Tag Archives: nbc nightly news

17 Dec

product, tool

Who taught: Brian Williams

Tool (source: http://peb.pl/albumy-rock-and-metal)

When I was young, I did not understand why my parents always wanted to watch news programs, especially, when there were some TV shows my brother and I really wanted to watch. You know what happened? Now, I love watching news programs. They are informative and fun as well. I watch two news programs. One is NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams (7 pm est) and CBS Evening News with Katie Couric (7:30 pm est). CBS one is more fun to watch. Katie uses a few fun expressions often. FYI, people here in the U.S. say “Do not watch any news from Fox channel.” Why? I do not know. Why don’t you try to ask your American friends the reason?

The other thing I want to point out is that news programs are amazingly useful to practice English. While watching them, I usually do the followings.

1. Listen very carefully to find out new words or expressions. I will get back to you later on this.

2. Listen very carefully to learn the sentences what anchors say. They are using very simple but great sentences.

3. Speak what anchors say! As soon as they say something, I myself speak them again out loud. I really try to mimic them in terms of voice and pronunciation. This way, I practice pronunciation and also it is a perfect way of practicing t0 listen and speak as fast as possible.

Getting back to the new words, a few days ago, I was watching NBC Nightly News and Brian Williams was talking about people who died on that day and he used a very interesting word. He said, “He is a product of Ohio and died today……” As soon as I heard it, I was quite surprised because that was the first time I heard the word, product, to describe a person. I have always thought product is the word that can be only used to describe things, not people. Well, I am a product of South Korea. How about you?

In this sense, there is another word which really sounds like it should be used to describe things but can be used in relation to people. It is “TOOL.” So, you can say like, “You are such a tool.” Wait!! You gotta keep reading. Here is the definition of the expression.

A fool. Characterized by low intelligence or self-esteem.

This expression is typically used for male. (Why? Who is using tools?) So, you would not want to use this often. Not a good expression at all. But, if you happen to be a guy and someone uses this expression to you, it is hard to understand if you do not know the meaning. You would be like, “Is he saying that I am good at dealing with tools or what?” So, again, it is really good to know these expressions to be able to protect yourself from being teased and participate in conversations properly.

28 Oct

shove it

shove it (source: www.celebpub.com)

A few days ago, Jessy and I were watching TV and heard one expression that we all do not understand. (Not a surprise! 🙂 ) By just hearing it, it sounded not really good at all. I think it was the NBC nightly news with Brian Williams. FYI, news is one of the things I really try to watch every day because they speak English very clearly and also I can learn a lot of political aspects of the United States. Anyway, one of the news that Brian mentioned was about a politician who tried to get an endorsement from Barack Obama, the president of the United States for his campaign. But, he was not able to get it.

He then got angry and told the president, “Shove it!” That was one of the news. Jessy and I started to look up the word, shove, to make sure what that means. The word, shove, means “push roughly.” For example, you are in a hurry and try to go though a big crowd to get to a place. What you are going to try is pushing people roughly so that you can get through them. In doing so, you are shoving. Then, what can “shove it” mean? Now, let’s imagine that you have something in front of you which is “it.” What will happen if you push it roughly? It will be moving away from you, right?

Moving on, what if you say this one to someone who is saying something? Then, his/her remark becomes an object that is being shoved. I believe you now get the idea of this expression. It is almost like “shut up” but I think this sounds even worse. But, to be honest, I still cannot get the correct feeling of this expression.

So, I will ask my American friends to answer my question. Which one is harsher, ‘shut up’ or ‘shove it’?