CULTURE Ò THE UNITED KINGDOM

THE UNITED KINGDOM CROSS-WORD
Read the text and complete the cross – word
U.K is the abbreviation for the ________ ________ .
The U.K includes England, ________ , Wales and Northern Ireland.
Great Britain is _________ , Scotland and Wales only.
The British Isles include England, Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland and Republic of __________ .
The capital of Scotland is __________ .
Cardiff is the capital of ________ .
Belfast is the capital of ________ .
THE UNITED KINGDOM CROSS-WORD
THE UNITED KINGDOM CROSS–WORD
THE UNITED KINGDOM CROSS–WORD
THE UNITED KINGDOM CROSS–WORD
THE UNITED KINGDOM CROSS–WORD
THE UNITED KINGDOM CROSS–WORD
THE UNITED KINGDOM CROSS–WORD
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland (usually shortened to the United Kingdom, the UK, or Britain) is a country and sovereign state that is situated in west Northern Europe. Its territory and population are primarily situated on the island of Great Britain and in Northern Ireland on the island of Ireland, as well as numerous smaller islands in the surrounding seas. The United Kingdom is bounded by the Atlantic Ocean, and its ancillary bodies of water, including the North Sea, the English Channel, the Celtic Sea, and the Irish Sea. The mainland is linked to France by the Channel Tunnel and Northern Ireland shares a land border with the Republic of Ireland.
The United Kingdom is a political union made up of four constituent countries: England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. The United Kingdom also has several overseas territories, including Bermuda, Gibraltar, Montserrat and Saint Helena among others. The dependencies of the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man, formally possessions of the Crown, form a federacy with the United Kingdom collectively known as the British Islands. A constitutional monarchy, the United Kingdom is a Commonwealth Realm, sharing the same person — Queen Elizabeth II — with the fifteen other Realms as monarch and head of state, forming a personal union with each.
Map of the United Kingdom
Map of England
Map of Scotland
Map of Wales
Map of Northern Ireland
The flag of The United Kingdom, known as the Union Jack, is made up of three crosses. The upright red cross is the cross of St George, the patron saint of England. The white diagonal cross (with the arms going into the corners) is the cross of St Andrew, the patron saint of Scotland. The red diagonal cross is the cross of St Patrick, the patron saint of Ireland. St David is the Patron saint of Wales.
THE UNION JACK
Flag of England
Flag of Scotland
Flag of Northern Ireland
Flag of Wales
When you visit London, one of the first things you will see is Big Ben, the famous clock which can be heard all over the world on the B.B.C. If the Houses of Parliament had not been burned down in 1834, the great clock would never have been erected. Big Ben takes its name from Sir Benjamin Hall who was responsible for the making of the clock when the new House of Parliament were being built. It is not only the immense size, but is extremely accurate as well. Officials from Greenwich Observatory have the clock check twice a day. On the B.B.C, you can hear the clock when it is striking because microphones are connected to the clock tower. Big Ben has rarely gone wrong. Once, however, it failed to give the correct time. A painter who had been working on the tower hung a pot of pain on one of the hands and slowed it down.
The Clock Tower - Big Ben
Canterbury Cathedral, one of the oldest and most famous Christian structures in the UK.
Unlike many countries today, which are officially secular, the UK is an officially Christian country. This is reflected throughout British public life, for instance, there are established state churches in England and Scotland and the Head of State is a Christian monarch crowned by an Arch-bishop in a church. British society is said to belong to the Judaeo-Christian tradition.
A majority of Britons, 72%, identify themselves as Christian. Christianity was first introduced to Britain by the Romans.
Despite this, a relatively small proportion of the population attends public worship on a weekly basis. The United Kingdom has one of the lowest levels of public worship attendance in the world, with less than 8% of people attending any form of worship on a regular basis (of whom the majority are of middle-aged and older generations).
Each home nation has its own church hierarchy.
Canterbury Cathedral
Hindu temple at Neasden
The UK is a constitutional monarchy. It means that it has a monarch (a queen or a king) as its Head of State. For many centuries ago, it was the richest country with many colonies all over the world. The position of the monarch in Britain is perfect illustration of the contradictory nature of the constitution. On many centuries before, the Queen or the King had almost absolute power, so it seemed very undemocratic. Today, the monarch has very little power at all. The British monarchy is probably more important to the economy of the country than it is to the system of government. Although the Queen appears to have a great deal of power, in reality she has very little.
The House of Common is the only one which has true power.
The British Prime Minster (now is Tony Blair) on the other hand, appears not to take much power but in reality has a very great deal indeed. Even though, every act of government is done in the Queen`s name
Other countries without a monarch have to use something else as the symbol of the country. In Britain, the monarchy is the symbol, especially the Queen. The monarchy appears as the paragon of family life in Britain. It offers the public a romantic link with a largely imaginary past. It gives the British a symbol of continuity and a harmless outlet for
the expression of national pride. Most British love the Queen and pay much attention to the monarchy state. The Queen`s official birthday ,royal weddings and ceremonial events such as the changing of the guard make up for the lack of color and ceremony in most people`s daily lives. There is no tradition of local parades as there in the USA and very few traditional local festivals survive as they do in other European countries.
Prime Minister TONY BLAIR and
the US President GORGE W. BUSH
Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philippine
The Palace of Westminster,
on the banks of the River Thames, London,
houses the Parliament of the United Kingdom.
The Mall looking onto Buckingham Palace,
The official residence of the British Monarch.
Parliament Buildings in Stormont, Belfast,
seat of the Northern Ireland Assembly
The kilt is a traditional Scotland garment.
There is no specifically British national costume. Even individual, England, Wales and Northern Ireland have only vestiges of a national costume; Scotland has the kilt and Tamo`shanter. In England certain military uniform such as the Beefeater or the Queen`s Guard are considered by tourist to be symbolic of Englishness, however they are not official national costumes. Morris dancers or the costume for the traditional English may dance are cited by some as examples of traditional English costume.
This is in large part due to the critical role that British sensibilities have played in world clothing since the eighteenth century. Particularly during the Victorian era, British fashions defined acceptable dress for men of business. Key figures such as Beau Brummell, the future Edward VII and Edward VIII created the modern suit and cemented its dominance. As such, it could be argued that the national costume of the British male is a three piece suit, tie and bowler hat-an image regularly used by cartoonists as a caricature of Brutishness.
The KILT is a traditional Scottish garment
A `typical` British family used to consist of mother, father and two children, but in recent years there have been many changes in family life. For example, the number of divorces has increased since the law made it easier to get a divorce. In fact, one marriage in every three now ends in divorce. However, the majority of divorced people marry again, and they sometimes take responsibility for a second family.
Members of family- grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins- keep in touch, but see less of each other than they used to. This is because people often move away from their hometown to work, and so the family becomes scattered. Christmas is the traditional season door reunions .Although the family group is smaller nowadays than it used to be, relatives often to spend the holiday together.
There are about 10 million old-age pensioners in Britain, of whom about 750.000 can not live entirely independently. The government gives financial help in the form of a pension but in the future it will be more and more difficult for the national economy to support the increasing number of elderly. At the present time, more than half of all old people are look after at home. Many others live in Old People Home, which may be private or state owned.
The individual and the family Relationship within the family are different now. Parents treat their children more as equals than they used to, and children have more freedom to make their own decisions. The father is more involved with bringing up children, often because the mother goes out to work. Increased leisure facilities and more money mean that there are greater opportunities for the individual to take part in activities outside the home. Although the family holiday is still an importance part of family life (usually taken in August, and often abroad) many children have holidays away from their parents, often with a school party or other organized group.
 The young people and law:
* Age 13: may be employed part-time.
* Age 14: allowed in bars but not to drink alcohol.
* Age 15: legally a ‘young person’ and not a ‘child’
* Age16: school leaving age can leave home, drive a moped, marry with parents’ consent (not needed in Scotland), and buy beer with a meal.
* Age 17: can drive a car or motorbike.
* Age 18: age of majority-can vote, get married without parents’ consent, own property, get tattooed, and drink in pubs…
The school year begins in late summer, usually in September and is divided into three terms. There are three main holidays: Christmas, Easter and for the month of August. In addition each term, there is normally a mid-term one –week holiday, known as “half-term”.
Education in Britain is provided by Local Education Authority (LEA) in each country. Local authority control with greater central government power combined with greater parental choice. Until recently each LEA was free to decide how to organize education in its own area .However, the “National Curriculum” was introduced. Now, there is greater governmental control over what is taught in school. The “National Curriculum” makes certain subjects, most notably science and modern language.
Nursery education (under 5 years): children start to go to school at five years old; however there is some (free) nursery–school education before that age.
Primary education (from 5 to 11 years): is divided two rank: infant school (pupils ages from 5 to 7 years) and junior school (pupils ages from 8 to 11 years)
EDUCATION SYSTEM
Private education (from 5 to 18 years) is called by different names: the preparatory school is for pupils ages up to 13, and the public schools are form 13 to 18 years old.
Secondary education (from 11 to 16/18 years)
The 1994, Education Act introduced free compulsory secondary education. Almost all children attended one of two kinds of secondary school. The decision was made on the results obtained in the “11 plus” examination, taken in the last year of primary school. 80% of pupils went to secondary modern schools (where they were expected to obtain sufficient education for skilled and employment). The top 20 % we were chosen to go to the academic grammar schools.
In 1965 (the labor government introduced) almost all the old grammar and secondary modern school were replaced by comprehensives.
Comprehensives Schools want to develop the talents of each individual child. They can choice subjects such as: art, sciences, Math, computer studies.
? College
There are many well-known universities in education, such as: Cambridge (1977), Oxford (1979).Universities choose their student after interviews, and arm petition for places at university is fierce.
In 1998, Labor shocked many who had voted for it by introducing tuition fees at Ê1000 per annum. Nowadays, all British citizens a place at university brings with it a grant from their local education authority.
After three at four years, students in college will take their finals. Most of them will get a first, second or third class degree and be able to put BA (Bachelor of Science) after their name. They will start to earn.
Cambridge University Library University College, Oxford
I`m in love!
On 14th February, St Valentine`s Day, many people send a card to the one they love or some one whom they have fallen in love with. People usually do not sign these cards and a lots of time is spend trying to guess who has sent them!
Valentine’s Day postcards
Easter eggs
At Easter time, the British celebrate the idea of new birth by giving each other chocolate Easter eggs which era opened and eaten on Easter Sunday. On Good Friday bakers sell hot cross buns, which are toasted and eaten with butter. Easter Monday is a holiday and many people travel to the seaside for the day or go and watch one of the many sporting events, such as football or horse-racing.
Easter Egg Decorating Easter Eggs
Ghosts and witches
Halloween means "holy evening", and takes place on 31st October. Although it is a much more important festival in United States than Britain, it is celebrate by many people in the UK. It is particularly connected with witches and ghosts. At patties people dress up in strange costumes and pretend they are witches. They cut horrible faces in potatoes and other vegetables and put a candle inside, which shines through the eyes. People may play difficult games such as trying to eat an apple from a bucket of water without using their hands.
In recent years children dressed in white sheets knock on door at Halloween and ask if you would like a "trick" or "treat". If you give them something nice, a "trick", they go away. However, if you don`t they play a "trick" on you, such as making a lot of noise or spilling flour on your front doorstep!
Halloween Party
Christmas Day
Christmas or Christmas Day is an annual Christian and secular holiday that celebrates the birth of Jesus, along with themes such as family, goodwill, giving and compassion. It incorporates Christian religious ceremonies with the traditions of ancient winter festivals such as Yule and Saturnalia. Christmas traditions include Nativity scenes, the exchange of gifts, the arrival of Santa Claus, Christmas cards and decorations and the display of Christmas trees.
Christmas is traditionally celebrated on December 25 which is the observed date of Jesus` birth, as well as the historic dates of the Roman festival of Sol Invictus and the Winter solistice. It is preceded by Christmas Eve and in some countries is followed by Boxing Day. Eastern Orthodox Churches celebrate Christmas on January 7, which corresponds to December 25 of the Julian calendar. These dates are merely traditional; the precise chronology of Jesus` birth and death is still debated.
Christmas is celebrated in most countries around the world, owing to the spread of Christianity and Western culture, mixed with the enduring popularity of exisiting winter celebrations. Various local and regional Christmas traditions are still practiced, despite the widespread influence of American and British Christmas motifs disseminated by film, popular literature, television, and other media.
Christmas tree
Gifts under a Christmas tree
Santa Claus and Reindeer
On Wednesday 24th October 1962, Love Me Do, entered the British Top Thirty. It was the first single by an unknown group from Liverpool called the Beatles. It was the first of a number of big hits that would make John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr the most successful pop group the world has ever known.
During 1960s the Beatles were always in the news headlines; films, world tours and sometimes scandal. John once suggested that the Beatles were better known than Jesus Christ. This caused hundreds of young Americans to burn their Beatle records. In addition some people thought there were hidden messages about drugs in some the songs.
After a decade of successful music and films, the Beatles finally decided to break up in the early seventies, after public disagreements about money and personalities.
Although many fans hopes there would be reunion throughout the 1970s, this became impossible with the traffic murder of John Lennon in New York in 1980.
The surviving Beatles are still deeply involved in musical and film projects, but many fans still long for the music of the 60s.
Sport plays such a large part in British life that many idioms in the English language have come from the world of sport, for example “to play the game “ means “to be fair”, and “that’s not cricket” means “that’s not fair”. The most popular sport in Britain as a whole is football. A lot of people support their local clubs at matches on Saturday afternoons, or watch the matches live on television.
Sport has for a long time been a very important part of a child’s education in Britain, not just- as you mat think – to develop physical abilities, but also to provide a certain kind of moral education. Team games in particular encourage such social qualities as enthusiasm, cooperation, loyalty, unselfishness. Above all, absolute fairness (no cheating) and being able to lose without anger (being a “good loser”) are considered important
Football Manchester United
team
Although there is ample evidence of a rich and varied approach to cuisine during earlier historical periods (particularly so amongst wealthy citizens), during much of the 19th and 20th century Britain had a reputation for somewhat conservative cuisine. The stereotype of the native cuisine was of a diet progressing little beyond stodgy meals consisting of "meat and two veg". Even today, in more conservative areas of the country, "meat and two veg" cuisine is still the favoured choice at the dinner table.
Meat and two veg
Traditional British fare usually includes dishes such as fish and chips, roast dishes of beef, lamb, chicken and pork, as well as regional dishes such as the Cornish Pasty and Lancashire Hotpot.
Fish and Chips
On 8 January 1940, four months after the outbreak of World War II, a system of food Rationing was introduced to conserve stocks and feed the nation during the critical war years. Rationing persisted until July 4, 1954 when a fourteen year period of relative privation (which profoundly affected a generation of people attitude to `a culture of food`) finally came to an end. With the end of rationing, Britain`s diet began to change, slowly at first during the 1950s and 1960s under the influence of such people as Elizabeth David, but immeasurably by the closing decades of the 20th century. During the transitional period of the 1970s, a number of influential figures such as Delia Smith (perhaps Britain`s most famous homegrown exponent of good food), began the drive to encourage greater experimentation with the new ingredients (e.g. pasta) increasingly being offered by the supermarkets.
The evolution of the British diet was further accelerated with the increasing tendency of the British to travel to continental Europe (and sometimes beyond) for their annual holidays, experiencing new and unfamiliar dishes as they travelled to countries such as France, Italy, and Spain. Towards the mid to late 1990s and onwards an explosion of talented new `TV chefs` began to come to prominence, (with figures as diverse as Jamie Oliver, Ainsley Harriott, Ken Hom, Nigella Lawson, Madhur Jaffrey, Nigel Slater, James Martin and Keith Floyd) this brought about a noticeable acceleration in the diversity of cuisine the general public were prepared to try and their general confidence in preparing food that had would once have been considered pure staples of foreign cultures, particularly the Mediterranean European, South and East Asian diets.
As a result, a new style of cooking Modern British emerged. This process of increased variety and experimentation in food inevitably dovetailed with the very profound impact that the post-war influx of immigrants to the UK (many from Britain`s former colonies in the Caribbean and Indian sub-continent) had on the national cuisine. The new communities propelled new and exciting dishes and ingredients onto restaurant tables and into the national consciousness. In many instances, British tastes fused with the new dishes to produce entirely new dishes such as the Balti, an English invention based on Indian cuisine that has since gained popularity across the world. Many of these new dishes have since become deeply embedded in the native culture, culminating in a speech in 2001 by Foreign Secretary, Robin Cook, in which he described Chicken Tikka Masala as `a true British national dish`. With the rich diversity of its peoples and its (arguably) relatively successful attempts at creating a true multicultural society, married to a reputation as an experimental and forward thinking nation, the future of British cuisine looks positive.
Steak and Kidney Pies with Cornish Pasties with chips,
chips and salad baked beans and salad
Chicken salad Toad-in-the-Hole
(sausages covered in batter and roasted)
SOME IMAGES OF
THE UNITED KINGDOM
The highest mountains in Scotland : Ben Nevis is 4,406 feet (1,343 m)
The highest mountains in Wales : Snowdon is 3,560 feet (1,085 m)
The longest rivers in the UK are the Severn (220 miles, 354 km) and the River Thames (215 miles, 346 km).
Stonehenge in fog
Bodiam Castle
Edinburgh