Национальный характер: миф или реальность. Часть 2

Н.А. СУШКОВА 

НАЦИОНАЛЬНЫЙ ХАРАКТЕР: 

 МИФ ИЛИ РЕАЛЬНОСТЬ? 

Учебное пособие 

Часть 2 

Липецк – 2020 

МИНИСТЕРСТВО ПРОСВЕЩЕНИЯ РОССИЙСКОЙ ФЕДЕРАЦИИ 

ФЕДЕРАЛЬНОЕ ГОСУДАРСТВЕННОЕ БЮДЖЕТНОЕ ОБРАЗОВАТЕЛЬНОЕ 
УЧРЕЖДЕНИЕ  ВЫСШЕГО ОБРАЗОВАНИЯ 

«ЛИПЕЦКИЙ ГОСУДАРСТВЕННЫЙ ПЕДАГОГИЧЕСКИЙ УНИВЕРСИТЕТ 
ИМЕНИ П.П. СЕМЕНОВА-ТЯН-ШАНСКОГО» 

ИНСТИТУТ ФИЛОЛОГИИ 

Кафедра лингвистики и  

межкультурной коммуникации 

Н.А. СУШКОВА 

National Character: 

Myth or Reality? 

Учебное пособие 

Часть 2 

Липецк – 2020 

МИНИСТЕРСТВО ПРОСВЕЩЕНИЯ РОССИЙСКОЙ ФЕДЕРАЦИИ 

ФЕДЕРАЛЬНОЕ ГОСУДАРСТВЕННОЕ БЮДЖЕТНОЕ ОБРАЗОВАТЕЛЬНОЕ 
УЧРЕЖДЕНИЕ  ВЫСШЕГО ОБРАЗОВАНИЯ 

«ЛИПЕЦКИЙ ГОСУДАРСТВЕННЫЙ ПЕДАГОГИЧЕСКИЙ УНИВЕРСИТЕТ 
ИМЕНИ П.П. СЕМЕНОВА-ТЯН-ШАНСКОГО» 

ИНСТИТУТ ФИЛОЛОГИИ 

Кафедра лингвистики и  

межкультурной коммуникации 

Н.А. СУШКОВА 

НАЦИОНАЛЬНЫЙ ХАРАКТЕР: 

 МИФ ИЛИ РЕАЛЬНОСТЬ? 

Учебное пособие 

Часть 2 

Липецк – 2020 

УДК 43 
ББК 81.432.1-7 
С 89 

Печатается по решению кафедры 
лингвистики и межкультурной  
коммуникации  ЛГПУ имени  
П.П. Семенова-Тян-Шанского 
Протокол № 9 от  24.04.2020  г. 

Сушкова, Н.А. Национальный характер: миф или реальность? 

С89 учебное пособие / Н.А. Сушкова. – Липецк: ЛГПУ имени 

П.П. Семенова-Тян-Шанского, 2020. – Ч. 2. – 81 с.  Текст непосредственный.

 ISBN 978-5-907168-94-7 (Ч. 2) 
ISBN 978-5-907168-91-6 

В пособии рассматриваются вопросы национальной идентичности 
англичан, американцев, русских. Статьи современных англоязычных авторов 
знакомят обучающихся с различными точками зрения на актуальные проблемы 
взаимоотношений между представителями различных стран. Каждый текст 
сопровождается упражнениями на развитие всех видов речевой деятельности, 
заданиями проектного характера.  
Данное 
пособие 
предназначено 
для 
студентов, 
обучающихся 
по 
направлению 45.03.02 «Лингвистика» (Теория и методика преподавания 
иностранных языков и культур), изучающих английский как основной 
иностранный язык и владеющих им на уровне B2 или C1 (Upper-Intermediate 
или Advanced). Может быть использовано для самостоятельной работы над 
совершенствованием речевых навыков. Рекомендовано для слушателей 
программ дополнительного профессионального образования соответствующего 
направления подго-товки

  УДК 43  

       ББК 81.432.1-7 

РЕЦЕНЗЕНТЫ:

 
 
 
  C 89 
Н.В. Урусова, канд. филол. наук, доцент ЛГПУ 
имени П.П. Семенова-Тян-Шанского 
О.В. Кашкарова, канд. филол. наук, доцент 
кафедры иностранных языков ЛГТУ 

© ФГБОУ ВО «Липецкий государственный 
педагогический университет имени 
П.П. Семенова-Тян-Шанского»,  2020 
© Н.А. Сушкова, 2020 

ISBN 978-5-907168-94-7 (Ч. 2)
ISBN 978-5-907168-91-6

UNIT FIVE: THE AMERICANS VS THE BRITISH 

As American As Apple Pie? 

If you say that someone or something is as American as apple pie, you 

mean that they are typical of the United States or of the people of this 

country.  

e.g. Leather jackets are as American as apple pie and Harley-Davidsons.

1. Pre-listening. In pairs decide how the things differ in the UK and

America: 

- relations between men and women/ family members/ friends and

colleagues

- attitude to work/ personal property/ people of other nationalities/ animals

- way of life in general

Listen to the interview with Terry Tompshire, an American who spent a 

lot of time in Great Britain, and compare the results. 

2. Read the article and put down the differences between the two nations.

The English Character: by an American 

by Henry Steele Commager 

―The United States and Britain‖, so Churchill said on a memorable 

occasion, ―are going to get more and more mixed up together‖. 

We have, to be sure, always been mixed up. But in early years, that 

relationship caused a good deal of distress, and Americans devoted their 

minds and energies to independence - not just political and economic, but 

cultural and psychological as well. 

It is almost inevitable, then, that we think of the English as a 

branch of the American family, and the English think of Americans in the 

same domestic fashion. In many and important respects the English and 

American peoples are unlike. The differences between the two, often 

extreme, are important. Here are some of them.  

1. England is the land of law and order. It was not always thus, but 

for 100 years and more England has been the very paragon of law-

abidingness, of orderliness, of the right and fair. If there is one idea more 

universally cherished by the English than any other, it is the idea of 

justice. The English obey the law. 

America is, by contrast, lawless and disorderly. Even the authorities 

do not really expect the public to observe speed laws or parking laws. 

That is why. they so often resort to absurdities like, "This Law Will be 

Enforced," as if others ordinarily would not. 

2. Part of the English sense for law and orderliness is a love of 

precedent. For an Englishman, the best of all reasons for doing something 

in a certain way is that it has always been done in that way.  

The American inclination is just the opposite. The normal American 

dearly loves what is new. He wants the latest style in everything. 

3. The English are practical and realistic; they are infatuated with 

common sense. They are not misled by romantic delusions of Bigness or of 

streamlined office procedure, and as a result many of their business 

practices are more efficient than the American. 

Americans are romantic and impractical. They are bemused by the 

future rather than the present, confident that the Golden Age is just ahead. 

They live, at least part of the time, in a world of fantasy projected by 

Hollywood; the fantasy created by television; the fantasy built up by the 

magazines; the fantasy world of advertising. 

4. In few realms is the contrast between English and American habits 

sharper than in the realm of business. In a broad way, it is correct to say 

that in England the customer is always wrong. A stranger indeed might get 

the impression that the chief object of any English trades person or clerk is 

to put him in the wrong, and much of business is a kind of gamesmanship 

where the seller scores points on the hapless buyer. 

The contrast of all this with American habits is dramatic. In the 

United States the customer is always right; he is always pampered. The 

English have no use for consumer research, but in America it has the dignity 

of a science; and American universities teach salesmanship and management  

- a thing English universities scorn to do. 

5. The English are prudent and careful about almost everything. Their 

lawns are closely cropped, their flower beds primly cultivated, and their 

trees neatly pruned. Everything is orderly. Drinks are carefully measured, 

seats in a moving picture theatre are carefully assigned (even if the theatre is 

empty, you are required to sit in the seat assigned to you), closing hours 

rigorously observed. 

The Americans, on the other hand, are congenitally and unashamedly 

careless. 

6. One consequence of English caution and prudence is the habit of 

suspiciousness. This is curious, for the English are among the kindest of 

people and the most honest. Yet the whole of their business and much of 

their social life seems organized on the basis of suspicion. The English 

demand your credentials, and woe to you if you cannot produce them; an 

honest face and good intentions are not enough. 

In America all this is reversed. Here almost everything is easy, and 

easy-going. Any hotel or shop will take your cheque, and almost any bank. 

You can walk into any library, borrow any book, do business anywhere, 

without worrying too much about introducing yourself or proving yourself. 

But though the reins are slack, they are short. Bills come monthly, not 

quarterly, and if you fail to pay promptly the alarm is sounded. 

7. England is still a man’s country. Oxford and Cambridge keep to 

the traditional ratio of ten men to one woman. England is the land of the 

club, the dower house, and the separation of the sexes in schools. 

The average English home still lacks many of the elementary 

laboursaving machines and gadgets that American housewives take for 

granted. 

8. The English have still in many, and important, respects a class 

society. Accent is important - accent and speech. Eton and Harrow, 

Winchester and Westminster, and a dozen other "public" schools play a 

role foreign to their American equivalents, if there are any American 

equivalents. 

9. The English sense of and feeling for privacy is notorious. England is 

the land of brick fences (often with glass embedded along the top), of 

hedges, of thick draperies at all the windows, and reluctant introductions. 

Privacy extends from the superficial to the intimate. 

The American has little use for privacy and no respect for it. He 

prefers to live in public [4]. 

 

Setwork 

1. Give the English equivalents: 

Законопослушание; проводить закон в жизнь; рациональный, 

баловать, потакать; презирать; строго; неохотный; исследование 

покупательского спроса; лелеять; одурачить кого-либо; получить 

преимущество над кем-либо 

 

2. Match the word with its definition: 

delusion
model of excellence , perfect person or thing

gadget
earlier happening

credentials
wild and foolish love

paragon
false opinion or believe

prudent
the art of winning games

precedent
careful, acting only after careful thought or 

planning

promptly
present from or before birth

infatuation
letters or papers showing that a person is what