雅思写作经典范文 10 篇
01 The Language of Music
A painter hangs his or her finished pictures on a wall, and everyone can see it. A
composer writes a work, but no one can hear it until it is performed. Professional singers
and players have great responsibilities, for the composer is utterly dependent on them. A
student of music needs as long and as arduous a training to become a performer as a
medical student needs to become a doctor. Mosttraining is concerned with technique, for
musicians have to have the muscular proficiency of an athlete or a ballet dancer. Singers
practice breathing every day, as their vocal chords would be inadequate without controlled
muscular support. String players practice moving the fingers of the left hand up and down,
while drawing the bow to and fro with the right arm-two entirely different movements.
Singers and instruments have to be able to get every note perfectly in tune. Pianists are
spared this particular anxiety, for the notes are already there, waiting for them, and it is the
piano tuner’s responsibility to tune the instrument for them. But they have their own
difficulties; the hammers that hit the string have to be coaxed not to sound like percussion,
and each overlapping tone has to sound clear.
This problem of getting clear texture is one that confronts student conductors: they have to
learn to know every note of the music and how it should sound, and they have to aim at
controlling these sounds with fanatical but selfless authority.
Technique is of no use unless it is combined with musical knowledge and understanding.
Great artists are those who are so thoroughly at home in the language of music that they
can enjoy performing works written in any century.
02 Schooling and Education
It is commonly believed in United States that school is where people go to get an
education. Nevertheless, it hasbeen said that today children interrupt their education to
go to school. The distinction between schooling and education implied by this remark is
important.
Education is much more open-ended and all-inclusive than schooling. Education knows
no bounds. It can take place anywhere, whether inthe shower or in the job, whether in a
kitchen or on a tractor. It includes both the formal learning that takes place in schools and
the whole universe of informal learning. The agents of education can range from a revered
grandparent to the people debating politics on the radio, from a child to a distinguished
scientist. Whereas schooling has a certain predictability, education quite often produces
surprises. A chance conversation with a stranger may lead a person to discover how little
is known of other religions. People are engaged in education from infancy on. Education,
then, is a very broad, inclusive term. It isa lifelong process, a process that starts long
before the start of school, and one that should be an integral part of one’s entire life.
Schooling, on the other hand, is a specific, formalized process, whose general pattern
varies little from one setting to the next. Throughout a country, children arrive at school at
approximately the same time, take assigned seats, are taught by an adult, use similar
textbooks, do homework, take exams, and so on.The slices of reality that are to be
learned, whether they are the alphabet or an understanding of the working of government,
have usually been limited by the boundaries ofthe subject being taught. For example,
high school students know that there not likely to find out in their classes the truth about
political problems in their communities or what the newest filmmakers are experimenting
with. There are definite conditions surroundingthe formalized process of schooling.
03 The Definition of “Price”
Prices determine how resources are to be used. They are also the means by which
products and services that are in limitedsupply are rationed among buyers. The price
system of the United States is a complex network composed of the prices of all the
products bought and sold in the economy as well as those of a myriad of services,
including labor, professional, transportation, and public-utility services. The
interrelationships of all these prices make up the “system” of prices. The price of any
particular product or service is linked to a broad, complicated system of prices in which
everything seems to depend more or less upon everything else.
If one were to ask a group of randomly selected individuals to define “price”, many would
reply that price is an amount of money paid by the buyer to the seller of a product or
service or, in other words that price is the money values of a product or service as agreed
upon in a market transaction. This definition is, of course, validas far as it goes. For a
complete understanding of a price in any particular transaction, much more than the
amount of money involved must be known.Both the buyer and the seller should be
familiar with not only the money amount, but with the amount and quality of the product or
service to be exchanged, the time and place at which the exchange will take place and
payment will be made, the form of money tobe used, the credit terms and discounts that
apply to the transaction, guarantees on the product or service, delivery terms, return
privileges, and other factors. In other words,both buyer and seller should be fully aware of
all the factors that comprise the total “package” being exchanged for the asked-for amount
of money in order that they may evaluate a given price.
04 Electricity
The modern age is an age of electricity. People are so used to electric lights, radio,
televisions, and telephones that it is hard toimagine what life would be like without them.
When there is a power failure, people grope about in flickering candlelight, cars hesitate in
the streets because there are no traffic lights to guide them, and food spoils in silent
refrigerators.
Yet, people began to understand how electricity works only a little more than two centuries
ago. Nature has apparently been experimenting in this field for million of years. Scientists
are discovering more and more that the living world may hold many interesting secrets of
electricity that could benefit humanity.
All living cell send out tiny pulses of electricity. As the heart beats, it sends out pulses of
record; they form an electrocardiogram, which a doctor can study to determine how well
the heart is working. The brain,too, sends out brain waves of electricity, which can be
recorded in an electroencephalogram. The electric currents generated by most living cells
are extremely small - often so small that sensitive instruments are needed to record them.
But in some animals, certain muscle cells have become so specialized as electrical
generators that they do not work as muscle cells at all. When large numbers of these cell
are linked together, the effects can be astonishing.
The electric eel is an amazing storage battery. It can seed a jolt of as much as eight
hundred volts of electricity through the water in which it live. (An electric house current is
only one hundred twenty volts.) As many as four-fifths of all the cells in the electric eel’s
body are specialized for generating electricity, and the strength of the shock it can deliver
corresponds roughly to length of its body.
05 The Beginning of Drama
There are many theories aboutthe beginning of drama in ancient Greece. The on most
widely accepted today is based on the assumption that drama evolved from ritual. The
argument for this view goes as follows. In the beginning, human beings viewed the natural
forces of the world-even the seasonal changes-as unpredictable, and they sought through
various means to control these unknown and feared powers. Those measures which
appeared to bring the desired results were then retained and repeated until they hardened
into fixed rituals. Eventually stories arose which explained or veiled the mysteries of the
rites. As time passed some rituals were abandoned, but the stories, later called myths,
persisted and provided material for art and drama.
Those who believe that drama evolved out of ritual also argue thatthose rites contained
the seed of theater because music, dance, masks, and costumes were almost always
used, furthermore, a suitable site had tobe provided for performances and when the
entire community did not participate, a clear division was usually made between the
"acting area" and the "auditorium." In addition, there were performers, and, since
considerable importance was attached to avoiding mistakes in the enactment of rites,
religious leaders usually assumed that task. Wearing masks and costumes, they often
impersonated other people, animals, or supernatural beings, and mimed the desired
effect-success in hunt or battle, the coming rain, the revival of the Sun-as an actor might.
Eventually such dramatic representations were separated from religious activities.
Another theory traces the theater’s origin from the human interest in storytelling.
According to this vies tales (about the hunt, war, or other feats) are gradually elaborated,
at first through the use of impersonation, action, and dialogue by a narrator and then
through the assumption of each of the roles by a different person. A closely related theory
traces theater to those dancesthat are primarily rhythmical and gymnastic or that are
imitations of animal movements and sounds.
06 Televisions
Television-----the most pervasive and persuasive of modern technologies, marked by
rapid change and growth-is moving into a new era, an era of extraordinary sophistication
and versatility, which promisesto reshape our lives and our world. It is an electronic
revolution of sorts, made possible by the marriage of television and computer
technologies.
The word "television", derived from its Greek (tele: distant) and Latin (visio: sight) roots,
can literally be interpreted as sight from a distance. Very simply put, it works in this way:
through a sophisticated system of electronics, television provides the capability of
converting an image (focused on a special photoconductive plate within a camera) into
electronic impulses, which can be sent through a wire or cable. These impulses, when fed
into a receiver (television set), can then be electronically reconstituted into that same
image.
Television is more than just an electronic system, however. It is a means of expression, as
well as a vehicle for communication, and as such becomes a powerful tool for reaching
other human beings.
The field of television can be divided into two categories determined by its means of
transmission. First, there is broadcast television, which reaches the masses through
broad-based airwave transmission of television signals. Second, there is nonbroadcast
television, which provides for the needs of individuals or specific interest groups through
controlled transmission techniques.
Traditionally, television has been a medium of the masses. We are most familiar with
broadcast television because it has been with us for about thirty-seven years in a form
similar to what exists today. During those years, it has been controlled, for the most part,
by the broadcast networks, ABC, NBC, and CBS, who have been the major purveyors of
news, information, and entertainment. These giants of broadcasting have actually shaped
not only television but our perception of it as well. We have come to look upon the picture
tube as a source of entertainment, placing our role in this dynamic medium as the passive
viewer.
07 Andrew Carnegie
Andrew Carnegie, known as the King of Steel, built the steel industry in the United States,
and, in the process, became one ofthe wealthiest men in America. His success resulted in
part from his ability to sell the product and in part from his policy of expanding during
periods of economic decline,when most of his competitors were reducing their
investments.
Carnegie believed that individuals should progress through hard work, but he also felt
strongly that the wealthy should use their fortunes for the benefit of society. He opposed
charity, preferring instead to provide educational opportunities that would allow others to
help themselves. "He who dies rich, dies disgraced," he often said.
Among his more noteworthy contributions tosociety are those that bear his name,
including the Carnegie Institute of Pittsburgh,which has a library, a museum of fine arts,
and a museum of national history. He also founded a school of technology that is now part
of Carnegie-Mellon University. Other philanthropic gifts are the Carnegie Endowment for
International Peace to promote understanding between nations, the
Carnegie Institute of Washington to fund scientific research, and Carnegie Hall to provide
a center for the arts.
Few Americans have been left untouched byAndrew Carnegie’s generosity. His
contributions of more than five million dollars established 2,500 libraries in small
communities throughout the country and formed the nucleus of the public library system
that we all enjoy today.
08 American Revolution
The American Revolution was not a sudden and violent overturning of the political and
social framework, such as later occurred in France and Russia, when both were already
independent nations. Significant changes were ushered in, but they were not breathtaking.
What happened was accelerated evolution rather than outright revolution. During the
conflict itself people went on working and praying, marrying andplaying. Most of them
were not seriously disturbed by the actualfighting, and many of the more isolated
communities scarcely knew that a war was on.
America’s War of Independence heralded the birth of three modern nations. One was
Canada, which received its first large influx of English-speaking population from the
thousands of loyalists who fled there from the United States. Another was Australia, which
became a penal colony now that America was no longer available for prisoners and
debtors. The third newcomer-the United States-based itself squarely on republican
principles.
Yet even the political overturn was not so revolutionary as one might suppose. In some
states, notably Connecticut and Rhode Island, the war largely ratified a colonial self-rule
already existing. British officials, everywhere ousted, were replaced by a home-grown
governing class, which promptly sought a local substitute for king and Parliament.
09 Suburbanization
If by "suburb" is meant an urban margin that grows more rapidly than its already
developed interior, the process of suburbanization began during the emergence of the
industrial city in the second quarter of the nineteenth century. Beforethat period the city
was a small highly compact cluster in which people moved about on foot and goods were
conveyed by horse and cart. But the early factories built in the 1840’s were located along
waterways and near railheads at the edges of cities, and housing was needed for the
thousands of people drawn by the prospect of employment. Intime, the factories were
surrounded by proliferating mill towns of apartments and row houses that abutted the older,
main cities. As a defense against this encroachment and to enlarge their tax bases, the
cities appropriated their industrial neighbors. In1854, for example, the city of Philadelphia
annexed most of Philadelphia County. Similar municipal maneuvers took place in Chicago
and in New York. Indeed, most great cities of the United States achieved such status only
by incorporating the communities along their borders.
With the acceleration of industrial growthcame acute urban crowding and accompanying
social stress-conditions that began to approachdisastrous proportions when, in 1888, the
first commercially successful electric traction line was developed. Within a few years the
horse-drawn trolleys were retired and electric streetcar networks crisscrossed and
connected every major urban area, fostering a wave of suburbanization that transformed
the compact industrial city into a dispersed metropolis. This first phase of mass-scale
suburbanization was reinforced by the simultaneous emergence of the urban Middle
Class, whose desires for homeownership in neighborhoods far from the aging inner city
were satisfied by the developers ofsingle-family housing tracts.
10 Types of Speech
Standard usage includes those words and expressions understood, used, and accepted
by a majority of the speakers of a language inany situation regardless of the level of
formality. As such, these words and expressions are well defined and listed in standard
dictionaries. Colloquialisms, on the other hand, are familiar words and idioms that are
understood by almost all speakers of a language and used in informal speech or writing,
but not considered appropriate for more formalsituations. Almost all idiomatic expressions
are colloquial language. Slang, however, refers to words and expressions understood by a
large number of speakers but not accepted as good, formal usage by the majority.
Colloquial expressions and even slang may be found in standard dictionaries but will be
so identified. Both colloquial usage and slang are more common in speech than in writing.
Colloquial speech often passes into standardspeech. Some slang also passes into
standard speech, but other slang expressions enjoy momentary popularity followed by
obscurity. In some cases, the majority never accepts certain slang phrases but
nevertheless retains them in their collective memories. Every generation seems to require
its own set of words to describe familiar objects and events. It has been pointed out by a
number of linguists that three cultural conditions are necessary for the creation of a large
body of slang expressions. First, the introduction and acceptance of new objects and
situations in the society; second, a diverse population witha large number of subgroups;
third, association among the subgroups and the majority population.
Finally, it is worth noting thatthe terms "standard" "colloquial" and "slang" exist only as
abstract labels for scholars who study language.Only a tiny number of the speakers of
any language will be aware that they are using colloquial or slang expressions. Most
speakers of English will, during appropriate situations, selectand use all three types of
expressions.