复旦研究生综合英语1Unit8

Unit 8 The Business World as a Hunting Ground,U8,Additional lnformation for the Teachers Reference,Text The Business World as a Hunting,Ground,Warm-up Activities,Further Reading,Speaking Skills,Additional Work,Warm-up Activities,Warm-up,1. How do you understand the title of the text,2. What do you think is the most important thing in a womans life,3. What kind of woman do you think a successful man usually,marries,Esther Vi1ar was born of German parents in 1935 in Buenos Aires and was educated at the University of Buenos Aires. After moving to Munich, she practiced as a physician and now works as a free-lance writer. This selection from The Manipulated Man has as its thesis that men from earliest childhood are manipulated by women, first by their mothers, then by their wives. Vi1ar claims that only women can break this vicious cycle of exploitation. But they will not break it, for they have no rational reason for doing so. Thus, the world will continue to sink into a barbaric, and feebleminded morass of femininity. Offices, factories, and universities are viewed as hunting grounds by predatory women looking for male “slaves.,AIFTTR1,Additional lnformation for the Teachers Reference,1. Esther Vilar,AIFTTR2.1,2. The Second World War,It was a conflict that involved virtually every part of the world during the year 1939 - 1945. The principal belligerents were the Axis powers Germany, Italy, and Japan and the Allies France, Great Britain, the United States, the Soviet Union, and, to a lesser extent, China. The war was in many respects a continuation, after an uneasy 20-year hiatus, of the disputes left unsettled by World War I.,German bitterness over their defeat in World War I and the harsh terms of the Treaty of Versailles, together with the social unrest and political instability that beset the Weimar Republic, resulted in the coming to power of Adolf Hitler, leader of the,AIFTTR2.2,intensely nationalistic and anti-Semitic National Socialist (Nazi) Party. Given dictatorial powers in 1933, Hitler began the secret rearmament of Germany almost immediately. Playing on the reluctance of other European powers to actively oppose him, he ordered the military occupation of the Rhineland, in contravention of the Treaty of Versailles, in March 1936. Later that year Benito Mussolini, the fascist dictator of Italy, who had already embarked on aggression in Ethiopia, declared a Rome-Berlin Axis; the next year Italy joined the 1936 Anti-Comintern Pact between Germany and Japan. Germany and Italy both intervened, in the name of anticommunism, in the Spanish Civil War from 1936. In March 1938 Hitler sent German troops to occupy Austria, which was promptly incorporated into Germany.,AIFTTR2.3,By a combination of external and internal pressures he succeeded in annexing or neutralizing all of what had been Czechoslovakia by March 1939. In April 1939 Italy annexed Albania. On September, secure behind the new German-Soviet Nonaggression Pact that had stunned the world in August, Hitler began an invasion of Poland. Great Britain and France declared war on Germany two days later. By the end of 1939 Germany and the Soviet Union had divided Poland between themselves, and the Soviets had occupied Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania and had attacked Finland, which they finally defeated in March 1940. For some months Germanys main activities were at sea, including an effective submarine campaign against merchant,AIFTTR2.4,shipping bound for Britain. In April 1940 Germany occupied several Norwegian ports and all of Denmark. On May 10 the major German offensive in the west began with a lightning weep through the Netherlands and Belgium into France; by June 22 three-fifths of France, including Paris, was occupied, and the rest had become a neutral state with its government at Vichy. During August-September the German Luftwaffe (Air Force) launched massive bombing raids on Great Britain in an attempt to soften it up for a cross-Channel invasion. The Battle of Britain was won by the Royal Air Force, however, and Hitler postponed the invasion indefinitely.,Following Italys abortive invasion of Greece in November 1940, Hitler drew Hungary, Romania, and Slovakia into the Axis;,AIFTTR2.5,Bulgaria joined in March 1941. In April Germany attacked Yugoslavia and Greece, both of which were overrun by the end of the month. In June Hitler abandoned the Nonaggression Pact of 1939 and launched a massive surprise invasion of the Soviet Union. German armoured units drove deep into Soviet territory and at one point reached the outskirts of Moscow before Soviet counterattacks and winter weather slowed the offensive to a halt.,Japan, the other Axis member, had meanwhile been tiring of its long, unproductive war in China and decided to take advantage of the situation in Europe to seize European colonial holdings in the Far East. To cripple what it foresaw would be its main opponent in a Pacific war of aggrandizement, Japan attacked United States installations at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, and,AIFTTR2.6,the Philippines on Dec.7 - 8,1941. Within days the United States was at war with all the Axis powers. Japan swiftly invaded and occupied the Philippines, most of Southeast Asia and Burma (Myanmar), the Netherlands East Indies (now Indonesia), and many Pacific Ocean islands. Despite the enormous initial advantage gained by its sudden offensives, Japan lost the crucial sea battle of Midway in June 1942. The American strategy in the Pacific was to use naval and amphibious forces to advance up the chains of islands toward Japan while smaller land forces cooperated with Chinese and British efforts on the Asian mainland.,AIFTTR2.7,In North Africa the British, who in 1940 - 1941 had defeated much larger Italian forces, were locked in a seesaw battle with the Germ November 1942 the first Allied offensive began with U. S. and British landings in North Africa. German forces were gradually squeezed into Tunisia and were finally eliminated in May 1943. In July Allied troops from North Africa landed in Sicily and thence invaded Italy in September. The fascist government was overthrown, and in October, Italy joined the Allies; fighting against German troops continued in Italy for the rest of the war.,After a bitterly opposed and finally unsuccessful attack on Stalingrad (August 1942 February 1943), German forces in the Soviet Union lost momentum, and, as the Red Army continued to,AIFTTR2.8,draw on its huge manpower reserves, it began during 1943 to push the Germans back from the western portion of the Soviet,Union. Germany was meanwhile preparing for an expected Allied invasion of western Europe. The invasion came on June 6, 1944 D-Day on the beaches of Normandy in northern France, where 156, 000 British, Canadian, and U. S. troops under the command of the U. S. general Dwight D. Eisenhower were landed. With command of the air the Allies quickly consolidated their foothold and began the advance eastward that ended in the occupation of the German homeland in March April 1945. Meanwhile, the Soviet forces in 1944 had pushed the Germans completely out of the Soviet Union and had advanced into Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, and Romania. In early 1945 they occupied the eastern,AIFTTR2.9,one-third of Germany. At the climax of the German collapse, with Berlin encircled by Soviet troops, Hitler committed suicide on April 30; on May 8 the surrender of all German forces was signed.,In the Pacific the “island-hopping strategy of the U. S. general Douglas MacArthur led to the Allied invasion of the Philippines by October 1944. The naval battle in Leyte Gulf that followed all but eliminated the Japanese navy. The capture, after bitter fighting, of the islands of Iwo Jima and Okinawa in March,and June of 1945 opened the way for both the heavy strategic bombing of Japan itself and a possible invasion. The war in the Pacific came to a sudden and dramatic close after the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki on August 6 and 9, 1949; Japans formal surrender was signed on September 2.,Text,The Business World as a Hunting Ground,Notes,Introduction to the Author and the Article,Phrases and Expressions,Exercises,Main idea of the Text,MIOTT1,Main idea of the Text,In the text, Esther Vilar describes how men, before and after their marriage, are manipulated by women, first by their female colleagues, then by their wives. She claims that women have a common proclivity to the exploitation of men. They regard the business world as a hunting ground where they can capture prospective breadwinners as their future husbands so that they can be provided for without exerting themselves. This evil intention is well displayed in offices and factories where women merely serve to falsify statistics with no sense of commitment, and in colleges and universities where they just mark time without real pursuit of knowledge. Vilar claims,that only women can break this vicious cycle of exploitation.,MIOTT2,But they will not break it, for they have no rational reason for doing so. Thus, the world will continue to sink into a barbaric and feebleminded morass of femininity. Offices, factories, and,universities will continue to be viewed as hunting grounds by predatory women looking for male “slaves.,Esther Vilar (1935 - ) was born of German parents in 1935 in Buenos Aires and was educated at the University of Buenos Aires. After moving to Munich, she practiced as a physician and now works as a freelance writer. This selection is chosen from The Manipulated Man which has as its thesis that men from earliest childhood are manipulated by women, first by their mothers, then by their wives. Vilar claims that only women can break this vicious cycle of exploitation. But they will not break it, for they have no rational reason for doing so. Thus, the world will continue to sink into a barbaric, and feebleminded morass of femininity. Offices, factories, and universities are viewed as hunting grounds by predatory women looking for male “slaves .,Introduction to the Author and the article,Introduction to the Author and the Article,Part2_T1,There are many women who,take their place,in the,working world of today. Secretaries and shop assistants,factory workers and stewardesses not to mention those,countless hearty young women who,populate,the colleges and universities in ever-increasing numbers. One might even get the impression that womans nature had undergone,Esther Vilar,The Business as a Hunting Ground,Text,a radical change in the last twenty years. Todays young women appear to be less unfair than their mothers. They seem to have decided perhaps out of pity for their victims not to exploit men any more, but to become, in truth, their partners.,The impression is,deceptive,. The only truly important act in any womans life is the selection of the right partner. In any other choice she can afford to make a mistake. Consequently, she will look for a man where he works or studies and where she can best observe and judge the necessary,masculine,qualities she values. Offices, factories, colleges, and universities are, to her, nothing but gigantic marriage markets.,Part2_T2,Part2_T3,The particular field chosen by any young woman as a hunting ground will depend to a large extent on the level of income of the man who has previously been her slave, in other words, her father. The daughters of men in the upper income brackets will choose colleges or universities. These offer the best chances of capturing a man who will earn enough to maintain the standards she has already acquired. Besides, a period of study for forms sake is much more convenient than a temporary employment. Girls from less-well-off homes will have to go into factories, shops, offices, or hospitals for a time but again with the same purpose in mind. None of them intend to stay in these jobs for long. They will continue only until marriage or, in cases of hardship, till pregnancy. This,Part2_T4,offers woman one important advantage, any woman who marries nowadays has given up her studies or her job “for the sake of the man of her choice and “sacrifices of this nature create obligations.,Therefore, when women work and study, it merely serves to falsify statistics and furthermore to enslave men more hopelessly than ever, because education and the professions mean something very different when applied to women as opposed to men.,When a man works it is a matter of life and death, and, as a rule, the first years of his life are decisive. Any man of twenty-five who is not well on his way up the ladder can be,Part2_T5,considered, to,all,intents,and,purposes, a hopeless case. At,this stage, all his faculties are being developed, and the fight with his competitors is a fight to the death.,Behind a mask of,business friendship, he is constantly on the watch for any,sign of superiority in one of his associates, and he will note,its appearance with anxiety.,If this same associate shows signs of weakness or indecision, it must be taken advantage of at once. Yet man is only a tiny cog in a gigantic business machine, he himself being in effect exploited,at,every,turn,.,When he drives others, he drives himself most of all,.,His orders are really orders from above, passed on by him.,If the men at the top occasionally take time to praise him, it is not in order to,Part2_T6,make him happy; it is only to spur him on, to stimulate him to greater effort. For man, who was brought up to be proud and honorable, every working day is merely an endless series of humiliations. He shows enthusiasm for products he finds useless, he laughs at jokes he finds tasteless, he expresses opinions which are not his own. Not for a moment is he allowed to forget that the merest oversight may mean demotion, that one slip of the tongue may spell the end of his career.,Yet woman, who is the prime cause of all these struggles, and under whose very eyes these fights take place, just stands aside and watches. Going to work means to her flirting and dates, teasing and banter, with the odd bit of “labor done for the sake of appearances work for which, as a rule, she has,no responsibility. She knows that she is only marking time, and even if she does have to go on working for one reason or another, at least she has had years of pleasant dreams. She watches mens battles from a safe distance, occasionally applauding one of the contestants, encouraging or scolding, and while she makes their coffee, opens their mail, or listens to their telephone conversations, she is cold-bloodedly taking her pick. The moment she has found “Mr. Right, she retires gracefully, leaving the field open to her successor.,The same applies to university education. American colleges admit more and more women, but the percentage who actually complete their courses is less than before the Second,Part2_T7,Part2_T8,World War. They sit happily in lectures designing their spring wardrobe and between classes flirt with the boys. With their scarlet nails carefully protected by transparent rubber gloves,they play around with corpses in the dissecting rooms, while their male colleagues realize their whole future is at stake. If a woman leaves the university with an engagement ring on her finger, she has earned her degree; man has hardly begun when he obtains his diploma. Degrees are, after all, easy to come by you have only to memorize. How many examiners can tell the difference between real knowledge and bluff Man, however, has to understand his subject as well. His later success will depend on whether his knowledge is well-founded; his later prestige will be built on this, and often other peoples lives are dependent on it.,None of these battles exists for woman.,If she,breaks,off,her studies,and marries a university lecturer, she has achieved the same level as he has without,exerting,herself,. As the wife of a factory owner she is treated with greater respect than he is (and not as somebody who at best would be employable on the assembly line in the same factory). As a wife she always has the same standard of living and social prestige and has to do nothing to maintain them as he does. For this reason the quickest way to succeed is always to marry a successful man. She does not win him by her industry, ambition, or perseverance but simply through an attractive appearance.,Part2_T9,Part2_T10,We have already seen what demands the well-trained man makes on a womans appearance. The best women trainers without the least effort catch the most successful fighters among men. The so-called “beautiful women are usually those who have had an easy life from their childhood days and therefore have less reason than others to develop their intellectual gifts (intelligence is developed only through competition); it follows as a logical consequence that very successful men usually have abysmally stupid wives ( unless, of course, one considers womans skill at transforming herself into bait for man a feat of intelligence).,It has almost become a commonplace that a really successful man, be he a company director, financier, shipping magnate, or orchestra conductor, will, when he reaches the zenith of his career, marry a beautiful model usually his second or third wife. Men who have inherited money often take such a supergirl as their first wife although she will be exchanged over the years for another. Yet, as a rule, models are women of little education who have not even finished school and who have nothing to do until they marry but look beautiful and pose becomingly in front of a camera. But they are “beautiful and that makes them potentially rich.,Part2_T11,Part2_T12,As soon as a woman has caught her man, she “gives up her career for love or, at least, that is what she will tell him. After all, he could hardly be flattered by the thought that she had been saved in the nick of time from having to sweat her way through examinations. He would much rather get drunk on the idea of the love “that knows no compromise, which this woman pretends to feel for him. Who knows, he thinks, she might have become a famous surgeon (celebrated prima ballerina, brilliant journalist), and she has given it all up for him. He would never believe that she preferred to be the wife of a famous surgeon, to have his income and prestige without having either the work or the responsibility. Therefore, he resolves to make her life at his side as comfortable as possible to compensate for her great sacrifice.,Part2_T13,A small percentage (ten to twenty percent) of women students in industrial countries of the West do, in fact, obtain,their degrees before they get married. Despite occasional,exceptions, they are, as a rule, less attractive and have failed to catch a suitable provider while still in school. But then, this,degree will automatically raise their market value, for there are certain types of men who feel,bolstered,if their wife has a degree ,providing they have one themselves,. It is clear evidence of his own cleverness if such a highly educated woman is interested in him. If by chance this female mastermind happens to be sexy,he will be beside himself with joy.,Part2_T14,But not for long. Even women doctors, women sociologists, and women lawyers “sacrifice their careers for their men, or at least set them aside. They withdraw into suburban ranch houses, have children, plant flower beds and fill their homes with the usual trash. Within a few years these new entertainments obliterate the small amount of “expert knowledge, learned by rote, of course, and they become exactly like their female neighbors.,slip of the tongue:,an error of speech,a tiny cog in a gigantic business machine:,a person who plays a small part in a large organization,his way up the ladder:,keeping improving his position,Notes,