Doç. Dr. Yalçın İzbul

Hacettepe Üniversitesi eski öğr. üyesi

Advanced Level Exercises

02/21/02 - 0002

 

Do not suppose for a second, Dearest Members, that our Beloved Country will take its place among the happiest nations as long as the daily exercise for most citizens remains consisting of: Dodging real issues, Jumping to conclusions, Side-stepping their responsibility, Making great strides in misgovernment, Walking off with public funds, Pushing their luck, and Running down their betters !!  izbul...

READING COMPREHENSION

[Remember Prof. Thornton's gems of double meaning, which I suggested that you translate into Turkish and thus have an impressive armory of ready-made statements to use when you are asked to write letters of recommendation for undeserving people?? Well, here is the second and final part...]

* * * * *

Lexicon of Inconspicuously Ambiguous Recommendations
( Ways to Handle Those Tricky Situations! )

( PART TWO )

Some examples from LIAR  --  continued

To describe an ex-employee who had problems getting along with fellow workers: I am pleased to say that this candidate is a former colleague of mine.

To describe a candidate who is so unproductive that the job would be better left unfilled: I can assure you that no person would be better for the job.

To describe a job applicant who is not worth further consideration: I would urge you to waste no time in making this candidate an offer of employment.

To describe a person with lackluster credentials: All in all, I cannot say enough good things about this candidate or recommend him too highly.

Thornton pointed out that LIAR is not only useful in preserving friendships, but it also can help avoid serious legal trouble in a time when laws have eroded the confidentiality of letters of recommendation.

In most states, he noted, job applicants have the right to read the letters of recommendations and can even file suit against the writer if the contents are negative.

When the writer uses LIAR, however, whether perceived correctly or not by the candidate, the phrases are virtually litigation-proof, Thornton said.

http://www-personal.monash.edu.au/~nate/humor/liar.html

 Fascinating Vocabulary 

 LOVE-BITES INTO ETYMOLOGY !! 

boycott :  Charles C. Boycott was an Englishman, a representative of landlords and a land agent whose nightmarish duty it was to collect the high rents demanded of Irish farmers. In protest, the farmers ostracized him: He was effectively barred from making purchases in town or hiring farm labourers to harvest the crops...

silhouette :  Etienne De Silhouette, who was the Finance Minister prior to the French Revolution, was known to advocate a simple life, ensuring that money in the country be simply channelled into the state treasury.. Remember that the simplest form of a portrait is the silhouette...

sadist :  The memoirs of the Marquis de Sade, an eighteenth-century French aristocrat, has never failed to fascinate imaginative people with his frank confessions of morbid torturing of friends and mistresses. Hence the word...

bayonet :  The deadly dagger-like weapon, which fits the muzzle of the rifle, was first manufactured in Bayonne, France...

gypsies :  Egypt was once supposed to have been the country from which this race of colourful fortune-telling wanderers had originated...

galvanism :  The word is after the inventor of the technique: Luigi Galvani, the Italian physiologist.

nicotine :  About four and a half centuries ago, Jean Nicot, who was the French ambassador to the Netherlands at the time, bought and planted some tobacco seeds from a Flemish merchant. His successful agricultural experiments later brought him linguistic immortality.

 Here Is An Advanced Level Vocabulary Test I have Prepared For You 

Test Yourself And See If You Can Find The Synonyms For : --

(1)...adversity    (2)...arrogant    (3)...censure    (4)...discreet    (5)...elegance    (6)...mean    (7)...pageant    (8)...persecute    (9)...slender    (10)...indifferent

( ) (a) reprove, criticize, disapprove of

( ) (b) hard luck, bad fortune, hardship

( ) (c) refinement, grace, good taste

( ) (d) haughty, pompous, overbearing

( ) (e) humble, insignificant, stingy, selfish

( ) (f) march, parade, procession, display

( ) (g) slim, thin, slight, meager

( ) (h) unconcerned, uninterested, disinterested

( ) (i) oppress, maltreat, abuse, molest

( ) (j) prudent, judicious, cautious

* * * * *

Study Suggestions Repeated for our New Members: Consult a good dictionary for any word you have doubts about -- for advanced learners I suggest an all-English dictionary and preferably one that offers extensive coverage of idioms and expressions for each entry and sample sentences as well... Write down your words in company with their dictionary definition, synonyms and antonyms, and a good number of the idioms and expressions it appears in, not forgetting the sample sentences... Try to memorize these sentences... Come back and have a look at the whole group from time to time - to refresh your memory and maybe to make a few additions...

Answers A Little Down The Page

You can always mail me, should you have any doubts lingering on your mind.

[ All Ads Deleted ]

 Test Results :  1-b   2-d   3-a   4-j   5-c   6-e   7-f   8-i   9-g   10-h 

Reading For Fun :

EuroEnglish

The European Commission has just announced an agreement whereby English will be the official language of the EU rather than German, which was the other possibility. As part of the negotiations, Her Majesty's Government conceded that English spelling had some room for improvement and has accepted a 5 year phase-in plan that would be known as "EuroEnglish"

In the first year, "s" will replace the soft "c". This will certainly make the sivil sevants jump with joy. The hard "c" will be dropped in favor of the "k". This should klear up konfusion and keyboards kan have 1 less letter.

There will be growing publik enthusiasm in the sekond year, when the troublesome "ph" will be replaced by the "f". This will make words like "fotograf" 20% shorter.

In the third year, publik akseptanse of the new spelling kan be expekted to reach the stage where more komplikated changes are possible. Governments will enkourage the removal of double letters, which have always ben a deterent to akurate speling. Also, al wil agre that the horible mes of the silent "e"s in the language is disgraceful, and they should go away.

By the fourth yer, peopl wil be reseptiv to steps such as replasing "th" with "z" and "w" with "v".

During ze fifz year, ze unesesary "o" kan be dropd from vords kontaining "ou" and similar changes vud of kors be aplid to ozer kombinations of leters.

After zis fifz yer, ve vil hav a reli sensibl riten styl. Zer vil be no mor trubls or difikultis and evri vun vil find it ezi tu understand ech ozer.

 ZE DREM VIL FINALI KUM TRU! 

ANASAYFA  --  TESTLER  --  OKUMA  --  EĞLENCE