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Chapter 53 PRISONER ABUSE in IRAQ
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Chapter 53PRISONER ABUSE in IRAQa.
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TEXT This is Steve Ember with IN THE NEWS, in VOA Special English. President Bush and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld apologized this week for the treatment of Iraqi prisoners in Baghdad. Mister Bush said he was sorry for the suffering caused to the prisoners and their families by the actions of American soldiers. The President made the comments Thursday after meeting with King Abdullah of Jordan at the White House. Mister Bush said he told the King that the pictures from the Abu Ghraib prison made Americans sick. In his words, "the wrongdoers will be brought to justice." The pictures that have appeared in the media include those of prisoners without clothing. Some of the men are tied to each other in sexual positions. People in the United States and around the world have denounced the treatment. In Washington, the House of Representatives this week passed a resolution deploring the actions of the soldiers involved. As of now, six members of the Army are facing criminal charges that could result in a military trial. There also are questions about the activities of privately employed civilians used by the Army. Some assist in questioning prisoners for intelligence. Mister Rumsfeld told Senators Friday that he accepted full responsibility. The Defense Secretary said he was seeking a way to help those prisoners who suffered. He said they suffered at the hands of a few members of the United States armed forces. Mister Rumsfeld said the Army began an investigation in January as soon as one soldier reported wrong-doing at the prison. He said he first learned about the investigation when the Army announced it in January. He said the Army then told the world more details in March. The now former government of Iraq had used the Abu Ghraib prison to torture Iraqis. Senator Edward Kennedy noted that the International Committee of the Red Cross had earlier compared actions by Americans at the prison to torture. Mister Rumsfeld said the Red Cross report had helped Army generals begin to make what he called corrections at the prison. The pictures were included in a secret report written by Army Major General Antonio Taguba. His investigators seized them from guards at the prison. Mister Rumsfeld said he did not see the pictures, except those already released by the media, until late this week. He said someone gave them to the media illegally. C-B-S television first broadcast some of the pictures last week. The Washington Post newspaper published more on Thursday. President Bush said his defense secretary should have told him about the pictures. But he said Mister Rumsfeld is an important part of his cabinet and will stay in his job. Also this week, American officials said twenty-five prisoners had died in Iraq and Afghanistan since two-thousand-two. They said two deaths have been ruled criminal acts by soldiers. Officials say they continue to investigate ten of the deaths. IN THE NEWS, in VOA Special English, was written by Cynthia Kirk. This is Steve Ember. Broadcast: May 8, 2004 Chapter 54 Changing Families
women :93.5% TEXT: TEXT [A] Families in almost every country are changing, In North Africa, in the past, many people lived in extended families. Fifty to a hundred people lived together in a group of houses. These were all family members--grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, children, and grandchildren. But now this traditional family is breaking into smaller groups. [B] The traditional Japanese family was also an extended family-a son, his parents, his wife, his children, and his unmarried brothers and sisters. They lived together in his parents' home. But this tradition is changing. Now most adults do not live with their parents. They have new problems. Men and women spend a lot of time at work. They don't spend a lot of time together as a family. This can be very difficult. [C] In Europe, in traditional families, the woman stayed home with the children and the man had a job. But families all over Europe are changing. The number of divorces is going up. The number of single-parent families is going up too. In Sweden, mare than 40 percent (40%) of all children have parents that are not married. More and more countries are recognizing gay partnerships and marriages. For example, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, the Netherlands, Hungary, and the U.S. state of Vermont all recognize these as legal unions. In much of Europe, many people live alone. In France, more than 26 percent of women between age 30 and 34 live alone, and more than 27 percent of men of the same age live alone. [D] There are also big changes in Quebec, Canada. In 1965, a traditional family was important. Almost 90 percent of men and 93.5 percent of women were married. But in 1985, only 49 percent of men and 51.7 percent of women were married! Now more than one-third (1/3) of all babies have parents that are not married. More than one-third of all marriages end in divorce. There are many new types of families. The world is changing, and families are changing too. Chapter 55 PORTABLE MUSIC PLAYERS CAUSE HEARING LOSS
- Some have to raise volume controls on TV or radio to hear it better. - Some experience ringing in the ears.
TEXT I’m Shep O’Neal with the VOA Special English Health Report. A college student listens to her iPod Electronic devices are changing the way people listen to music. But studies show the devices may be causing hearing loss in many people. Some experts say people may be playing them too loud and for too long. Researchers from Zogby International did a study for the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association. It involved three hundred high school students and one thousand adults. They were asked about their use of portable music devices. Some of the most popular are Apple Computer’s iPod, C.D. players and portable laptop computers. Forty percent of students and adults said they set the sound levels, or volume, at high on their iPods. But students were two times more likely to play the music at a very loud volume. More than half of the students said they would probably not limit their listening time. And about a third said they were not likely to reduce the volume. The study found that more than half of the students and less than forty percent of the adults had at least one kind of hearing loss. Some reported difficulty hearing parts of a discussion between two people. Others said they had to raise volume controls on a television or radio to hear it better. And, some experienced ringing in their ears or other noises. Hearing experts say part of the problem is the listening equipment people are using. They say large earphones that cover the whole ear are probably safer than the smaller earbuds that come with most music players. Earbuds are thought to be less effective than earphones in blocking out foreign noises. Hearing loss may not be apparent for years. But once it happens, it is permanent. About thirty million Americans have some hearing loss. One third of them lost their hearing as a result of loud noises. Experts at the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota say any sound above ninety decibels for long periods may cause some hearing loss. But most portable music players can produce sounds up to one hundred twenty decibels. The American Speech-Language-Hearing Association is working with manufacturers and government officials on setting rules for use of portable music devices. The group says the best way to protect your hearing is to reduce the volume, limit listening time and using earphones that block out foreign noises. This VOA Special English Health Report was written by Cynthia Kirk. I’m Shep O’Neal.
protect the environment .
TEXT This is Shep O'Neal with the VOA Special English Development Report. Winners of an environmental design competition for college students in the United States will now try to bring their ideas to market. Six teams won the second year of the event, called P-Three: People, Prosperity and the Planet. The competition is held by the Environmental Protection Agency and other public and private organizations. Teams compete to design sustainable technologies that support economic growth but also protect the environment. One of the winning teams is from Appalachian State University in North Carolina. The students propose to research low-cost, environmentally friendly fuels. One idea is to use waste vegetable oil to make biofuel that poor families and local farmers can use. Another winning proposal is from Lafayette College in Pennsylvania. The students will design a water supply system in Honduras for the village of La Fortuna. They will look for simple technologies, local materials and community involvement. Students from Portland State University in Oregon will create a Web site as a teaching tool for the local public schools. The interactive site will explain how the world is connected environmentally. At Stanford University in California, students will put their award money toward what they call a "Green Dorm." The goal is to develop student housing where environmentally friendly systems can be tested. Students from the University of Massachusetts at Lowell will explore a possible cancer treatment. Their work will involve compounds found in green tea. And the sixth winning team is from the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. The students will work with building materials made from natural compounds and plastics that can be recycled. The team will develop and test new product designs. Forty-one teams each received ten thousand dollars to develop their projects over the school year. They presented their ideas earlier this month in Washington, D.C. Judges from the National Academies helped choose the six winners. Each team can now receive as much as seventy-five thousand dollars more to continue work. Four teams from last year have already started small businesses. Only schools in the United States can enter the P-Three competition, but they can work with foreign colleges and universities. Proposals for next year will be accepted starting in December. This VOA Special English Development Report was written by Jill Moss. I’m Shep O'Neal. Chapter 57 TELEVISION and ATTENTION problems a.
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TEXT This is Steve Ember with the VOA Special English Education Report. A new study suggests that very young children who watch a lot of television may have attention problems later in school. Children with attention problems cannot sit still or control their actions. They talk too much, lose things, forget easily and are not able to finish tasks. People with attention problems may suffer a condition known as Attention Deficit Disorder, or A.D.D. Experts say the cause of A.D.D involves chemicals in the brain. Teachers say many children in the United States are showing signs of the disorder. Some education researchers have been saying for years that watching television at a very young age could change the normal development of the brain. For example, they say that children who watch a lot of television are not able to sit and read for an extended period of time. The new study tested the idea that television watching by very young children is linked to attention problems by the age of seven. It involved more than one-thousand-three-hundred children. There were two groups of children, ages one and three. Researchers at Children’s Hospital and Regional Medical Center in Seattle, Washington reported the results in the publication Pediatrics. They asked the parents how often the children watched television. The parents also described their children’s actions at the age of seven using a method that can tell if someone suffers attention deficit disorders. The children who watched a lot of television at an early age were most likely to have attention problems. Every hour of watching television increased the chances of having attention problems by about ten per cent. For example, children who watched three hours a day were thirty percent more likely to have attention problems than those who watched no television. The researchers say that all the children with attention problems might not have A.D.D. But they still could face major learning problems in school. The findings support advice by a group of children’s doctors that children under the age of two should not watch television. One of the researchers said there are other reasons why children should not watch television. Earlier studies have linked it with children becoming too fat and too aggressive. Other experts say the new study is important, but more work needs to be done to confirm the findings and better explain the cause and effect. This VOA Special English Education Report was written by Nancy Steinbach. This is Steve Ember. By Nancy Steinbach Broadcast: April 15, 2004 Chapter 58 antı - Americanism Surges in MUslım Natıons
TEXT (IT STARTS AFTER 35 SECONDS) Recent surveys of nearly 40,000 people in 44 countries indicate a startling loss of international support for the United States. Andrew Kohut, Director of the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press, says America's image is slipping not only in Muslim countries but also in NATO nations, the developing world and Eastern Europe. "We found in 27 countries where we had a benchmark, the American image was lower in 19 of those countries," he says. "The real dislike of America continues to be concentrated in the Muslim nations of the Middle East." Mr. Kohut says there is still a large reserve of goodwill for American citizens, but little of it can be found in the Middle East. "The most disturbing decline in my view was the way in which the public of our NATO ally Turkey has changed," he says. "Our unfavorable rating rose from 20 percent in the year 2000 to 55 percent in late 2002 when we did this survey. And in Pakistan our new ally on the war on terror, only 10 percent of Pakistanis said they had a good opinion of the United States." Mr. Kohut says part of this drop is a clear backlash in the Muslim world against the war on terrorism. In 10 of 11 Muslim countries, the public indicate they do not like the war against terror. He notes a majority of Muslims say that perceived U.S. support of Israel drives anti-American sentiment in their countries. "Dislike of the United States is principally driven by our Middle East policies, " he says. "A Gallup poll, which conducted nationwide surveys in nine Muslim nations at the beginning of 2002, summed it up this way: they said the perception that Western nations are not fair in their stance toward Palestine fits with the more generalized view that the West is unfair to Arab and Islamic worlds." However, Mr. Kohut says American cultural exports, including movies, television and music, continue to be well received across the Muslim world. One example is a new U.S. public diplomacy initiative called Radio Sawa (the name means 'together' in Arabic). It is a project of the International Broadcasting Bureau, the U.S. government agency that also operates the Voice of America. Independent observers say Radio Sawa's unrivaled mix of Western and Arabic music, speckled with short newscasts, draws a large audience in the Arab world. Communications professor R.S. Zaharna of Washington's American University says the listeners enjoy the music and the American style of interactive communication. For example, people across the Middle East express their opinions openly on a popular program called Sawa Chat. But professor Zaharna warns many U.S. efforts to win the hearts and minds of Muslims are not working. "I'm concerned that American public diplomacy appears to be backfiring and doing more of the same may hurt us more than help us," she says. "Since September 11, 2001, America has turned up the volume of American public diplomacy with high-profile, aggressive initiatives in the Arab and Muslim world. With such an intensive and concerted effort one would expect positive results. Instead, support for America has declined and anti-Americanism has grown." Professor Zaharna says part of the problem is that U.S. policy often focuses too much on the getting out the message instead of taking the time to build relationships. "American executives often complain that they must spend endless hours and sometimes days having coffee or tea before they get down to business," she says. "It's not because we like coffee or tea so much, but it's because relationships are the cornerstone of activities in this part of the world. And so instead of speaking at the people in the Muslim world, we need to speak with them and start looking more on ways of creating a dialogue." Professor Zaharna says damage is also done when the U.S. government sends conflicting messages to Muslims. For example, U.S. officials insist the war on terror is not a war on Islam. At the same time, Muslims hear reports of Muslims in America detained and treated with suspicion. Professor Zaharna says in the age of instant global communications, what is said in America is heard around the globe. "The derogatory statements made by prominent American religious leaders quickly spread like wildfire through Asia, Africa and the Middle East," she says. "President Bush condemned some of the comments. A few of the leaders apologized. Nevertheless, the damage was already done. America's own religious tolerance became suspect." Professor Zaharna says U.S. leaders and citizens can make a genuine difference at home by visiting a mosque or attending a Muslim community event. These gestures send a strong message about American tolerance, diversity and democracy. A top ranking official on the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Joseph Biden, says public diplomacy is limited by U.S. foreign policies. For example, the lack of an American initiative to solve the Israel-Palestinian conflict has fostered resentment in the Muslim world. "The Middle East or Palestinian issue is of gigantic consequence," he says. "And I would agree that there is a direct correlation between our neglect, our benign neglect (of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict), and that translates into opposition." Professor Zaharna adds that extensive media coverage of a possible U.S. military attack and eventual occupation of Iraq adds to Muslim hostility toward America. She says Muslims associate the term 'military occupation' with the Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories. But Senator Biden points out the treatment of Muslims in the United States has been reasonable, if not generous, considering the circumstances of the September 11 terrorist attacks. "In the face of the terrorist acts that occurred here, which were the product of those who happen to be Muslim, I would argue the United States has acted better than any other country in the world in terms of how it treats the minority of Muslim-American citizens," he says. Observers will closely watch the level of anti-Americanism if the United States goes to war with Iraq. With much of the world public opinion against the war, analysts say U.S. public diplomacy will have even greater challenges ahead. Brent Hurd Washington 10 Mar 2003, 21:57 UTC Chapter 59 War and English Teaching a.
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TEXT AA: I'm Avi Arditti and this week on Wordmaster -- it's time for our monthly visit with English teacher Lida Baker. She writes textbooks and she teaches in the American Language Center at the University of California at Los Angeles. Today Lida offers some advice for English teachers who are looking for ways to use the war in Iraq as a teaching opportunity. LIDA BAKER: "Now, in a reading class, of course you could have students reading the news each night or do it in class. The articles could be used for the purpose of learning vocabulary, summarizing. Actually, stories about disasters and wars -- news events that carry on for a period of days or in this case weeks and hopefully not months -- are wonderful for learning vocabulary because in order to learn new words, we have to repeat them a lot, we have to see them in a variety of contexts. So reading the news about the war would be an excellent way for students to improve their vocabulary." AA: Lida Baker says there's also a variety of activities that students could do in a writing class. LIDA BAKER: "If students are doing journals, they could write in their journals their feelings and their responses to what they're hearing in the news. By the way, this is an excellent way of channeling students' feelings into something that enhances their language learning. Have hem write down these strong feelings that they're having about what they're seeing on television and reading about in the newspaper. So students can do journals about the war, they can write essays where they're presenting their point of view and supporting their point of view with facts and examples and other kinds of evidence. "In a speaking class, you have the opportunity to set up debates where students are presenting both sides, both points of view -- for the war and against the war. AA: "And in which case the teacher would serve sort of as what -- " BAKER: "As a moderator." AA: "A neutral person, without a position?" BAKER: "Absolutely. I really do not think it is appropriate for a teacher to present her point of view about the war -- especially not at the beginning of a lesson. It's OK, I think, to do it at the very, very end, after students have written or said whatever they want about the topic. But for a teacher -- especially in an English as a second language situation, where students generally come from cultures where it's unthinkable for a student to disagree with a teacher or contradict a teacher -- it wouldn't be right for a teacher to present her point of view up front. Because then students would feel intimidated about saying how they feel. So it would be, I think, a wrong way for a teacher to use her power or her authority to do that. " I suppose I would not hesitate at the very end of the activity to politely say how I feel, but I wouldn't do it at the beginning. I wouldn't want to impinge on students’ freedom of expression in the classroom, or for them to think that because I'm their teacher that they're obligated to agree with me." AA: Lida Baker says formal debates are just one of the options if teachers or students want to bring up the war in class. Students could also form small discussion groups in the classroom. Lida Baker says in a situation like that, she would walk around to serve not just as a moderator but also as a language consultant. LIDA BAKER: "If students are sitting in small groups, talking about their views, and they need a word or they don't know how to say something, then I'm right there to help them form their thoughts, express their feelings, find the words that they need in order to continue their discussion." AA: Author and English teacher Lida Baker from the American Language Center at the University of California at Los Angeles. And that's Wordmaster for this week. Our postal address is VOA Wordmaster, Washington DC 20237 USA. Our e-mail address is word@voanews.com. And our programs are on the Internet at voanews.com/wordmaster. Rosanne Skirble is back with me next week. I'm Avi Arditti Broadcast on "Coast to Coast": April 3, 2003 
www. flickr.com Chapter 60 ımagInatIon in Wrıtıng a.
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