英美国家概况课后答案

75. What is the main theme in American literature according to the author? How does the author illustrate his point?

75. The questing of the American people has indeed been a drama of many parts. In one way or another, however, it has always been a \of happiness\American literature is the continuous narrative of that pursuit.

76. Why did Mark Twain win so many readers both at home and abroad?

76. Mark Twain was the first major American writer to be born away from the East Coast. He grew up in a small town on the banks of the Mississippi River and received only a basic public school education. He began working in a printer's shop when he was still a boy, and this experience led to a series of newspaper jobs in the Midwest and the West. Twain was a new voice, an original genius, a man of the people, and he quickly won readers. 77. What are the major characteristics of education in America?

77. Americans have a strong tendency to educate their children about major public concerns—problems such as environmental pollution, nuclear issues, neighborhood crime and drugs. Responding to public pressure, boards of education in different areas often add courses on various relevant issues to the elementary and secondary school curriculum.

78. What are some of the major themes in novels written by the \

78. The \Generation\is a term used to describe the generation of young men and women who came to maturity in the 20s. Some of them fought in World War I. They became disgusted with war and disillusioned with the post-war society. They shared the same sense of dislocation, rootlessness and disillusionment.

79. What is the goal of education in the United States? Discuss the similarities and differences in Great Britain, the United States and China concerning the goals of education. 79. The goal is—and has been since the early decades of the republic—to achieve universal literacy and to provide individuals with the knowledge and skills necessary to promote both their own individual welfare as well as that of the general public. Though this goal has not yet been fully achieved, it remains an ideal toward which the American educational system is directed. The progress which has been made is notable both for its scope and for the educational methods which have been developed in the process of achieving it. 80. What does an American student learn?

80. American students pass through several levels of schooling—and thus, several curricula—on their way to a high school diploma. They attend: Elementary School, Secondary School, high school.

81. What were the major social movements of the 1960s? And what was the historical background of the social movements of that decade?

81. The Civil Rights Movement, Youth Anti-war Movement, Women’s Liberation movement and etc.

82. The black political movement that began as a force for integration changed course in the mid-1960s and began to emphasize black uniqueness and even black separatism. What caused this transformation?

82. Although these segregation laws were illegal under the 14th Amendment to the United States Constitution, the US government would not declare the Southern laws unconstitutional until there were cases brought in federal courts. The civil rights movement began when black people spontaneously protested segregation laws and created organizations to make the protests

successful. Long before the students in Greensboro, North Carolina began their sit-ins, there were many others who protested the segregation laws.

83. Draw analogies between the black revolution and the women's movement. What common assumptions do they share?

83. The women activities were most in the civil rights and anti-war movements before. They believed the male leaders of these movements were discriminating against women in the movement just like White’s discrimination against black men. They became known as the \publicity. This group found strong support among large numbers of young activists from other organizations.

84. The author says that the United States was founded on the principle of human equality, but in practice the nation has fallen far short of that ideal. Illustrate this point with what you have learned from this book.

84. For example, the racial discrimination, sex discrimination, class structure, etc.

85. What does poverty mean in the United States ? Why is poverty a social problem in America?

85. Poverty in the United States does not simply mean that the poor do not live quite as well as other citizens. It means many old people eating dog and cat food to supplement their diets. It means malnutrition and deprivation for hundreds of thousands of children. It means greater susceptibility to disease, to alcoholism, to victimization by criminals, and to mental disorders. It often means unstable marriages, slum housing, illiteracy, ignorance, inadequate medical facilities, and shortened life expectancy. Poverty can mean low self-esteem, despair, and stunting of human potential.

86. Why does the author emphasize that the invention of one technology has to be supported by a number of related technologies which form a supporting system? Give examples.

86. A technology is a system of practices, often involving a physical device that accomplishes some result desired by some influential segments of society: government planners, military leaders, businessmen, or even a large proportion of citizen consumers. 87. When are the American football matches held?

87. The late summer (preseason), the fall (regular season), and the winter until late in January (post-season, or play off time ). All this culminates in the Super Bowl to decide the champion team for the year.

88. Why did a musical form of black origin gain acceptance in all classes in America and spread throughout the country?

88. It is a uniquely American contribution to the arts. No other art form, painting, fiction, poetry, has had a distinctive American contribution as has jazz music. Composers around the world during the twentieth century found inspiration in early American jazz.

89. What are the contributions made by Louis Armstrong to the early jazz music?

89. But Armstrong himself left Chicago in 1924 for New York with his new wife, Lil Hardin, to play with Fletcher Henderson's orchestra. Armstrong organized, with the help of his wife, several of his friends into the recording groups known as the Hot Five and the Hot Seven to make a justly Hot Five Dancing in the Roaring Twenties famous series of recordings for the Okeh Recording company. At this time, 1926, Armstrong also recorded his famous \singing\vocalizing nonsense syllables in tune with the music. Armstrong continued to play and record during the

1930's, both in America and in Europe. With the New Orleans revival in the late 1940's and with his motion picture appearances, particularly with the popular Bing Crosby, Armstrong once again shone brightly as America's foremost jazz musician.

90. Why Canada is regularly rated as having the best standard of living in the world?

90. It has a lively and rich culture, with many world famous actors, pop stars and writers. In annual \of life\surveys produced by the United Nation each year, Canada regularly is rated as having the best standard of living in the world because of its health care, education, clean environment, social welfare, and so on.

91.What is the distinct feature in Canadian modern literature?

91. In Modern literature, Canadian nationhood was no longer in doubt from an outside perspective, but from the inside the nature of that nation and the strength of its institutions remained somewhat in question. Ethnic, region and gender were the topics Canadian literature investigated in a process of self-analysis.

92. Discuss the similarities and differences in the government systems between the U.K. and Canada.

92. As a former British colony, Canada's system of government was based on the British system of parliamentary democracy. This is often referred to as “Westminster—style” democracy, named after the British House of Commons. Like other former colonies like New Zealand and Australia, many Canadian laws, political practices and customs were brought from the \adapted to the different conditions of the new country. At first glance, the similarity between British and Canadian political conditions are great; but when you look more closely, you can see important differences which have arisen from the experience of governing a huge but sparsely populated country.

93. What are some of the characteristics of the Canadian party system?

93. Through most of the 20th century, federal political power has been held by either the Liberal Party or by the Progressive Conservatives. Since 1900, the Liberals have spent about 66 years in power, compared to the Conservative Party's record of about 30 years in government. With the system so dominated by these two parties, the party that was not in power always formed the official opposition to the government. But neither of these parties were popular throughout the whole country. The western provinces preferred more socialist—oriented policies and seldom elected a Liberal to represent them, so during the many years of Liberal government, they had very little influence on national policy, since only a handful of MPs belonged to the most powerful parties. Quebec experienced the same thing during periods of Conservative rule, since it seldom voted Conservative.

94. What are some of the things that make Canada a unique and interesting country?

94. This introduction opens with one of the things that makes Canada distinctively different—a welcome to Canada in the two official languages of English and French. This is our first clue as to what makes Canada special. If people outside of Canada are a little bit confused about what Canada is, the same is also true for Canadians.

95. How do you understand \

95. Officially, Canada refers to itself as \on bilingualism and biculturalism in the 1960s when a Royal Commission was set up to examine relations between French and English Canada. Organized ethnic communities demanded that their heritages also be acknowledged. Politicians noted that one—third of Canadians were neither

English nor French and thus invented the idea of a multicultural society within a bilingual framework and provided money to help different ethnic groups retain their identities.

96. Why do you think the author says that Canada has avoided the worst excesses of intolerance and prejudice?

96. As a prominent member of Canada's Ukrainian community remarked: There is no longer any excuse for anyone in this country to be ashamed of his cultural background. Canada is a multicultural society. The days of Anglo-Saxon dominance are gone. 97. What is the Canada's Place in the World Economy?

97. One area of Canadian influence is the world economy. By actively building up a strong domestic economy, Canadian policy-makers succeeded in creating a wealthy country which wields an amount of economic power in the international arena that is surprising for a country that is so small in terms of its population. Canada, along with the US, France, Italy, Great Britain, Germany and Japan, is a member of the Group of 7, the world's leading economies. Membership of the Group of 7 gives Canada significant prestige and influence in the international system.

98. Do you think the Canadian government should subsidize the inefficient Canadian farmers or import foodstuff from neighbouring American states?

98. In the past, agricultural exports have been very important to the Canadian economy: before World War I, 50 per cent of Canada's exports were agricultural; this fell to 40 per cent after World War II. But in recent years there has been a dramatic drop, and now they comprise less than 10 per cent of Canada's total exports. Furthermore, it has become cheaper in many cases to import foodstuffs rather than to produce such items domestically. For example, it makes more geographical sense for Easterners to buy their vegetables from neighbouring American states rather than shipping similar products from western Canada. The conclusion of the Free Trade Agreement also displaced inefficient Canadian farmers, who used to rely on government subsidies to remain productive.

99. Why is the idea of survival thought of as the central symbol of Canadian literature? What does cultural survival mean in Canadian literature?

99. The idea that there is such a thing as \or \or in this case, \literature suggests another question: what makes this literature different from those other nations' literatures. a concern with \—a reflection of the dangerous natural world in which Canadians find themselves, with huge distances to cross to get help, endless forests to get lost in, hard winters to freeze in, wild animals to attack them. Just surviving in these conditions was a full—time job for Canadians, native or settler, prior to this century.

This idea can extend to concern with \survival in a variety of ways: the attempt to maintain a Canadian identity in the first place that does not disappear into a weak version of the old colonial power's (Britain's); the dogged persistence of native Canadian peoples to maintain their distinctive cultures against overwhelming European dominance; the assertive survival of a French-Canadian identity in Quebec after the English had conquered the French in Canada; the survival of any kind of overall Canadian identity while troubled by these internal differences, and while being flooded from outside by the culture of their huge neighbour to the south: the USA. In all these ways the Canadian identity is under threat and perhaps defined by that threat, so that \

100. What are the major reasons for Canada's active role in international organizations? And how does Canada play its active role?

100. Because of its geography, Canada has sometimes been described as being \a result, Canada has had to find different ways of ensuring its security. Because of its military vulnerability, Canadian policy-makers have had a great interest in promoting peace and cooperation among nations. For this reason, Canada has always played an active role in international organizations like the United Nations, the Commonwealth (the political grouping of former British colonies and dominions), and La Francophonie (an informal group of countries and regions with French as their mother tongue). It makes strong contributions to UN peacekeeping missions, works hard to resolve disputes between countries using diplomatic means, has a large development aid program, and is a major player in the world economy. 101. what was British Empire

The British Empire was the biggest in history and had global power. It lasted for a century and had 458 million people. (Approximately a quarter of the population) it took up 36.7 million km2 (14.2 million square miles) about a quarter of the earths total land area. At the peak of its power, it was often said that: 'The sun never sets on the British Empire' because the span across the globe insured the sun always shone on at least one or several countries that belonged to it.