Family Album, part II

This is a useful course credit by Family Album on the side of bar here in my blog you can check out more video or on youtube search for Family Album, standard American Accent, good luck friends.

American History: Fear of Communism in 1920 Threatens Civil Rights

Source: www.voanews.com

Photo: loc.gov

Strikers in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, around 1919

 

BOB DOUGHTY: Welcome to THE MAKING OF A NATION -- American history in VOA Special English.

The United States Constitution guarantees freedoms such as freedom of speech, freedom of the press and freedom of religion. The Bill of Rights in the Constitution protects these and other individual rights. But the government has not always honored all of the rights in the Constitution.

In the seventeen hundreds, for example, President John Adams supported laws to stop Thomas Jefferson and the Democratic Party from criticizing the government.

During the Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln took strong actions to prevent newspapers from printing military news. And, during the nineteen fifties, Senator Joseph McCarthy accused innocent people of being communists and traitors.

Some of the most serious government attacks on personal rights took place in nineteen nineteen and nineteen twenty. A number of government officials took sometimes unlawful actions against labor leaders, foreigners and others.

This week in our series, Kay Gallant and Harry Monroe discuss the campaign that came to be known as the "Red Scare."

KAY GALLANT: These actions took place because of American fears about the threat of communism. Those fears were tied closely to the growth of the organized labor movement during World War One. There were a number of strikes during the war. More and more often, workers were willing to risk their jobs and join together to try to improve working conditions.

President Woodrow Wilson had long supported organized labor. And he tried to get workers and business owners to negotiate peacefully.

But official support for organized labor ended when strikes closed factories that were important to the national war effort. President Wilson and his advisers felt workers should put the national interest before their private interest. They told workers to wait until after the war to demand more pay and better working conditions.

HARRY MONROE: In general, American workers did wait. But when the war finally ended in nineteen eighteen, American workers began to strike in large numbers for higher pay.

As many as two million workers went on strike in nineteen nineteen. There were strikes by house builders, meat cutters, and train operators. And there were strikes in the shipyards, the shoe factories and the telephone companies.

Most striking workers wanted the traditional goals of labor unions: more pay and shorter working hours. But a growing number of them also began to demand major changes in the economic system itself. They called for government control of certain private industries.

Railroad workers, for example, wanted the national government to take permanent control of running the trains. Coal miners, too, demanded government control of their industry. And even in the conservative grain-farming states, two hundred thousand farmers joined a group that called for major economic changes.

KAY GALLANT: All these protests came as a shock to traditional Americans who considered their country to be the home of free business. They saw little need for labor unions. And they feared that the growing wave of strikes meant the United States faced the same revolution that had just taken place in Russia. After all, Lenin himself had warned that the Bolshevik Revolution would spread to workers in other countries.

Several events in nineteen nineteen only increased this fear of violent revolution. A bomb exploded in the home of a senator from the southeastern state of Georgia. And someone even exploded a bomb in front of the home of Attorney General A. Mitchell Palmer, the nation's chief law officer.

However, the most frightening event was a strike by police in Boston, Massachusetts.

The policemen demanded higher wages. But the police chief refused to negotiate with them. As a result, the policemen went on strike. When they did, thieves began to break into unprotected homes and shops. Massachusetts Governor Calvin Coolidge finally had to call out state troops to protect the people. His action defeated the strike. Most of the policemen lost their jobs.

HARRY MONROE: All this was too much for many Americans. They began to accuse labor unions and others of planning a revolution. And they launched a forceful campaign to protect the country from these suspected extremists.

Leaders of this campaign accused thousands of people of being communists, or "reds." The campaign became known as the Red Scare.

Of course, most people were honestly afraid of revolution. They did not trust the many foreigners who were active in unions. And they were tired of change and social unrest after the bloody world war.

A number of these Americans in different cities began to take violent actions against people and groups that they suspected of being communist extremists.

In New York, a crowd of men in military uniforms attacked the office of a socialist newspaper. They beat the people working there and destroyed the equipment. In the western city of Centralia, Washington, four people were killed in a violent fight between union members and their opponents.

loc.gov

Riot police

Public feeling was against the labor unions and political leftists. Many people considered anyone with leftist views to be a revolutionary trying to overthrow democracy. Many state and local governments passed laws making it a crime to belong to organizations that supported revolution. Twenty-eight states passed laws making it a crime to wave red flags.

KAY GALLANT: People also demanded action from the national government. President Wilson was sick and unable to see the situation clearly. He cared about little except his dream of the United States joining the new League of Nations.

But Attorney General Palmer heard the calls for action. Palmer hoped to be elected president the next year. He decided to take strong actions to gain the attention of voters.

One of Palmer's first actions as Attorney General was to prevent coal miners from going on strike. Next, he ordered a series of raids to arrest leftist leaders. A number of these arrested people were innocent of any crime. But officials kept many of them in jail, without charges, for weeks.

Palmer expelled from the country a number of foreigners suspected of revolutionary activity. He told reporters that communists were criminals who planned to overthrow everything that was good in life.

Strike leader in Gary, Indiana, advising demonstrators around 1919

HARRY MONROE: Feelings of fear and suspicion extended to other parts of American life. Many persons and groups were accused of supporting communism. Such famous Americans as actor Charlie Chaplin, educator John Dewey, and law professor Felix Frankfurter were among those accused.

The Red Scare caused many innocent people to be afraid to express their ideas. They feared they might be accused of being a communist.

But as quickly as the Red Scare swept across the country so, too, did it end in nineteen twenty. In just a few months, people began to lose trust in Attorney General Palmer. They became tired of his extreme actions. Republican leader Charles Evans Hughes and other leading Americans called for the Justice Department to obey the law in arresting and charging people.

KAY GALLANT: By the summer of nineteen twenty, the Red Scare was over. Even a large bomb explosion in New York in September did not change the opinion of most Americans that the nation should return to free speech and the rule of law.

The Red Scare did not last long. But it was an important event. It showed that many Americans after World War One were tired of social changes. They wanted peace and business growth.

Of course, the traditional way for Americans to show their feelings is through elections. And this growing conservatism of the nation showed itself clearly in the presidential election of nineteen twenty. That election will be the subject of our next program.

(MUSIC)

BOB DOUGHTY: Our program was written by David Jarmul. The narrators were Kay Gallant and Harry Monroe.

You can find our series online with transcripts, MP3s, podcasts and images at voaspecialenglish.com. You can also follow us on Facebook and Twitter at VOA Learning English. Join us again next week for THE MAKING OF A NATION -- an American history series in VOA Special English.

___

This is program #166

Family Album, Part I

Source: Family Album

Recently I've been posted 80 videos about pod English, today I'm posting Episodes credit by Family Album, here you can improve your listen, go ahead and keep practicing, the more you, more you learn. Continue twitting my blog and share it for friends. 

THE YEHUDI MENUHIN SCHOOL

Perfect Harmony

Standard British Accent

Language Level: Advanced

Source: Speak Up

Perfect Harmony

Yehudi Menuhin was a musical genius and one of the great violinists of the 20th century. But he also dreamed of providing others with what he had missed as a child – a creative and caring environment with excellent teachers, time to practice and opportunities to perform. In 1963 he founded the Yehudi Menuhin School, which moved to the secluded Surrey village of Stoke D’ Abernon the following year. There is a very special atmosphere here, and the sound of music is everywhere: from classrooms, studios and pupils practising in their rooms. The enthusiasm and raw talent of the young musicians is something that needs careful nurturing says Nicholas Chisholm, who has been headmaster here for the past 17 years:

Nicholas Chisholm

(Standard, British accent)

What I think is always exciting, and the challenge, is to keep – and it’s the challenge, more than anything –It's to keep that awareness, that the imagination, that spark alive because adolescence can be such a deadening thing, if it isn’t given a chance to survive. And it’s very fragile. So I think that’s one of the reasons why the school Is as small as it is, so that there aren’t those competing pressures which, if you like, squeeze, or have the potential to squeeze, imagination and creativity out of children.

MAKING IT

The school currently has 64 pupils half are Britain and half are from countries around the world, including Romania, Korea, and New Zealand. The international flavour of the school represents the ideals of its founder and there are more than 200 applications each year for the handful of places on offer.

The Yehudi Menuhin School holds around 200 concerts every year and is currently building a 2.5 million pounds, 350 seat concert hall. Many of the school’s talented students dream of professional success, but in today’s celebrity focused world, that can be dangerous, as Nicholas Chisholm explains:

Nicholas Chisholm:

Everybody’s different, fortunately, and, of course, it doesn’t suit everybody. So I think there are quite a lot that are saying “I’m not sure I really want that.” And, to a certain extent, Yehudi set the school up to prevent what he saw as exploitation. I mean, he was playing on the stage around the world from the age of 10. And I think it… well, he was never quite sure this was a good idea. We don’t fell that there’s a need to rush. And so, to be honest with you, the cult of the visual, and the cult of the young, which seem to be what it’s really all about, is something that we don’t necessarily feel is all that productive.

THE STONES

Fame, of course, does have its rewards and musicians can enjoy enormous wealth as well as long playing careers. Sometimes they choose to put something back: in 2004, rock legends the Rolling Stones provided the money to set up a classical guitar course at the school.

Links between musical forms are not so unusual: Yehui Menuhin himself played jazz, was an admirer o the Beatles, and worked with the legendary Indian musician Ravi Shankar.

Whether or not musical ability is genetic is open to debate, but great musicians certainly can come from unmusical parents.

THE REAL ME

Born in Dublin, Ireland, 16 years old Shophie Cashell is a brilliant pianist and now is her fourth year at the Yehudi Menuhin School. She began playing at the age of five, encouraged by her elder brother and sister who have also attended the school. She enjoys communicating through her music. But does she become a different person when she sits at the piano?

Sophie Cashell

Standard Irish accent

No, it’s more that you become more of the person that you are when you’re at the piano, I find. It’s like a concentration of all your feelings and the whole point is that you want to express who you are in the music, without taking away from it. You don’t become a different person at all.

The gentle genius (no sound)

When Albert Einstein heard the 13 years old Yehudi Menuhin play violin at a concert in Berlin, he declared: “Now I know there is a God in heaven!” Born in New York to Russian Jewish parents, on 22 April 1916, Yehudi Menuhin made his performing debut at the tender age of seven, but was never comfortable with the tag or “child prodigy.” A musician, composer, teacher and lecturer, Yehudi Menuhin devoted much of his time to peaceful causes. Throughout the 75 years of his musical career, he was an active campaigner for human rights and viewed music as an opportunity for cultural exchange. Yehundi Menuhin settled in Britain in 1985 but performed oil over the world and always thought of music as a global language. When he died in 1999, Yehudi Menuhin was buried in the school grounds.

30 years without John Lennon

Source: www.maganews.com.br

30 years without John LennonThe most controversial [1] Beatle was abandoned by his parents when he was a child, but overcame[2] the hardship [3]and became one of the great legends of the 20th Century

On December 8th fans and journalists all around the world willmark [4] 30 years since the death of John Lennon, one of the most famous people of the 20th Century. The most controversial of the four Beatles was murdered[5] with four shots [6] fired by fan Mark David Chapman, in front of the Dakota Building, where he lived in New York. The Press considered him the leader of the greatest band of all times and the most creative of the Beatles. However, outside the world of music, his image was not the best. Some biographies published recently (like the ones by Albert Goldman, Rosa Montero, and Cynthia Powell, his ex-wife) portrayed [7] Lennon as an authoritarian and very egocentric man, and often very aggressive, as the result of his addiction [8] to alcohol and hard drugs.

Ex-Beatle had a hard childhood

    The bad behavior (according to some biographies) of this musical genius possibly originated in his childhood. John Winston Lennon was born on October 9th 1940, the son of Julia and Alfred. The couple soon split up [9] and Lennon was abandoned by his parents and raised [10] by an aunt[11]. In 1955 he got together with some friends from school and put together a band called The Quarry Men (which later would change to The Beatles). At the peak of his success, Lennon dared to say that the Beatles were more famous than Jesus Christ. In 1968, he left his wife, Cynthia, to live with Yoko Ono. In 1970, John said, in an interview with the magazine Rolling Stone, something that would go down in history: “the dream is over”, saying goodbye to The Beatles. After the end of the band, Paul continued to have hits and more hits. John, for his part, recorded almost nothing in the 1970s – but got involved in peace campaigns to end the war in Vietnam, and in humanitarians causes. In 1980, he made a come back with the excellent Double Fantasy album, which was highly praised by the critics. The good old Lennon was back. But this would only last until 11PM on December 8^th, 1980.

Vocabulary

1 controversial – polêmico

2 to overcome - superar
3 hardship – sofrimento
4 mark – marca / marcar / lembrar
5 to murder – assassinar
6 shot – tiro
7 to portray – retratar
8 addiction - vício

9 to split up – se separar
10 to raise – criar / educar

11 aunt – tia

Twitter...the latest sensation

Level: Basic

Source: Speak

British Standar Accent

Every year there is a new internet phenomenon. In the past we have seen e-mail, Google, Messenger, Wikipedia, Youtube, MySpace and Facebook. The latest sensation is called Twitter. It is very popular in the United States, Britain and Japan. Twitter is a "Social networking system" like MySpace and Facebook. The difference is that you write messages with a maximum of 140 characters. In your message you answer one simple question: "What are you doing now?"

A MESSAGE FROM THE PRESIDENT

Twitter is popular with "normal people," but it also popular with celebrities who use it as a blog. Barack Obama, John McCain, Gordon Brown and Britney Spears all like Twitter. The simple format makes twitter esay to use from a mobile phone. Many guests at Obama's presidential inauguration wrote Twitter messages during the ceremony. People watching on televison complained about this.

A BIRD LANGUAGE

A Twitter message is called a tweet. "Tweet" is literally the sound of a small bird: the symbol on the twitter website is a bird on a tree. The word twitter also refers to the sound of birds singing. Humans can also twitter when they talk quickly and nervously. In British English a twit is a stupid person.  

Twitter may not be an intelligent word, but it is the new digital activity. It is replacing "chat" as the most important form of communication. Other twitter words include follower, a person who "follow" a twitter's old messages: re-twit, which means sending another person's message; a twitterati, which describes the people who use twitter. Twitter is based in Silicon Valley, California. Will Twitter replace Facebook? Who knows. According to the British newspaper The Financial Times, last year Facebook offered to buy Twitter for $ 500 million. Twitter said no.

The City of Books

Source: Speak Up

Language Level: Advanced

Standard Accent: American

There aren’t many bookshops where you need a map to find your way around, but it’s easy to get lost in Powell’s City of Book, the world’s largest independent bookstore, which is located in Portland, Oregon. Powell’s main bookshop on Burnside is a vast Aladdin’s cave of books in every shape, size and format. More than one million volumes line the shelves of the different colored rooms, each of which corresponds to different themes. And, if you include the five warehouses and five other store locations around the city. Then Powell’s has over four million books.

The responsibility for all this will soon pass to 27 years old Emily Powell, whose father, Michael, currently runs the business. Back in 1979, Michael Powell left his Chicago bookstore to join his father, Walter, in Portland and then bought the store from him two years later.  Emily is “Director of Used Books.” Powell’s places new and used books, hardback and paperback, next to each other on the same shelf. As Emilly explains, this was her grandfather’s idea:

Emily Powell

Standard: American Accent

And, since he wasn’t really a book person, he saw that… he was selling used books and he said “well, I see people coming in and they’ve got their new books from another store. You know, this doesn’t make sense. Why shouldn’t I be selling these, too? And apparently my dad said, something (like) “Oh, you know, that’s a tough business, or “margins are bad,” or, you know, whatever, and sort of, on the surface, wasn’t that interested, but my grandfather decided to do it and that was sort of… has been one of our key success. We were… I don’t know f we were the first , but certainly one  of the first to do it. At the time, even if a store had new or used books, they would be in separate sections, so you would go and find your new look at used. But why not put them together, so that you can have the choice of whichever price you want? Do you want a new copy, or do you want something that’s a little bit cheaper but, you know, maybe not pristine?

A SENSE OF COMMUNITY

It certainly proved to be a successful formula as Powell’s expanded from its humble beginning in a derelict northwest corner of Portland to become a true “City of Books.” Michael Powell, now 66, knows the value of words in more ways than one: he has always been a strong supporter of freedom of expression and anti-censorship issues. As a family-owned, independent bookseller, Powell’s has also built strong ties with the local community; it regularly donates books, time and money to literacy programs and local organizations. Powell’s Community Giving Program has donated 40.000 books in nine years, while its new School Book Challenge program has already donated more than 55.000 books to local students. Powell’s is certainly moving with the times. Its award-winning website was launched back in 1994 and now accounts for one third of total business. But, says Emily Powell, that isn’t the key reason for its success:

Emily Powell:

I think part of it is the people here who are really book lovers. I mean, you walk into  our breaks room in our internet warehouse here and people are sitting there with a book in their hand. I mean, they’re with books all day and then they’re… on their spare time, you know, they’re off reading. So I think it’s really about… it’s those folks who are making sure we have the best inventory of the books that are really the most interesting and the most unusual – so you have a great experience when you walk in and stumble upon something, but are also sure to find the classics that we just need to have day in and out.

Powell’s has five stores in Portland: 1005 W. Burnside, 33 NW Park Avenue, 3723 SE Hawthorne Blvd, 3747 SE Hawthorne Blvd, 7000NEAirport Way (Suite 2250), 3415 SW Cedar Hills Blvd: and one is nearby Beaverton of 3415 SW Cedar Hills Blvd. For further info visit http://www.powells.com