新标准大学英语综合教程4教师用书(外研社)(2)

employment by lying on the sofa at home.

Culture points

honours degree: Traditionally, in the British university system, BA and BSc honours degrees are awarded

in different categories: a first class degree (written using Roman numbers as I), a second (divided into two

subcategories, written as IIii and IIii, which are called “a two one” and “a two two”), a third (written III) and

a pass degree. Most people get a second. There are also ordinary degrees with more general courses of study

without these categories.

Generation Y and Grunt: The main idea here is that there is a succession of different generations or

cohorts of adults who come into the workforce in North America which are given different informal names

to characterize them. First, “Baby boomers” were born in the great increase (the boom) of births after World

War II (1946–1960), followed by “Generation X” people (born 1960–1980) who were said to bring new

attitudes of being independent, informal, entrepreneurial, and expected to get skills and have a career before

them. “GenerationY” or the “Millenial Generation” (born 1980s and 1990s and becoming adult in the new

millenium) are now making up an increasing percentage of the workforce; they are said to be spoilt by doting

parents, to have structured lives, to be used to teamwork and diverse people in a multicultural society. In

the passage, this generation is now becoming (morphing into) Generation Grunt, which is an ironic name

referring to repetitive, low status, routine or mindless work – this may be the only work available to some

graduates, who may have to take very ordinary jobs to get experience before they find something more

suitable. “Grunt” also refers to coarse behaviour or bad manners and to the deep sound that is made by a pig;

when people “grunt” they express disgust but do not communicate with words – this may be how the parents

of new graduates think their children communicate with them!

A comprehensive refers to a British type of secondary school which became popular in the1960s. Before that

there were academic “grammar schools” and more general “secondary modern” schools for those who did

not pass the grammar school entrance tests, but the comprehensive schools