Inglés
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Inglés |
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| Ejercicios resueltos |  Use of English
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TITULO: The Big Bottle - Use of English
PALABRAS CLAVE: crowd, wander, search, get together, break out, booze-up, binge-drinking, fashionable, outdo, gathering, teenagers, councils, cautious, fear, drunken, unlikely, rubbish
In Spanish cities, at night, crowds of young people wander the streets in search of a party, meeting their friends and stopping to drink. When a large mass of people get together, a party spontaneously breaks out. This phenomenon, translated into English as booze-up or binge-drinking, is perceived by local governments as a social problem because it is impossible to predict where it will take place and because drinkers are as young as 12. In addition, now it has become fashionable to compete for the biggest national drinking party, as cities from Málaga to Madrid and Barcelona to Bilbao try to outdo one another by organizing the largest gathering. Word is spread by e-mail and text messages, and teenagers crowd into city centres, armed with bottles of soft drinks generously mixed with alcohol. City councils are very cautious about calling in the police for fear that drunken youths will turn to violence. The Government has tried to introduce emergency legislation but this is unlikely to have much impact, because, across Spain, regional authorities have set different minimum ages to buy alcohol. Despite Spain's reputation for civilised Mediterranean drinking habits, “the big bottle” leaves city centres full of rubbish, and residents, who have been kept up all night, furious. Under-age drinkers claim that this way they can enjoy a night out for as little as 6 euros a night, whereas bars are too expensive. Use of English: (?) a) Find in the text the word which has the following definition: “to walk around without a particular destination” (verb) Ayuda: wander significa "deambular", y concuerda con la definición: “pasear sin ningún destino en concreto.” b) Give one opposite for BREAK (verb) Ayuda: hay varios verbos cuyo significado es el opuesto a break (= romper). Cualquiera de los propuestos es una respuesta válida. Repair significa "reparar"; mend y fix significan "arreglar". c) Find in the text one synonym for LITTER (noun) Ayuda: buscaremos en el texto un sustantivo en singular con el mismo significado de litter que significa "basura", al igual que su sinónimo en el texto, "rubbish". d) Complete the series with another word of the same semantic group: CROWD, PARTY, GATHERING... Ayuda: existen muchas palabras que designan a un grupo de gente: mass (masa); group (grupo); assembly (concurrencia); multitude (multitud); mob (multitud); band (grupo, pandilla); meeting (reunión); bunch (grupo); throng (multitud, gentÃo); rabble (muchedumbre). e) Join the following sentences using an appropriate linker (do not use AND or BUT). Make changes if necessary. Although the Government has a good reputation, it has not solved the problem yet. Even though the Government has a good reputation, it has not solved the problem yet. Although the Government has not solved the problem yet, it has a good reputation. Despite the Government´s good reputation, the problem has not been solved yet. In spite of the government´s good reputation, the problem has not been solved yet. Ayuda: Hay varias posibilidades para unir estas dos frases en una sola oración. Por ejemplo, podemos utilizar las conjunciones although y even though o las preposiciones despite o in spite of. Todas ellas aparecen en oraciones concesivas (contrast clauses), que expresan un contraste entre dos cosas o ideas. Debemos hacer cambios en la frase según la que utilicemos. f) Fill in the gap with a correct form of the verb in brackets. Ayuda: los verbos modales perfectos (modal + have + past partciple) expresan conjeturas sobre hechos pasados como en este ejemplo. En negativa, esta forma con el verbo modal should indica algo que no deberÃa haber ocurrido según nuestra opinión. Si traducimos la oración al español: g) Rewrite the sentence without changing its meaning. Begin as indicated. Ayuda: unlikely es un adjetivo que significa "improbable". Su opuesto se forma sin el prefijo un- : likely, que significa "probable". Debemos utilizarlo si queremos que la frase mantenga su significado. Cambiaremos el adverbio quite de la oración original por very para acercarnos de manera más precisa al significado de la oración propuesta: quite unlikely = not very likely. h) Give a question for the underlined words. Ayuda: el verbo de la oración afirmativa está en pasado simple (drank) y asà debemos mantenerlo en la pregunta utilizando el auxiliar did. How many es el pronombre interrogativo que utilizamos para preguntar acerca de una cantidad cuando precede a un sustantivo contable. Si traducimos la oración:
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