现代大学英语听力2-dictation原文

1、Unit 1Social customs and ways of behaving change. But they do notnecessarily always change for the better. Things which were consideredimpolite many years ago are now acceptable. Just a few years ago, it wasconsidered impolite behaviour for a man to smoke on the street. No manwho thought of himself

2、as being a gentleman would make a fool of himselfby smoking when a lady was in the room.The important thing to remember about social customs is not to doanything that might make other people feel uncomfortable especiallyif they are your guests. There is a story about a rich nobleman who hada very fo

3、rmal dinner party. When the food was served, one of the guestsstarted to eat his peas with a knife. Other guests were amused orshocked, but the nobleman calmly picked up his knife and began eating inthe same way. It would have been bad manners to make his guest feelfoolish or uncomfortable.Unit 2Und

4、oubtedly, Tibet is one of the harshest places for humanexistence. It is cool in summer but freezing cold in winter. In Lhasa,the mildest city temperature may exceed 29C in summer while plummetingto -16C in winter! Sun radiation is extremely strong in Tibet. Thesunlight in Lhasa is so intense that th

5、e city is called Sunlight City.The thin air can neither block off nor retain heat so that thetemperature extremes can be met in daytime and the same nightrespectively in Tibet. However it is not impossible to visit the holysnow land. April to October is the best time to visit Tibet, out of thecoldes

6、t months, which are from December to February usually. The averagetemperature in north Tibet is subzero and winter arrives in Octoberuntil the following May or June. July and August are the best time tovisit the area, enjoying warm temperature, intense sunshine, beautifulscenery and festive events.

7、May, June and September is the touristseason in east Tibet. In winter, roads are all blocked by heavy snow.Landslides and rock falls frequently occur, which will make traveldifficult.Unit 3I could hear the guard blowing his whistle, so I ran onto theplatform and up to the train.Luckily someone saw m

8、e coming, a door opened, and I jumped on whilethe train was moving out of the station. “Phew!” I thought. “That washard work!” I was sure the other passengers 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

9、compartment was full, but I was the only one standing. The people inthe carriage turned their eyes away as they noticed me looking at them;all except one, a beautiful woman sitting in the corner. I saw herwatching me in the mirror. Automatically, I adjusted my tie. She hadseen me running for the tra

10、in: maybe this was my lucky day after all. Iprepared 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 wasgetting middle-aged.Unit 4Aesop was a very clever man who lived in Greece thousands of yearsago. He wrote m

11、any good fables. He was known to be fond of jokes. Oneday, as he was enjoying a walk he met a traveler, who greeted him andsaid, “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 youto tell me how soon I shall get

12、 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, “Youwill get to town in two hours.” The traveler turned around inastonishment. “Why didnt you tell me that before?” he asked.“How could I have t

13、old you before?” answered Aesop. “I did notknow how fast you could walk.Unit 5Americans know that higher education is the key to the growth theyneed to lift their country, and today that is more true than ever. Justlisten to these facts. Over half the new jobs created in the last threeyears have bee

14、n managerial and professional jobs. The new jobs require ahigher level of skills.Fifteen years ago the typical worker with a college degree made 38percent more than a worker with a high school diploma. Today that figureis 73 percent more. Two years of college means a 20 percent increaseannual earnin

15、gs. People who finish two years of college earn a quarterof a million dollars more tan their high school counterparts over alifetime.Unit 6I began my career during college, reporting on news stories at aToronto radio station. The stations program manager was also aprofessor who taught one of my clas

16、ses. I convinced him that she neededa youth reporter because that year was International Youth Year. Aftergraduation, I took a job as a television news reporter and later, newsanchor. But sports reporting was something different, so I decided totry it. Figure skating was my first assignment.I had tw

17、o months until my new job began. It was like waiting anentire summer for school to start. I spent those two months talking tofigure skating coaches and judges. I read boring rule books. I drove tothe rinks where the skaters trained, and made notes about ourconversations. I even took a lesson, which

18、made some of the skaterslaugh.Unit 7Thomas Edison was one of ten said to be the greatest genius of hisage. There are only a few men in all of the history, who have changedthe lives of other men as much as the inventor of the first usefulelectric light. But Edison could never be happy only because so

19、meonesaid 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 earliestdays as a child he wondered about the secrets of nature. Nature, heoften said, is full of secrets. He

20、tried to understand them; then, hetried to learn what could usefully be done with them.Edison enjoyed thinking. He knew that most people will do almostanything instead ofthe difficult work of thinking, especially if they do not thinkvery often. But he knew, too, that thinking can give men enjoyment

21、andpleasure.Unit 8The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization says hungerkills millions of people each year especially children . The UNorganization says millions more people will die unless more money isinvested to fight against hunger.This is b ased on the result of a new UN study called

22、“The Stateof Food Insecurity in the World, 2002”. It found that more than ninemillion people die each year from hunger. Six million of them arechildren younger than age five. Researchers also found that the numberof starving people is growing in some parts of the world.The report says that about eig

23、ht hundred and forty million peoplearound the world are getting enough food to eat. Ninety-five percent ofthese people are in developing countries.Unit 9In contemporary English, there are many reported differences in thetalk of males and females . In same gender pairs having conversations,women gene

24、rally discuss their personal feelings more than men . Menappear to prefer non-personal topics such as sport and news . Men tendto respond to mention personal experiences that match or connect withthe other womans . There is a pattern documented in the AmericanEnglish social context of women cooperat

25、ing and seeking connection vialanguage, whereas men are more competitive and concerned with power vialanguage . In mixed-gender pairs having conversations, the rate of meninterrupting women is substantially greater than he reverse. Women arereported to use more expressions associated with tentativen

26、ess , such as“hedges” and “tags” , when expressing an opinion : Well ,erm , Ithink that golf is kind of boring , dont you ?Unit 10The University of Oxford, situated in the city of Oxford, England,is the oldest university in the English-speaking world . Theuniversities of Oxford and Cambridge are som

27、etimes referred tocollectively as Oxbridge. The two universities have a long history ofcompetition with each other, as they are two oldest and most famousuniversities in England.The date of Oxfords foundation is unknown, and indeed it may nothave been a single event , but there is evidence of teachi

28、ng there asearly as 1096. When Henry II of England of forbade English students tostudy at the University of Paris in 1167, Oxford began to grow veryquickly . The foundation of the first halls of residence, which laterbecame college, dates from this period and later. Following the murderof two studen

29、ts 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 Universitysstatus was formally confirmed.Unit 11Planet Earth is 4,600,000,000 years old. If we condense this times

30、pan we can compare it to a person 46 years old. Only at the age of 42did the Earth begin to flower. Dinosaurs and the great reptiles did notappear until one year ago, when the planet was 45. Mammalsarrived only eight months ago, and in the middle of last weekhuman-like apes developed into ape-like h

31、umans, and last weekend thelast ice age covered the Earth.Modem man has been around for 4 hours. During the last houragriculture was discovered. The Industrial Revolution began a minute ago.Since then, we have multiplied our numbers to plague proportions, causedthe extinction of 500 species of anima

32、ls, turned the planet upside downin the search for fuels, and now we stand, arrogant with power, on theedge of a war to end all wars, and close to effectively destroying thisoasis of life in the solar system.Unit 12London is one of the biggest cities in the world. It has apopulation of over 8 millio

33、n. Some people like it very much becausethere is a lot to do there and it is very interesting. There arehundreds of cinemas, theatres, museums and restaurants there. But otherpeople dont like it because there is so much traffic and noiseeverywhere.Brighton is a medium-sized town with a population of

34、 around 300,000.It is on the coast, about 50 miles from London. Of course it isnt asinteresting as London, but the air is a lot cleaner and better. Thereare a few factories, but not many. It isnt very easy to find a good jobthere. But there are a lot of hotels and language schools in the town,and in

35、 the summerthe town is full of tourists.Unit 13An old man died and left his son a lot of money. But the son was afoolish young man, and he quickly spent all the money, so that soon hehad nothing left. Of course, when that happened, all his friends lefthim. When he was quite poor and alone, he went t

36、o see Nasreddin, who wasa kind, clever old man and often helped people when they had troubles.“My money has finished and my friends have gone,” said the youngman. “What will happen to me now?”“Dont worry, young man,” answered Nasreddin. “Everything willsoon be all right again. Wait and you will soon

37、 feel much happier.”The young man was very glad. “Am I going to get rich again then?”he asked Nasreddin.“No, I didnt mean that,” said the old man. “I meant that youwould soon get used to being poor a nd to having no friends.”Unit 14The future will not determine itself. The future is determined bythe

38、 actions of the present day.Edward Cornish, the editor of The Futurist magazine published bythe World Future Society, says:The responsibility we have for the future begins when we recognizethat we ourselves create the future that the future is not somethingimposed upon us by fate or other forces beyond our control. We ourselvesbuild 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. Anengineering teach