现代大学英语听力2_dictation原文

Unit 1

Social customs and ways of behaving change. But they do not necessarily always change for the better. Things which were considered impolite many years ago are now acceptable. Just a few years ago, it was considered impolite behaviour for a man to smoke on the street. No man who thought of himself as being a gentleman would make a fool of himself by smoking when a lady was in the room.

The important thing to remember about social customs is not to do anything that might make other people feel uncomfortable — especially if they are your guests. There is a story about a rich nobleman who had a very formal dinner party. When the food was served, one of the guests started to eat his peas with a knife. Other guests were amused or shocked, but the nobleman calmly picked up his knife and began eating in the same way. It would have been bad manners to make his guest feel foolish or uncomfortable.

Unit 2

Undoubtedly, Tibet is one of the harshest places for human existence. It is cool in summer but freezing cold in winter. In Lhasa, the mildest city temperature may exceed 29C in summer while plummeting to -16C in winter! Sun radiation is extremely strong in Tibet. The sunlight in Lhasa is so intense that the city is called Sunlight City. The thin air can neither block off nor retain heat so that the temperature extremes can be met in daytime and the same night respectively in Tibet. However it is not impossible to visit the holy snow land. April to October is the best time to visit Tibet, out of the

coldest months, which are from December to February usually. The average temperature in north Tibet is subzero and winter arrives in October

until the following May or June. July and August are the best time to visit the area, enjoying warm temperature, intense sunshine, beautiful scenery and festive events. May, June and September is the tourist season in east Tibet. In winter, roads are all blocked by heavy snow. Landslides and rock falls frequently occur, which will make travel difficult.

Unit 3

I could hear the guard blowing his whistle, so I ran onto the platform and up to the train.

Luckily someone saw me coming, a door opened, and I jumped on while the train was moving out of the station. “Phew!” I thought. “That was hard work!” I was sure the other pa ssengers could hear my heart beating; it was so loud, and I was in a cold sweat.

After a while, I recovered, and had a look at the other passengers. The compartment was full, but I was the only one standing. The people in the carriage turned their eyes away as they noticed me looking at them; all except one, a beautiful woman sitting in the corner. I saw her watching me in the mirror. Automatically, I adjusted my tie. She had seen me running for the train: maybe this was my lucky day after all. I prepared to say hello.

She spoke first, however. “Would you like my seat?” she asked. “You look rather ill.” That was the day on which I realized I was getting middle-aged.

Unit 4

Aesop was a very clever man who lived in Greece thousands of years ago. He wrote many good fables. He was known to be fond of jokes. One day, as he was enjoying a walk he met a traveler, who greeted him and said, “Kind man, can you tell me how soon I shall get to town?”

“Go,” Aesop answered.

“I know I must go”, said the traveler, “but I should L ike you

to tell me how soon I shall get to town.”

“Go,” Aesop said again angrily.

“This man must be mad,” the traveler thought and went on.

After he had gone some distance, Aesop shouted after him, “You

will get to town in two hours.” The traveler turned around in astonishment. “Why didn’t you tell me that before?” he asked.

“How could I have told you before?” answered Aesop. “I did not know how fast you could walk.

Unit 5

Americans know that higher education is the key to the growth they need to lift their country, and today that is more true than ever. Just listen to these facts. Over half the new jobs created in the last three years have been managerial and professional jobs. The new jobs require a higher level of skills.

Fifteen years ago the typical worker with a college degree made 38 percent more than a worker with a high school diploma. Today that figure is 73 percent more. Two years of college means a 20 percent increase annual earnings. People who finish two years of college earn a quarter of a million dollars more tan their high school counterparts over a lifetime.

Unit 6

I began my career during college, reporting on news stories at a Toronto radio station. The station’s program manager was also a professor who taught one of my classes. I convinced him that she needed a youth reporter because that year was International Youth Year. After graduation, I took a job as a television news reporter and later, news anchor. But sports reporting was something different, so I decided to

try it. Figure skating was my first assignment.

I had two months until my new job began. It was like waiting an entire summer for school to start. I spent those two months talking to figure skating coaches and judges. I read boring rule books. I drove to the rinks where the skaters trained, and made notes about our conversations. I even took a lesson, which made some of the skaters laugh.

Unit 7

Thomas Edison was one of ten said to be the greatest genius of his age. There are only a few men in all of the history, who have changed the lives of other men as much as the inventor of the first useful electric light. But Edison could never be happy only because someone

said he was a genius.“ There is no such thing as genius,” Edison said. He said that what people called genius was mostly hard work.

But Edison was a dreamer as well as a worker. From his earliest days as a child he wondered about the secrets of nature. Nature, he often said, is full of secrets. He tried to understand them; then, he tried to learn what could usefully be done with them.

Edison enjoyed thinking. He knew that most people will do almost anything instead of

the difficult work of thinking, especially if they do not think very often. But he knew, too, that thinking can give men enjoyment and pleasure.

Unit 8

The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization says hunger kills millions of people each year — especially children . The UN organization says millions more people will die unless more money is invested to fight against hunger.

This is b ased on the result of a new UN study called “The State

of Food Insecurity in the World, 2002”. It found that more than nine million people die each year from hunger. Six million of them are children younger than age five. Researchers also found that the number of starving people is growing in some parts of the world.

The report says that about eight hundred and forty million people around the world are getting enough food to eat. Ninety-five percent of these people are in developing countries.

Unit 9

In contemporary English, there are many reported differences in the talk of males and females . In same gender pairs having conversations, women generally discuss their personal feelings more than men . Men appear to prefer non-personal topics such as sport and news . Men tend to respond to mention personal experiences that match or connect with the other woman’s . There is a pattern documented in the American English social context of women cooperating and seeking connection via language, whereas men are more competitive and concerned with power via language . In mixed-gender pairs having conversations, the rate of men interrupting women is substantially greater than he reverse. Women are reported to use more expressions associated with tentativeness , such as “hedges” and “tags” , when expressing an opinion : Well ,erm , I think that golf is kind of boring , don’t you ?

Unit 10

The University of Oxford, situated in the city of Oxford, England, is the oldest university in the English-speaking world . The

universities of Oxford and Cambridge are sometimes referred to collectively as Oxbridge. The two universities have a long history of competition with each other, as they are two oldest and most famous universities in England.

The date of Oxford’s foundation is unknown, and indeed it may not have been a single event , but there is evidence of teaching there as early as 1096. When Henry II of England of forbade English students to study at the University of Paris in 1167, Oxford began to grow very quickly . The foundation of the first halls of residence, which later became college, dates from this period and later. Following the murder

of two students accused of rape in 1209, the University was disbanded, and this led to the foundation of the University of Cambridge. In 1214, the University returned to Oxford with a charter, and the University’s status was formally confirmed.

Unit 11

Planet Earth is 4,600,000,000 years old. If we condense this time span we can compare it to a person 46 years old. Only at the age of 42 did the Earth begin to flower. Dinosaurs and the great reptiles did not appear until one year ago, when the planet was 45. Mammals

arrived only eight months ago, and in the middle of last week

human-like apes developed into ape-like humans, and last weekend the

last ice age covered the Earth.

Modem man has been around for 4 hours. During the last hour agriculture was discovered. The Industrial Revolution began a minute ago. Since then, we have multiplied our numbers to plague proportions, caused the extinction of 500 species of animals, turned the planet upside down in the search for fuels, and now we stand, arrogant with power, on the edge of a war to end all wars, and close to effectively destroying this oasis of life in the solar system.

Unit 12

London is one of the biggest cities in the world. It has a population of over 8 million. Some people like it very much because

there is a lot to do there and it is very interesting. There are hundreds of cinemas, theatres, museums and restaurants there. But other people don't like it because there is so much traffic and noise everywhere.

Brighton is a medium-sized town with a population of around 300,000. It is on the coast, about 50 miles from London. Of course it isn't as interesting as London, but the air is a lot cleaner and better. There

are a few factories, but not many. It isn't very easy to find a good job there. But there are a lot of hotels and language schools in the town, and in the summer

the town is full of tourists

.

Unit 13

An old man died and left his son a lot of money. But the son was a foolish young man, and he quickly spent all the money, so that soon he had nothing left. Of course, when that happened, all his friends left him. When he was quite poor and alone, he went to see Nasreddin, who was a kind, clever old man and often helped people when they had troubles.

“My money has finished and my friends have gone,” said the young man. “What will happen to me now?”

“Don’t worry, young man,” answered Nasreddin. “Everything will soon be all right again. Wait and you will soon feel much happier.”

The young man was very glad. “Am I going to get rich again then?” he asked Nasreddin.

“No, I didn’t mean that,” said the old man. “I me ant that you would soon get used to being poor a nd to having no friends.”

Unit 14

The future will not determine itself. The future is determined by the actions of the present day.

Edward Cornish, the editor of The Futurist magazine published by the World Future Society, says:

The responsibility we have for the future begins when we recognize that we ourselves create the future — that the future is not something imposed upon us by fate or other forces beyond our control. We ourselves build the future both through what we do and what we do not do.

A novel way of teaching may change the way universities are run. An engineering teacher at the American University of Illinois has had great success without textbooks, without exams

and without deadlines. His students won nine of the top ten engineering awards in a university competition.

The engineering professor, Ricardo Uribe, let his engineering students express themselves, in-stead of telling them what to do. His

students all focused on the problems that interested them, not what

their teacher told 'them. They worked their own hours, not hours set by the university. They did not have to sit tests, and they helped each other in open classes.

Unit 15

Newspapers are one of the main sources from which we learn what is going on--in world politics, science, local government, the arts, fashion, food, education and sports. The papers we choose show our interests and usually the politics which we believe in. There are nine national daily newspapers in Britain, of which five are tabloids and

four are quality papers. Do these newspapers realty serve the people

they are written for? Many people question the objectivity of newspapers. How objective are they? We might be better able to judge if we understand how a newspaper is produced. Reporters, of course, are the source from which the facts must come, but there are many other people who are involved in and influence newspapers.