外研版高中英语必修四课文文本.docx

1、外研版高中英语必修四课文文本Module 1 Reading The City of the FutureWhat will the city of the future look like? No one knows for sure, and making predictions is a risky business. But one thing is certainthey are going to get bigger before they get smaller. In the future, care for the environment will become very i

2、mportant as earths natural resources run out. We will use lots of recycled materials, such as plastic, aluminium, steel, glass, wood and paper, and we will waste fewer natural resources. We will also have to rely more on alternative energy, such as solar and wind power. All this seems certain, but t

3、here are plenty of things about city life in the future which are not certain.To find out what young people think about the future of urban life, a teacher at a university in Texas in the United States asked his students to think how they would run a city of 50,000 people in the year 2025. Here are

4、some of the ideas they had:Garbage ships To get rid of garbage problems, the city will load huge spaceships with waste materials and send them towards the sun, preventing landfill and environmental problems.Batman Nets Police will arrest criminals by firing nets instead of guns.Forget smoking No smo

5、king will be allowed within a future citys limits. Smoking will be possible only outside cities, and outdoors.Forget the malls In the future all shopping will be done online, and catalogues will have voice commands to place orders.Telephones for life Everyone will be given a telephone number at birt

6、h that will never change no matter where they live.Recreation All forms of recreation, such as cinemas, bowling, softball, concerts and others, will be provided free of charge by the city.Cars All cars will be powered by electricity, solar energy or wind, and it will be possible to change the colour

7、 of cars at the flick of a switch.Telesurgery Distance surgery will become common as doctors carry out operations from thousands of miles away, with each city having its own telesurgery outpatient clinic.Holidays at home Senior citizens and people with disabilities will be able to go anywhere in the

8、 world using high-tech cameras attached to their head.Space travel Travelling in space by ordinary citizens will be common. Each city will have its own spaceport.Cultural Corner Famous Last WordsNot all predictions come true. Many of them are wrong, and some are very wrong. Here are just a few of th

9、e bad predictions people made in the twentieth century about the twenty-first century:AIRPLANESNo flying machine will ever fly from New York to Paris.Orville Wright, 1908.COMPUTERSI think there is a world market for maybe five computers.Thomas Waston, chairman of IBM, 1943.CLOTHESThirty years from n

10、ow people will be wearing clothes made of paper which they will be able to throw away after wearing them two or three times.Changing Times Magazine, 1957.MEN ON THE MOONWith the first moon colonies predicted for the 1970s, work is now in progress on the types of building required for men to stay in

11、when theyre on the moon.Arnold B. Barach in The Changes to Come, 1962.THE BEATLESWe dont like their sound, and guitar music is on the way out.Decca Recording Co. rejecting the Beatles, 1962.ROBOTS IN THE HOUSEBy the year 2000, housewives will probably have a robot shaped like a box with one large ey

12、e on the top, several arms and hands, and long narrow pads on the side for moving about.New York Times, 1966.KEYSBy the mid-1980s no one will ever need to hide a key under the doormat again, because there wont be any keys.Computer scientist Christopher Evans,The Micro Millennium, 1979.Module 2 Readi

13、ng Getting Around in BeijingTaxisTaxis are on the streets 24 hours a day. Simply raise your hand, and a taxi appears in no time. They are usually red, and they display the price per kilometre on the window. You should check the cab has a business permit, and make sure you ask for a receipt.Buses and

14、 trolleybuses Public transport provides a cheap way to get around in Beijing. There are 20,000 buses and trolleybuses in Beijing, but they can get very crowded. Its a good idea to avoid public transport during the rush hour (6:30 a.m.8:00 a.m. and 5:00 p.m.6:30 p.m.). Fares are cheap, starting at 1

15、yuan. Air-conditioned buses cost more.Buses numbered 1 to 100 are limited to travel within the city centre. Higher numbers have destinations in the suburbs. Tourists shouldnt miss the 103 bus which offers one of the most impressive routes, past the Forbidden City and the White Pagoda in Beihai Park.

16、 If you get on a double-decker bus, make sure you sit upstairs. Youll have a good view of the rapidly changing city.Most buses run from about 5:00 a.m. to midnight. However, there is also a night bus service, provided by buses with a number in the 200s.MinibusesMinibuses with seats for 12 passengers

17、 offer an alternative to expensive taxis and crowded public transport in some areas. They run regular services and follow the same routes as large public buses. And in a minibus you always get a seat even in rush hours.UndergroundThere are four underground lines in Beijing, and several lines are und

18、er construction. Trains are fast and convenient, but rush hours can be terrible. A one-way trip costs 3 yuan. Station names are marked in pinyin. The underground is open from 5:00 a.m. to 11:00 p.m.PedicabsTourists like these human-pedalled tricycle taxis, but they can be expensive. You should talk

19、to the driver, and make sure you know the price before you begin the journey, for example, if it is per person, single or return. Tricycles are worth using if you want to explore the narrow alleys (hutong) of old Beijing.Cultural Corner The London Congestion ChargeBeijing isnt the only city with tra

20、ffic problems. You can get stuck in a traffic jam anywhere in the world. The worst problems occur in cities which are growing fast, such as Sao Paolo in Brazil and Lagos in Nigeria. But even cities in developed countries such as the US suffer. Los Angeles, which was built with the motor car in mind,

21、 and is famous for its six-lane highways, is now the USAs most congested city.In Europe most capital cities were planned and built before cars, and city centre traffic jams have been part of daily life for a long time. The situation in central London, where drivers spent fifty percent of their time

22、in queues, became so bad that the local government decided to do something about it. In February 2003 the Mayor of London, Ken Livingstone, introduced a congestion chargea tax for cars entering the centre of the city.The idea is simple: every car coming into the centre has to pay 5 a day. Drivers ca

23、n pay the charge at any of 10,000 pay points in the capital before 10 p.m. As the cars come into the centre, video cameras record their registration numbers, and these are checked with a list of drivers who have paid the charge for that day. People who do not pay the charge will face a fine of 80.Mo

24、st Londoners are not happy with the idea. They agree that London has a traffic problem, but the congestion charge is expensive, and limits their freedom .But does the congestion charge work? A survey carried out at the end of 2003 suggests it does. After only six months, traffic coming into central

25、London was reduced by about 30 percent, and journey times by 15 percent. More people used public transport to get to work, and bicycles were suddenly very popular. Whats more, central London shops did not lose business even though there were fewer cars.But there are a few people who think the charge

26、 should be much higher, for example rich businessmen who work in the city centre and can easily afford it. This would keep even more cars out of central London, and the roads would be nearly empty. However, there are no plans to increase the charge.Module 3 Reading Greetings Around the WorldIf you s

27、ay the word communication, most people think of words and sentences. Although these are very important, we communicate with more than just spoken and written words. Indeed, body positions are part of what we call body language. We see examples of unconscious body language very often, yet there is al

28、so learned body language, which varies from culture to culture.We use learned body language when we are introduced to strangers. Like other animals, we are on guard until we know it is safe to relax. So every culture has developed a formal way to greet strangers, to show them we are not aggressive.

29、Traditionally, Europeans and Americans shake hands. They do this with the right handthe strongest hand for most people. If our right hand is busy greeting someone, it cannot be holding a weapon. So the gesture is saying, I trust you. Look, Im not carrying a threatening weapon. If you shake hands wit

30、h someone, you show you trust them. We shake hands when we make a deal. It means, We agree and we trust each other.Greetings in Asian countries do not involve touching the other person, but they always involve the hands. Traditionally in China, when we greet someone, we put the right hand over the l

31、eft and bow slightly. Muslims give a salaam, where they touch their heart, mouth and forehead. Hindus join their hands and bow their heads in respect. In all of these examples, the hands are busy with the greeting and cannot hold a weapon.Even today, when some people have very informal styles of gre

32、eting, they still use their hands as a gesture of trust. American youths often greet each other with the expression, Give me five! One person then holds up his hand, palm outwards and five fingers spread. The other person raises his hand and slaps the others open hand above the head in a high five. Nowadays, it is quite a common greeting.Body language is fascinating for anyone to study. People give away much more by their gestures than by their words. Look at your friends and family and