-one knows that.

“SHE SELL SEASHELLS”

The fossils along the 150 kilometres of the “Jurassic Cost” in the south of England are only visible today because of the gradual collision of the land mass forming present day Italy with southern Europe, over 50 million years ago. The force of the impact formed the Alps and sent shockwaves far northwards, lifting the fossils beds that are now visible at Lyme Regis to the surface.

Today the remains of those cliffs, rich in fossil treasures, rise high above the groups of schoolchildren and collectors. They are very unstable and continuously eroded by wind, rain and tide. The dark mud of the Black Ven cliffs flows like a glacier towards the shore. Every day a flood of fossils wash down onto the beach.

One of Britain’s most famous fossil collectors, Mary Anning, lived in Lyme Regis at the beginning of the nineteenth century. Mary, who was later immortalized in the tongue-twister, “she sells seashells on the sea shore,” would sell her finds to collectors and scientists. She made some incredible discoveries, including several large dinosaur fossils.

In recent years, fossil hunters have begun to attack the cliffs with mechanical tools in the hope of finding rare specimens. In 2002, the Jurassic Coast was declared a World Heritage Site, protecting the cliffs from future indiscriminate and dangerous digging. But exciting finds continues to be made, says Katherine Bone, who is senior warden at Charmouth Heritage Center, located just three kilometers along the coast from Lyme Regis:

Katherine Bone:

Standard: British Accent

One of the, the biggest things recently has been…a scelidosaurus, which is  a type of dinosaur that was found, about eight specimens have been found in the last 150 years, just in Charmouth…And, it’s a guy called David Sole, who’s a professional hunter from Lyme Regis. And he just walks between Lyme and Charmouth, so just that cliff there, every day, and he pulled out over the last couple of years, a whole skeleton of a scelidosaurus dinosaur. And the reason it’s so important is that it shouldn’t be here. 195 million years ago Charmouth was a marine environment; it was under the sea the whole time. So finding a land-living dinosaur at charmouth, and a rare one at that, that whole specimen , kind of thing, is, is controversial, definitely.

LIVING HISTORY

The Jurassic Coast is unique because it represent an almost continuously history of the earth during the Mesozoic era, around 245 to 65 million years ago, which comprises the Triassic, Jurassic and Cretaceous periods. This was the time of the dinosaurs. The first mammal, birds, and flowering plants were only just beginning to appear. Humankind simply did not exist. To walk this coastline is to follow a timeline between two major extinctions. An Exmouth, in East Devon, the rocks date from 250 million years ago –around the time when 95 per cent of the earth’s species were destroyed.

At the other end of the Jurassic Coast, at Studland Bay near Swanage in Dorset, the 60-million-year-old coastline dates from five million years after the extinction of the dinosaurs. It is a sobering thought that while the bacteria and algae that began the world are still here, other species have come and gone in a relatively short space of geological time. So if fossils are messengers from the past, what can they tell us?

Steve Davies:

Oh, gosh, I mean it’s never-ending, it tells you about life, you know, do you understand how you’re here and why you’re here and what’s led up to you. And it’s all there in the fossil record. 

Sales figure, Pod English, lesson 78

U.S. jury system - Part I

Source: www.ingvip.com visit the website for more info, and getting started to study private classes with Teacher Fulvio.

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1. Welcome to THIS IS AMERICA in VOA Special English. I'm Steve Ember. And I'm Barbara Klein. This week on our program, we take a look at the jury systemin the United States.

2. A listener in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, Batmunkh Buyantogtokh, wants to learn more about American juries. For that, we visit a courtroom that looks much like the ones in movies and TV shows like "Law & Order."

3. We are in the Superior Court of the District of Columbia. The D.C. Superior Court is the general trial court for the city of Washington.

4. This is the fourth day in the case of a man accused of assault with a deadly weapon. We could not bring in a recorder, but the courtroom is mostly quiet except for the lawyers, witnesses and judge talking.

5. To the judge's right, along the side of the courtroom, is an area where twelve people are seated. In the front row is a man with glasses who looks old enough to be retired. A woman dressed like a young professional sits behind him, listening as a witness is questioned.

6. A man also in his twenties or thirties rocks back in his seat. His hair is cut on both sides of his head; down the middle stands a mohawk. These three and the other nine people are the members of the jury.

7. Each day, thousands of Americans are called to serve on jury duty. The idea of citizens hearing legal arguments might date back to the ancient Greeks and Egyptians. But the modern trial by jury is a British tradition that colonists brought to North America centuries ago.

8. Laws on jury trials differ from state to state. But the United States Constitution guarantees the right to trial by jury. The Sixth Amendment establishes the right in all federal criminal cases. The Seventh Amendment gives the same right in civil cases that involve more than a small amount of money.

9. The American system has three kinds of juries. The most common one is the petit jury. "Petit" -- p-e-t-i-t – comes from the French word for small. Petit juries can have as few as five or six members or as many as twelve. Twelve is traditionally the number in a criminal case.

10. Often a jury trial will last only a day or two. But some go for weeks or even months. During a trial, lawyers for the opposing sides question the witnesses who testify. The lawyers also make opening andclosing statements to the jury. At the end, the judge makes a final statement to the jury. The judge explains the laws that govern the decision the jury is asked to make.

11. The jury then deliberates. The members meet in private, choose a leader and try to agree on a judgment. Most states require all the jurors in a criminal case to agree on the verdict.

12. Sometimes a jury is unable to reach a verdict. This is called a “hung” jury. The judge declares a “mistrial”. Prosecutors then have to decide whether to try the case again.

13. Juries decide questions of fact; judges decide questions of law. A judge may overrule a jury's decision in some situations, but that is unusual. Decisions by judges and juries can be appealed to higher courts.

14. Juries rarely decide sentences. An exception is when a jury is asked to recommend either execution or life in prison in murder cases punishable by death.

15. Under American law, a person is considered innocent until proven guilty. Also, there is constitutional protection against double jeopardy -- being put on trial twice for the same crime. In mistrials, though, prosecutors may retry a case until a jury reaches a verdict.

16. The verdict is either "guilty" or "not guilty." Jurors must find a defendant not guilty even if they are not completely sure the person is innocent of any crime. Jurors only need to have a "reasonable doubt" -- a reasonable question in their mind -- that the person is guilty as charged. This is true for criminal cases, but civil cases are different.

17. Individuals and organizations can bring a lawsuit in court if they believe they have suffered a civil wrong. Many lawsuits are settled without a trial. But if a trial is held, jurors are not required to decide "beyond a reasonable doubt." They must decide only that there is enough evidence to support the accusations.

18. The jury might also award damages. The money could be the amount requested by the plaintiff, the one bringing the action. Or it could be less. Or it could be more, if the jury wants to punish the losing party and set an example for others.

On the tip of the tong

Source: www.sozoexchange.com

This is a phrase which means to have something that is on the verge of being remembered.

This expression comes from the idea that the thing is just about to be said but can’t quite make it out of the mouth.

The phrase also means barely inaccessible.

For example, you can say, “I can almost remember her name; it’s on the tip of my tongue.”

Word Master, Jack and the Beanstalk,' Told With Food-Related Slang

Source: www.voanews.com

AA: I'm Avi Arditti with Rosanne Skirble, and this week on WORDMASTER: Our theme is food, or more precisely, slang having to do with food. After all, Thanksgiving is just a day away, and the traditional way to celebrate the holiday is with a big, festive meal.

So we're dusting off a vintage WORDMASTER, a segment we did with our old friend David Burke, better known as "Slangman." It's a story he wrote for our listeners based on the children's classic "Jack and the Beanstalk." 

DAVID BURKE: "Once upon a time, there lived a woman who was as American as apple pie. She lived in the Big Apple."

RS: "Where else."

AA: "New York."

DAVID BURKE: "New York. With her only son Jack, the apple ...

AA/RS/DAVID BURKE: " ... of her eye!"

DAVID BURKE: "The most important thing to her. Unfortunately, she just couldn't cut the mustard in the working world. And to cut the mustard means to succeed. So she could not cut the mustard in the working world, and Jack was such a couch ... "

RS: "Potato!"

DAVID BURKE: "Very good. A coach potato, a lazy person who does nothing but sit on the couch and usually just watch television. He was such a couch potato that there was no one to bring home the bacon, which means to earn money for food. For now, selling milk from their cow was their bread and butter, which means the only way they could earn money. But the cow they bought turned out to be a lemon, defective. [laughter] That's something you buy then you discover later that it just doesn't work."

AA: "Like a car."

DAVID BURKE: "Right, we hear that a lot, especially of course with cars. If a car doesn't work after you bought it, it's a lemon.

"But in this case, the cow was a lemon and stopped producing milk! They were certainly in a pickle -- a bad situation. I have no idea why we say that, although we do. That's the interesting thing about some of these expressions. If you ask an American 'why do you say that, where does it come from?' we don't know, we just use it. So, 'Jack,' said his mother. "I'm not going to sugar-coat this.' That means to tell it like it is, even though it may be painful for the other person to hear. Well, the mother said, 'We have to sell the cow.' 'Sell the cow?!' Jack exclaimed. 'Mother, I think your idea is half-baked!'"

RS: "Not a great idea."

DAVID BURKE: "Right, not carefully considered. It's half-baked. But Jack's mother kept egging him on, which means pushed him to do something, to encourage him. And the next morning, Jack took the cow to the city to sell it. Well, on his way to the market, Jack was stopped by a man who said 'I'd like to buy your cow, and I'll give you five beans for it.'

"And Jack said: 'What are you, some kind of a nut?' -- somebody who's crazy. We can say nutty. In fact, the movie 'The Nutty Professor' means the crazy professor. 'Ah, but these are magic beans!' said the man, 'and that's no baloney!' And baloney, which is ... "

AA: "Processed meat."

DAVID BURKE: "Processed meat. I was going to say it's a food, but it simply means in this case nonsense, 'that's baloney.' The man told Jack that if he planted the beans, by the next morning they'd grow up tall, tall, tall and reach the sky. Well, since Jack really didn't know beans about ...

SLANGMAN/RS: " ... beans!"

DAVID BURKE: "If you don't know beans about something, it means you don't know anything about it. Well, he did agree, and took the beans, then ran home to tell his mother the good news. When his mother discovered what Jack had done, she turned beet red. Now a beet is a vegetable that is really deep red. She turned beet red and went bananas, and threw the beans out the window.

"When he woke up the next morning, to Jack's surprise, there was growing an enormous beanstalk. 'Hmm, I'll see where it goes,' thought Jack, and with that he stepped out of the window on to the beanstalk to climb up and up and up.

"In the distance, he could see a big castle. When he walked in, Jack tried to stay as cool as a cucumber -- which means very calm, very relaxed. Well, it was difficult to stay as cool as a cucumber, because sitting there at the table was a giant who was rather beefy."

AA: "A big guy."

DAVID BURKE: "A big guy. Big and muscular, that's beefy. And the giant was definitely what you would call a tough cookie, a stubborn and strict person. The giant placed a goose on the table and said, 'Lay three eggs!' and out came three golden eggs!

"The giant took the eggs, and left the room. 'Wow!' thought Jack. 'If I borrow the goose, my mother and I will have no more money problems! This is going to be as easy as pie!' he thought. Which means something extremely easy to do, which is kind of strange because pie is not that easy to make. Have you ever tried to make a pie?"

AA: "That's true."

DAVID BURKE: "So he climbed up the table and grabbed the goose. The giant came running after Jack. Jack quickly climbed all the way down the beanstalk, took an ax, and chopped it down. And that, my friends, is the whole enchilada."

RS: "Enchilada."

DAVID BURKE: "That's a Mexican dish, meat and cheese, that's wrapped in a tortilla which is made of flour and water. 'The whole enchilada' -- that means that's the whole story."

AA: For more of a taste of how you can learn English with help from Slangman David Burke, you can visit his website, slangman.com. With Rosanne Skirble, I'm Avi Arditti.

 

New York: Garibaldi in America

                        Garibadi-Meucci Museum

Language Level: Advanced

Standard: American Accent

Source: Speak Up

Garibald in America

Giuseppe Garibaldi, who was Born 200 years ago, fought for the Farroupilha Republic in The South of Brazil, where He also met his wife Anita. Later he became the hero of Italian Unification. A distinguished British Historian, A.J.P. Tailor, once described him as “the only wholly admirable figure in modern history” and the great patriot is remembered fondly the world over . Along with fighting several campaigns in South America, he also spent time in North America, where he even offered to lend his support to Abraham Lincoln’s Union troops during the Civil War. Prior to that Garibaldi had briefly lived in New York, as the guest of Antonio Meucci, who many people believe, was the “real” inventor of the telephone. Meucci’s house was on Staten Island. Today it is known as the “Garibaldi Meucci Museum.” Speak Up asked the museum’s publicity coordinator Nicole Fenton to explain how Garibaldi had come to live there:

Nicole Fenton

(Standard American Accent)

The house was built in 1840 and Antonio Meucci and his wife came here in 1850 and learned of its availability and began renting it. Within the same year, Garibaldi came to New York. He had just lost a battle in Italy and just lost his wife Anita, who died in Italy. So he came to New York, really seeking a place to recover and to…I think he was really depressed when he came to America, to New York. He landed in Lower Manhattan, and there was a very strong Italian community there, a lot of expatriates, political refugees there, but there was so much attention for him in Lower Manhattan, and he did not wanted more quiet, so he was connected with Antonio Meucci and Garibaldi came here, to the house on Staten Island. It was not located in this location, it was located across the street, originally. So he lived with Antonio Meucci and his wife Ester and began making candles, in Meucci’s candle factory. So he was here with Antonio and make candles and hunted and fished for probably about six months. And then Garibaldi began…I think he left, maybe went to China or to Chile or the Philippines –he was very antsy! So he left and then came back, I think over the course of two years, he came… you know, he was back and forth. And then when he finally left, I think it was 1854… or maybe I guess it was longer, so in 1854 is when he finally left Staten Island and went back to Italy and that’s when he led his famous one thousand red shirts brigade through Sicily and up the Southern part of Italy, to unify Italy, as we know it today.

THE RED SHIRT

Legend has it that those red shirts were originally designed to be worn in an Argentinean slaughterhouse: The museum in fact owns Garibaldi’s red shirt, as well as his cap and walking stick, not to mention a large amount of historical documents. The museum also runs an educational program which helps explain the significance of Garibaldi to young Americans:

Nicole Fenton:

It’s important to know that what he did was similar to what George Washington did in America, so, you know, for people to draw those Parallels, or the similarities with that, for at least Americans to know the importance of him. He was a real symbol of democracy, so this is really for Americans to know, or I guess for people just to know and honor him. He was a symbol for democracy. He believed in multiculturalism and had altruistic goals, so it wasn’t about him, it was about the people, like him conquering the southern part of Italy, he could have easily ruled that part and I think people probably wanted him to, but that wasn’t his vision, he wanted it to be united as one, so he gave it over to the king. I mean, I think that shows what kind of man he was. I think he was a very important figure in history.

A House of Staten Island (no sound)

The Italian revolutionary Giuseppe Garibaldi (1807-1882) was a guest of the inventor Antonio Meucci (1808-1889) and his wife at their house on Staten Island in the 1850s. Today the house is a museum dedicated to both men. It contains many of their personal artifacts, including Garibaldi’s pistol. The museum also runs an educational program designed to increase awareness of Garibaldi historical relevance.

The Garibaldi-Meucci Museum, 429 Tompkins Avenue, Staten Island, New York 10305, or for more info visit http://www.garibaldimeucci.org

U.S. jury system - Part I

U.S. jury system - Part I       source: www.ingvip.com

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1. Welcome to THIS IS AMERICA in VOA Special English. I'm Steve Ember. And I'm Barbara Klein. This week on our program, we take a look at the jury systemin the United States.

2. A listener in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, Batmunkh Buyantogtokh, wants to learn more about American juries. For that, we visit a courtroom that looks much like the ones in movies and TV shows like "Law & Order."

3. We are in the Superior Court of the District of Columbia. The D.C. Superior Court is the general trial court for the city of Washington.

4. This is the fourth day in the case of a man accused of assault with a deadly weapon. We could not bring in a recorder, but the courtroom is mostly quiet except for the lawyers, witnesses and judge talking.

5. To the judge's right, along the side of the courtroom, is an area where twelve people are seated. In the front row is a man with glasses who looks old enough to be retired. A woman dressed like a young professional sits behind him, listening as a witness is questioned.

6. A man also in his twenties or thirties rocks back in his seat. His hair is cut on both sides of his head; down the middle stands a mohawk. These three and the other nine people are the members of the jury.

7. Each day, thousands of Americans are called to serve on jury duty. The idea of citizens hearing legal arguments might date back to the ancient Greeks and Egyptians. But the modern trial by jury is a British tradition that colonists brought to North America centuries ago.

8. Laws on jury trials differ from state to state. But the United States Constitution guarantees the right to trial by jury. The Sixth Amendment establishes the right in all federal criminal cases. The Seventh Amendment gives the same right in civil cases that involve more than a small amount of money.

9. The American system has three kinds of juries. The most common one is the petit jury. "Petit" -- p-e-t-i-t – comes from the French word for small. Petit juries can have as few as five or six members or as many as twelve. Twelve is traditionally the number in a criminal case.

10. Often a jury trial will last only a day or two. But some go for weeks or even months. During a trial, lawyers for the opposing sides question the witnesses who testify. The lawyers also make opening andclosing statements to the jury. At the end, the judge makes a final statement to the jury. The judge explains the laws that govern the decision the jury is asked to make.

11. The jury then deliberates. The members meet in private, choose a leader and try to agree on a judgment. Most states require all the jurors in a criminal case to agree on the verdict.

12. Sometimes a jury is unable to reach a verdict. This is called a “hung” jury. The judge declares a “mistrial”. Prosecutors then have to decide whether to try the case again.

13. Juries decide questions of fact; judges decide questions of law. A judge may overrule a jury's decision in some situations, but that is unusual. Decisions by judges and juries can be appealed to higher courts.

14. Juries rarely decide sentences. An exception is when a jury is asked to recommend either execution or life in prison in murder cases punishable by death.

15. Under American law, a person is considered innocent until proven guilty. Also, there is constitutional protection against double jeopardy -- being put on trial twice for the same crime. In mistrials, though, prosecutors may retry a case until a jury reaches a verdict.

16. The verdict is either "guilty" or "not guilty." Jurors must find a defendant not guilty even if they are not completely sure the person is innocent of any crime. Jurors only need to have a "reasonable doubt" -- a reasonable question in their mind -- that the person is guilty as charged. This is true for criminal cases, but civil cases are different.

17. Individuals and organizations can bring a lawsuit in court if they believe they have suffered a civil wrong. Many lawsuits are settled without a trial. But if a trial is held, jurors are not required to decide "beyond a reasonable doubt." They must decide only that there is enough evidence to support the accusations.

18. The jury might also award damages. The money could be the amount requested by the plaintiff, the one bringing the action. Or it could be less. Or it could be more, if the jury wants to punish the losing party and set an example for others.