研究生英语口语交流课程学习材料 (1)

II. Useful sentences in speaking

1.It‘s up to you. 由你决定。

2. I envy you. 我羡慕你。

3. How can I get in touch with you? How can I contact/reach you? 我怎么和你联系？

4. Where can I wash my hands? 请问卫生间在哪？

5. Where are you headed? 你要去哪？

6. I wasn‘t born y esterday. 我又不是三岁小孩。

7. What do you do for relaxation? 你做什么消遣？

8. It‘s a small world. 这世界真小。

9. It‘s my treat this time. 这次我请客。

10. When is the most convenient time for you? 你何时最方便？

III. Group discussion

Topic 1: Physical Attractiveness

It has become a self-fulfilling prophecy. The popular television series Friends played on anorexic chic in an ad which was soon pulled.

In some ways, we all have distorted views of what is beautiful. And the repeated exposure to a particular image teaches you to like that particular image. And we have become so used to seeing extremely thin women that we have learned to think that this is what is beautiful.

The mystique of thin began with the arrival of the British model Twiggy in the late 1960s. Standing five feet six inches tall, she weighed only 91 pounds and was dubbed Britain‘s top mini model. Since then, fashion models have become increasingly thinner, with body weights nearly 25 percent less than the average American woman who weighs 140 pounds.

I think there are two primary things going on right now with the cultural availability of eating disorders. First, the whole society is involved in the perfection game, alright, that we all can fix our bodies, make our bodies over. And then, I think, among young women, they are increasingly tuned in to a celebrity culture where the models‘ and actresses‘ bodies are considerably thinner than they have ever been in the past. This is very seductive and hard for young girls to resist. This is not about illness. This is about idealized beauty and perfection of a certain type.

These plus-size models are boldly challenging contemporary ideals of beauty. Ranging from size 12 to 18 they are much more in tune with the average American woman. Now a plus-size icon, Kate Dillon started out as a skinny model.

I think it happens to everybody at some point where you feel one way about yourself. And that your initial, your intuition about who you are is that you‘re a good person, that you‘re beautiful, that you‘re strong, that you‘re capable. And then at some point it‘s met with an outside force that‘s telling you, ―no, you‘re none of those things.‖

I remember getting ready for my first day of Junior High. And I was sitting at my mirror, putting on my electric blue mascara and my frosted pink lipstick. And I was thinking I was like, ―yeah, I‘m fine. I‘m looking good.‖ You know? And when I got to school, it was just, they were just horrible to me, telling me I was fat. And whether it was in PE or coming home on the bus every day, they‘d stand up, and they would jump up and down, and they would chant, ―overweight Kate, overweight Kate‖. And I remember just like, you know, I‘m like sitting in the front seat. I would always wear these massive sweaters, and I was sitting in the front seat, and just like trying so hard not to cry, because I was so embarrassed and horrified.