Earthworms are not creatures likely to attract much attention. Socretive, silent, slow-moving, and featureless, almost no one would ever think. Let’s quote Charles Darwin, who wrote: ‘It may be doubted wheather there are many other animals whichs have played so important a part in the history of the world as have these lowly-organised creatures’. That …
Unsung and Lowly Creatures – IELTS Academic Reading Passage Read More »
A When thinking of the most popular restaurant dish in the UK, the answer ‘chicken tikka masala’ does not spring readily to mind. But it is indeed the answer, often now referred to as a true ‘British national dish’. It may even have been invented by Indian immigrants in Scotland, who roasted chicken chunks (tikka), mixed …
The Spice of Life! – IELTS Academic Reading Passage Read More »
The idea that the continents are moving was first proposed by a German meteorologist, Alfred Wegener, in a book published in 1915. He had gathered a great deal of careful and tantalising evidence, the most obvious being the simple observation that the great landmasses of the world seem to fit together, jigsaw-like, a striking example …
Continents Collide! – IELTS Academic Reading Passage Read More »
When movies made in one language are shown to speakers of another, the two methods of resolving the language barrier are subtitling and dubbing. Subtitling is the written translation of the words, usually appearing discreetly at the bottom of the screen, while dubbing is the recording of voices in the target language. Dubbing, although seemingly …
Subtitling: Some Strategies – IELTS Academic Reading Passage Read More »
The human eye was not designed for the years of intensive book learning that are now common in modern society. The result is eye strain and deterioration, often at an early age, but this same society has provided the obvious answer: corrective lensed eyeglasses. Ubiquitous and ever present, coming in all styles, colours, and designs, …
Could You Pass Me My Glasses, Please? – IELTS Academic Reading Passage Read More »
Gordon Moore is the scientific brain behind Intel, the world’s biggest maker of computer chips. Both funny and self-deprecating, he’s a shrewd businessman too, but admits to being an ‘accidental entrepreneur’, happier in the back room trading ideas with techies than out selling the product or chatting up the stockholders. When he applied for a …
TITAN of Technology – IELTS Academic Reading Passage Read More »
A Our daily lives are largely made up of contacts with other people, during which we are constantly making judgments of their personalities and accommodating our behaviour to them in accordance with these judgments. A casual meeting of neighbours on the street, an employer giving instructions to an employee, a mother telling her children how to …
Psychology And Personality Assessment – IELTS Academic Reading Passage Read More »
There are more than two hundred different species and sub-species of birds in the London area, ranging from the magpie to the greenfinch, but perhaps the most ubiquitous is the pigeon. It has been suggested that the swarms of feral pigeons are all descended from birds which escaped from dovecotes in the early medieval period; …
The Birds Of London – IELTS Academic Reading Passage Read More »
For a one-year period I attempted to conduct an ethnography of shopping on and around a street in North London. This was carried out in association with Alison Clarke. I say ‘attempted’ because, given the absence of community and the intensely private nature of London households, this could not be an ethnography in the conventional …
A Theory of Shopping – IELTS Academic Reading Passage Read More »
A You might ask, why be concerned about the architecture of a stadium? Surely, as Long as die action is entertaining and the building is safe and reasonably comfortable, why should the aesthetics matter’ This one question has dominated my professional life, and its answer is one 1 find myself continually rehearsing. If one accepts that …
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