Номер 4, страница 27 - гдз по английскому языку 9 класс рабочая тетрадь Афанасьева, Михеева

Unit two. People and society - номер 4, страница 27.

Условие.

SFA 4. Read the text and choose the appropriate items to complete the sentences after it.

The Denial Rule

The main rule of behaviour on public transport in Britain is the Denial Rule: we try to avoid acknowledging that we are among a scary crowd of strangers, and to maintain as much privacy as possible, by pretending that they do not exist — and much of the time, pretending that we do not exist either. The Denial Rule requires us to avoid talking to strangers, or even making eye contact with them (eye contact in public places in England is never more than a fraction of a second: if you do accidentally meet a stranger’s eye, you must look away immediately — to maintain eye contact for even a full second may be interpreted as either flirtation or aggression).

At the same time, the rule imposes an obligation to avoid drawing attention to oneself and to mind one’s own business.

It is common, and considered entirely normal, for English commuters to make their morning and evening train journeys with the same group of people for many years without ever exchanging a word. The more you think about this, the more utterly incredible it seems, yet everyone I spoke to confirmed the story. Sometimes a particularly “outgoing” person might start to greet you with a brief nod after seeing you every morning for a couple of months, but many people would regard such a behaviour a bit forward, a bit pushy and that would make them a bit uncomfortable. This information I received from a young woman working as a secretary for a PR (public relations) agency in London. She was not an especially shy or retiring person. In fact, I would have described her as quite the opposite: friendly, lively and gregarious. I am quoting her here because her responses are typical — almost all of the commuters I interviewed said that even a brief nod constituted a fairly drastic escalation of intimacy, and most were highly cautious about progressing to this stage, because, as another typical commuter explained, “Once you start greeting people like that — nodding, I mean — unless you’re very careful, you might end up starting to say good morning or something, and then you could end up actually having to talk to them.” But what would be so awful, I asked each of my informants, about a brief friendly chat with a fellow commuter? This was clearly regarded as an exceptionally stupid question. Obviously, the problem with actually speaking to a fellow commuter was that if you did it once, you might be expected to do it again — and again, and again: having acknowledged the person’s existence, you could not go back to pretending that they did not exist, and you could end up having to exchange polite words with them every day. You would almost certainly have nothing in common, so these conversations would be highly awkward and embarrassing. Or else you would have to find ways of avoiding the person — standing at the other end of the platform, for example, or hiding behind the coffee kiosk, and deliberately choosing a different compartment on the train, which would be rude and equally embarrassing. The whole thing would become a nightmare.

1. The author of the text is ____________.

a) American

b) Australian

c) British

d) Canadian

2. The Denial Rule doesn’t allow people ____________.

a) to go by crowded trains

b) to pretend that they are scared

c) to come in contact with fellow passengers

d) to avoid talking to fellow passengers

3. Eye contact in public places in England ____________.

a) should be accepted as a symbol of danger

b) should be prohibited

c) should last a second

d) should last less than a second

4. Commuters on English trains ____________.

a) never talk to each other

b) choose not to give any sign of recognition to strangers

c) prefer to draw attention of others to themselves

d) always travel with the same group of people

5. An outgoing person is a person who ____________.

a) enjoys going out

b) is friendly and enjoys meeting people and talking to them

c) is open about his problems

d) is willing to consider many different possibilities

6. English people avoid greeting with a nod commuters who they might see every morning on the train because ____________.

a) they are afraid of being involved into a conversation

b) they are arrogant and don’t want to mix with other groups of people

c) they have nothing in common with them

d) they are embarrassed

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Variants

Решение.