英美概况复习--the Great Britain
Unit One: The Country
1. Briefly discuss the international influence which the UK exercises on today’s world stage.
By the turn of the 20th century, the United Kingdom had built up a huge overseas empire, which at its height in 1922 encompassed almost a quarter of the world’s land surface, the largest empire in history. Today it has fourteen overseas territories, all remnants of the British Empire. British influence can continue to be observed in the language, culture and legal systems of many of its former colonies. Queen Elizabeth II remains the head of the Commonwealth of Nations and head of state of each of the Commonwealth realms.
It was the world's first industrialised country and the world's foremost power during the 19th and early 20th centuries, but the economic cost of two world wars and the decline of its empire in the latter half of the 20th century diminished its leading role in global affairs. The UK nevertheless remains a major power with strong economic, cultural, military and political influence worldwide. It is a developed country, with the fifth (nominal GDP) or sixth (PPP) largest economy in the world. It is a nuclear power and has the second or third highest defence spending in the world. It is a Member State of the European Union, holds a permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council, and is a member of the G8, NATO, OECD, World Trade Organization and the Commonwealth of Nations. The UK today pursues an active global approach to foreign policy, which invariably involves a close military and political relationship with the United States. Britain's global presence and influence is further amplified through its trading relations and its armed forces, which maintain approximately eighty military installations and other deployments around the globe.
2. Discuss the differences between the terms of “British Isles”, “United Kingdom”, “Great Britain”, and “England”.
(1) The British Isles
The British Isles is a geographically term which includes Great Britain, the whole of Ireland, and all the offshore islands, most notably the Isle of Man which has its own parliament and laws. Or, in detail, it is consists of the following islands:
●Great Britain (England, Scotland and Wales)
●Ireland (the Republic of Ireland, a country west of England across the Irish Sea (not part of the United Kingdom)
●Northern Ireland ( part of the United Kingdom)
●The Orkney and Shetland Islands (islands off the northeast coast of Scotland)
●The Isle of Man (an island in the Irish Sea)
●Hebrides (including the Inner Hebrides, Outer Hebrides and Small Isles). All are islands off the northwest coast of Scotland.
●The Isle of Wight (an island off the southern coast of England)
●Isles of Scilly (an island off the southwest coast of England)
●Lundy Island (an island off the southwest coast of England)
●The Channel Islands (a group of small islands in the English Channel, off
the coast of Normandy, France. The principal islands of the group include
Jersey, Guernsey, Alderney and Sark.)
●Plus about five thousand other offshore small islands.
Map of the British Isles
(2) Great Britain
Great Britain can be a geographical term referring to the island on which England, Wales and Scotland are situated, together with numerous smaller islands, which comprise the main territory of the United Kingdom. It has an area of 229,850 km2 (88,745 sq. mi.) and is the largest island of the British Isles. Great Britain can also be a political term serving as the official name for the two kingdoms of England and Scotland, and the principality of Wales.
Great Britain
Great Britain is very often, but incorrectly, used as a synonym for the sovereign state properly known as the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland or
the United Kingdom (UK) for short, but Great Britain and the United Kingdom refer to different areas. If you look at the full name of the UK, you will see that the UK includes Great Britain AND Northern Ireland.
Great Britain United Kingdom Sometimes people use the shortened name Britain instead of Great Britain, to mean the same thing, but in the strict sense Britain only refers to England and Wales. The name Britain goes back to Roman times when they called England and Wales "Britannia" (or "Britannia Major", to be distinguished from "Britannia Minor", ie Brittany in France). The Roman province of Britannia only covered the areas of modern England and Wales. The area of modern Scotland was never finally conquered.
(3) The United Kingdom
The official name of the United Kingdom (UK) is the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Island. It is made of:
●England - The capital is London
●Scotland - The capital is Edinburgh
●Wales - The capital is Cardiff
●Northern Ireland - The capital is Belfast.
People in the UK are called British although they have different nationalities.
The United Kingdom (UK) was formed in on January 1, 1801 and constituted and still constitutes the greater part of the British Isles. In history it was the union of what were once four separate nations: England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland. When the Irish Free State ceased to be part of the Union in 1922, the title changed to include “Northern Ireland”.
The United Kingdom
(4) England
Located in north-west Europe and in the southern part of Great Britain, England is the largest country (historically it is called a country or nation) in Great Britain and the UK. It is sometimes wrongly used in reference to the whole United Kingdom, the entire island of Great Britain, or indeed the British Isles. This is not only incorrect but can cause offence to people from other parts of the UK. England has not had a separate political identity since 1707, when Great Britain was established as a political entity. There is no government or parliament just for England.
England
1.How has climate affected the Southern way of life? Why are Southerners,
in general, so conservative?
Key Points:
The South has mild winters and hot summers, making it an ideal place for agricultural industry.
For a long time, southern agriculture was characterized by plantation economy, controlled by slave-owners and landed gentry class, whose vested interest in plantation economy made them conservative virtually in every aspect, politically, economically and socially.
Historically, the South was hierarchical in its social structure, giving rise to a caste system based on black salves and indentured servants, with big plantation owners sitting at the top.
The Southern slow-paced agricultural life has produced what people there call “the Southern way of life”, which in principle, cherishes rural virtues, emphasizes community life, suspects modernization, and rejects moral sins..
2.Traditionally, New Englanders have always attached great importance to
education. Why is that and what are the implications?
Key Points:
Education is important to Puritans as a way of seeking truth from the Bible. It is true for both clergymen and laymen.
Education is important to the cultivation of republican virtues for public-minded New Englanders, who launched the public school movement as early as the early 19th century.
Education is believed to be the best vehicle for common people to realize their potential and ultimately their personal worth. Being a place that stresses equality and democracy (as reflected in its town meeting and congregationalism), New England has always led the nation in making education available to all people across the board.
Education has developed rapidly in the area at all levels, from elementary- and secondary-level education to college and university education, and from public to private education.
Unit Two: The People
1. Discuss how the English, Welsh, Irish and Scottish have defined themselves in term of their individual nationalities.
People from various ethnic groups reside in the United Kingdom. For most of the last millennium, the lands now constituting the United Kingdom were largely inhabited by English, Scots, Irish, Welsh people.
The English are a nation and ethnic group native to England who speak English, whose identity as a people is of early medieval origin. Today the largest single English population resides in England, forming the largest part of the racially-based classification used in the 2001 UK census known as White British. It is difficult to clearly define the origins of the English, owing to the close interactions between the English and their neighbours in the British Isles, and the waves of immigration that have added to England's population at different periods. The English are often believed to be a mixture of several closely related groups that have settled in what became England, such as the Angles, Saxons, Norse Vikings and Normans. Another complication in defining the English is a common tendency for the words "English" and "British" to be used interchangeably. This blurring is a sign of England's dominant position with the UK, and it is also problematic for the English when it comes to conceiving of their national identity.
The Welsh people are an ethnic group and nation associated with Wales and the Welsh language. The origin of the "Welsh nation" can be traced to the late 4th and early 5th centuries, following the Roman withdrawal from Britain, although Celtic
languages seem to have been spoken in Wales far longer. As with all ethnic groups, the term Welsh people applies to people who identify themselves as Welsh, and who are identified by others as Welsh. They may perceive themselves, or be perceived, as having a shared cultural heritage, or shared ancestral origins. In modern use in Wales, "Welsh people" may also refer to anyone born or living in Wales.
The Irish people are an ethnic group who originated in Ireland, which has been populated for around 9,000 years, with the last group of the people's earliest ancestors supposedly representing the "pure" Gaelic ancestry, and still serving as a term for the Irish race today. The main groups that interacted with the Irish in the Middle Ages include the Scottish people and the Vikings, with the Icelanders especially having some Irish descent. The Anglo-Norman invasion of the High Middle Ages, the English plantations and the subsequent English rule of the country introduced the Normans, Welsh, Flemish, Anglo-Saxons, and Bretons into Ireland. On 3 May 1921 under the Government of Ireland Act 1920, six of the traditional nine counties of the historic Irish province of Ulster formulated Northern Ireland as a distinct subdivision of the UK. At the time of the 2001 UK Census, Northern Irish population was 1,685,000, constituting between a quarter and a third of the island's total population and about 3 per cent of the population of the UK. People from Northern Ireland are British citizens but may additionally be recognised as Irish citizens, as a result of the 1998 Belfast Agreement between the British and Irish governments. However, a 1999 survey showed that 51 per cent of Protestants felt "Not at all Irish" and 41 per cent only "weakly Irish" where 77 per cent of Catholics polled said they felt "strongly Irish".
The Scots people are a nation and an ethnic group indigenous to Scotland. Historically, as an ethnic group, they emerged from an amalgamation of Celts, Picts, Gaels and Brythons. In modern use "Scottish people" or "Scots" refers to anyone born in Scotland. In another sense, it applies to people who are descended from the Scots and who identify ethnically as Scots. While the Latin word Scoti originally applied to a particular, 5th century, Gaelic tribe that inhabited areas in the north of Ireland and western Scotland, and continued to be synonymous with the Gaelic language until the 15th century. Today the term Scots is now used to describe all Scottish people. Though usually considered archaic or pejorative, the term Scotch has also been incorrectly used for the Scottish people, but this use has been primarily by people outside of Scotland.
2. Critically examine the Britishness in the contemporary UK population.
Britishness is a term referring to a sense of national identity of the British people, and common culture of the United Kingdom. Britishness only became synonymous with a national civic identity with the formation in 1707 of the united Kingdom of Great Britain, which became the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland and in turn, the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland with the secession of what became the Republic of Ireland. Following the 1707 Act of Union, it became common for the people of the Kingdom of Great Britain to have a "layered" identity, that is, to think of themselves as simultaneously British and also Scottish, English, and/or Welsh.
In the present day, the term “Britishness” is often a ssociated with a desire to develop the sense of British identity for political reasons by appealing to British patriotism, British nationalism or British unionism, and in this capacity is reported as
controversial. Across all Scottish and Welsh group s, regardless of people’s ethnic backgrounds, national identification is much stronger than identification with Britain, although those identities are not seen as incompatible or mutually exclusive. The situation is different in England, where there is a sharp difference in the ways in which white English and ethnic minority people think of themselves. Most white English people see themselves as English, first and foremost, but also as British. By contrast, most ethnic minority people (except for black Africans) see themselves as British, to the exclusion of any identification with England, since they strongly associate England with white English people. Thus, perhaps against expectations, it would seem that ethnic minority people (except for black Africans) who live in England are the ones who most strongly identify themselves as British.
Unit Three: History
1. Discuss how England, Scotland, Wales, and Ireland have gradually become united in history creating the current United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.
The United Kingdom today is broken down into four constituent Home Nations: England, Northern Ireland, Scotland, and Wales. Each of these nations bears its own history, with all but Northern Ireland having been independent states at one point.
Prior to 1707 which marked the founding of the United Kingdom, the history of the British Isles roughly spans Celtic tribes of the Iron Age, Roman invasion between AD 43 and 410; thereafter invasion by the Anglo-Saxons in the 5th and 6th centuries; invasions by the Vikings in the 9th century, through to the Norman conquest of England in 1066; the development of the separate states of England and Scotland from the 9th century, and competition and cooperation between those states. The British Isles faced no further successful military incursion after the Norman conquest of England in 1066, allowing England and Scotland to each develop political, administrative and cultural institutions including representative governance, law systems, and distinguished contributions to the arts and sciences, upon which the United Kingdom was built.
In 1603, upon the death of his unmarried and childless first cousin, Queen Elizabeth I of England, the last monarch of the Tudor dynasty, James VI, King of Scots, acceded to the throne of England, thus uniting Scotland and England under one monarch. Although termed the Union of the Crowns, properly speaking this was merely a personal or dynastic union. The Crowns remained both distinct and separate, despite James's best efforts to create a new "imperial" throne of “Great Britain”. England and Scotland continued to be independent states until the Acts of Union in 1707 during the reign of the last monarch of the Stuart Dynasty, Queen Anne. The 1707 Union created the Kingdom of Great Britain, which shared a single constitutional monarch and a single parliament at Westminster. A further Act of Union in 1800 added the Kingdom of Ireland to create the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland.
The early years of the United Kingdom were marked by Jacobite risings which ended with defeat at Culloden in 1746. Later, victory in the Seven Years' War, in 1763, led to the dominance of the British Empire which was the foremost global power for over a century and grew to become the largest empire in history. By 1921, the British Empire held sway over a population of about 458 million people, approximately one-quarter of the world's population. And as a result, the culture of the United
Kingdom, and its industrial, political and linguistic legacy, is widespread.
In 1922, the territory of what is now the Republic of Ireland gained independence, leaving Northern Ireland as a continuing part of the United Kingdom. As a result, in 1927 the United Kingdom changed its formal title to the "United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland", usually shortened to the "United Kingdom", the "UK" or "Britain".
2. Discuss how the British Empire expanded, reached its apex but then declined.
During the Age of Discovery in the 15th and 16th centuries, Spain and Portugal pioneered European exploration of the globe and in the process established large overseas empires. Envious of the great wealth these empires bestowed, England, France and the Netherlands began to establish colonies and trade networks of their own in the Americas and Asia. A series of wars in the 17th and 18th centuries with the Netherlands and France left England (following the 1707 Act of Union, Britain) the dominant colonial power in North America and India, creating the British Empire. However, the loss of the Thirteen Colonies in North America in 1783 after a war of independence was a blow to Britain, depriving it of its most populous colonies. Despite this setback, British attention soon turned towards Africa, Asia and Oceania. Following the defeat of Napoleonic France in 1815, Britain enjoyed a century of effectively unchallenged dominance, and expanded its imperial holdings across the globe. Increasing degrees of autonomy were granted to its white settler colonies, which were reclassified as dominions.
At its height the British Empire was the largest in history and, for over a century, was the foremost global power. By 1922, the British Empire held sway over a population of about 458 million people, one-quarter of the world's population, and covered more than 13,000,000 square miles (33,670,000 km2): approximately a quarter of Earth's total land area. As a result, its political, linguistic and cultural legacy is widespread. At the peak of its power, it was often said that "the sun never sets on the British Empire" because its span across the globe ensured that the sun was always shining on at least one of its numerous territories.
The growth of Germany and the United States eroded Britain's economic lead by the end of the 19th century. Subsequent military and economic tensions between Britain and Germany were major causes of the First World War, for which Britain leaned heavily upon its Empire. The conflict placed enormous financial strain on Britain, and although the Empire achieved its largest territorial extent immediately after the war, it was no longer a peerless industrial or military power. Despite emerging victorious, the Second World War saw Britain's colonies in South-East Asia occupied by Japan, which damaged British prestige and accelerated the decline of the Empire. Within two years of the end of the war, Britain granted independence to its most populous and valuable colony, India. During the remainder of the 20th century, most of the territories of the Empire became independent as part of a larger global decolonisation movement by the European powers, ending with the return of Hong Kong to China in 1997. After independence, many former British colonies joined the Commonwealth of Nations, a free association of independent states. Fourteen territories remain under British sovereignty, the British overseas territories.
Unit Four: Government and Politics
1. The British parliamentary democracy has been emulated in many parts of the world. Discuss the essence of such a system.
The British democratic parliamentary system of government (termed the Westminster system after the Palace of Westminster, the seat of the UK Parliament) is a series of procedures for operating a legislature. It is used, or was once used, in the national legislatures and subnational legislatures of most Commonwealth and ex-Commonwealth nations, beginning with the Canadian provinces in 1867 and Australian colonies in 1901.
Important features of the Westminster system include the following:
● a sovereign or head of state (the monarch) who is the nominal or theoretical holder of executive power, and holds numerous reserve powers, but whose daily duties mainly consist of performing the role of a ceremonial figurehead.
● a head of government (the prime minister), who is officially appointed by the head of state and in practice, is the leader of the largest elected party in parliament.
● a de facto executive branch usually made up of members of the legislature with the senior members of the executive in a cabinet led by the head of government.
●parliamentary opposition (a multi-party system).
● a bicamerallegislature, in which at least one house is elected; legislative members are usually elected by district in first-past-the-post elections.
● a lower house of parliament with an ability to dismiss a government by "withholding (or blocking) Supply" (rejecting a budget), passing a motion of no confidence, or defeating a confidence motion.
● a parliament which can be dissolved and elections called at any time.
However, it must be noted that the British Parliamentary system is often criticised for absence of clear-cut separation of powers between the executive and legislative branches, leading to a different set of checks and balances compared to those found in presidential systems.
2. Analyse the structure and mechanism of the government in the UK.
The government and public administration in the UK has three areas: Central government and Civil Service; regional and devolved government; and local government.
The central government or Her Majesty's Government is an executive authority consisting of the monarch's ministers, who are responsible for the conduct of national affairs. The position of Prime Minister, the UK's head of government, belongs to the Member of Parliament who can obtain the confidence of a majority in the House of Commons, usually the current leader of the largest political party in that chamber. The Prime Minister and Cabinet are formally appointed by the Monarch to form Her Majesty's Government. Though the Prime Minister chooses the Cabinet, and by convention HM The Queen respects the Prime Minister's choices. The Cabinet is traditionally drawn from members of the Prime Minister's party in both legislative houses, and mostly from the House of Commons, to which they are responsible. The Prime Minister and Cabinet are sworn into Her Majesty's Most Honourable Privy Council, and become Ministers of the Crown.
Regionally Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales each has its own government or Executive, led by a First Minister, and a devolved, unicameral legislature. England, the largest country of the United Kingdom, has no devolved executive or legislature and is administered and legislated for directly by the UK government and parliament on all issues.
At the local level, the UK is divided into a variety of different types of Local Authorities, with different functions and responsibilities. England has a mix of two-tier and single-tier councils in different parts of the country. In Greater London, a unique two-tier system exists, with power shared between the London borough councils, and the Greater London Authority which is headed by an elected mayor. Unitary Authorities are used throughout Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.
Unit Six: Economy
1. Comment on the changes of workforce patterns in the UK during the last few decades.
The UK employment levels have been rising generally over the last three decades, with the total labor force increasing from 24.6 million in 1971 to more than 29 million in 2006. By sector, manufacturing, which used to be the largest employer, has reduced its employee jobs to the lowest level—largely due to a shift from manual to non-manual occupations. In contrast, service trades as well as self-employment have increased. When manual jobs have decreased in number, managerial and professional jobs have expanded ranking among the largest occupational groups. The number of women working outside the home has increased since the 1950s, but a majority of them are still low-paid, part-time, or often unprotected by trade unions or the law. Other recent trends include an expansion of part-time employment and a rise in the number of employees working on short-term contracts instead of on permanent jobs.
2. Examine British economic policies and performance in modern times.
In the 19th century, Britain had the world’s leading economy. With the growth of the economies of other nations in the 20th century, the British economy remained relatively strong, but already began to decline. Following the end of World War II, some industries such as British Oil Corporation, British Airways, and British Telecommunications were nationalized for better efficiency. Despite a largely prosperous period in the 1950s and 1960s, the British economy recorded weaker growth than other European nations and by the 1970s was referred to as the "sick man of Europe". But since the mid-1970s, Britain’s economy had received a boost with the discovery and exploitation of abundant oil reserves in the North Sea as well as benefiting from a worldwide economic upswing. In the 1980s, under the Government of Margaret Thatcher, most state-owned enterprises in the industrial and service sectors were privatised. Since around 1992, Britain had witnessed the longest period of sustained economic growth for more than 150 years. In 1997 its economy grew at a rate of 2.5 per cent, one of the highest rates among members of the European Union. (This ended in 2008 when the United Kingdom entered a recession bought about by the global financial crisis.)
Unit Eight: Religion
1. Critically examine the relations between church and state in the UK.
The historical background is essential to understanding the constitutional position of the church in the UK since it has emerged over centuries. The English church broke away from Rome in the 16th century and the king/queen has ever since been its constitutional head. The C hurch of England is “established”—official and involved in all state events. The Church of England still maintains a constitutional position in the legislature, demonstrated by the following, among others: (1) Its bishops are appointed by the Queen on the advice of the Prime Minister but based on a shortlist selected by the church; (2) There are 26 places reserved for the most senior Church of England bishops in the House of Lords—the upper house of Parliament.
Although it is rare for churches to receive public funding, religious charities can be and are funded or contracted to provide services in the community, for example homes for children or the elderly. In the armed forces, prisons and hospitals, Christian chaplains are paid for by public funds.
The most important example of this public funding to provide a service is in the school system. One in three schools in the publicly funded system in England and Wales is owned and run by religious faiths. Almost all of them are Church of England or Roman Catholic, with a small number of other Christian schools and an even smaller number of Jewish schools. In addition, the Government has recently started fully funding new legally independent schools after their sponsors (usually big businesses but sometimes religious bodies) make an initial contribution of 10 to 20 per cent of the capital cost. In ordinary (“community”) schools in the public system—attended by 75 per cent of pupils—the law requires a daily act of religious worship which must be “wholly or mainly broadly Christian”, and all pupils must be given religious education, which covers Christianity and the other main world religions but almost invariably (and officially) excludes non-religious lifestances.
In modern UK, Northern Ireland is an exceptional place where religion is deeply entwined with politics with two communities using religious designations to express different, and hostile, political agendas. Protestants, largely descendants of Scottish and English settlers, are interested in maintaining their union with Britain, while Roman Catholics, a minority of around 40 per cent, campaign strongly for union with Ireland.
2. Discuss how British society becomes markedly secular in modern times.
Despite the age-old Christian tradition, society in the United Kingdom has been markedly more secular since the 1950s. In the last twenty years in the 20th century the major religious groups, including the Church of England and the Roman Catholic Church, suffered remarkable decline in church membership or mass attendance. According to the 2001 census, 71.6 per cent of population declared themselves to be “Christian” while only 15.5 per cent said they had “no religion”. Yet according to a 2004 YouGov poll, 44 per cent of UK citizens believed in God, while 35 per cent did not. By the same token, there has been a fall in actual church attendance. The Christian Research group’s fourth English Church Census(2004) indicated that between 1998 and 2005, the regular Sunday church-goers decreased from 7.5 to 6.3 per cent and half a million people stopped going. The majority of British people enter a religious building only for baptisms, weddings and funerals.
There are various reasons for the marked secularization in the modern times in the UK. First, the state has grown in power and has taken many roles (such as overseeing welfare, education, medicine) previously played by religious institutions.
Second, the institutions of scientific work have grown in importance and claim to solve problems, such as those of health or the origins of the universe, which previously were the concerns of religious institutions. Third, religion has become less oriented to public performance but more to “private consolation”.
Unit Nine: Education*
1. Critically examine state secondary education in the UK, analysing its structures, aims and achievements.
In general children in the UK attend secondary education from the age of eleven to sixteen. Some local authorities operate a three-tier system, where children leave primary school aged 9 to go on to a middle school until the age of 13. A student can go to a comprehensive school, grammar school or an independent (fee-paying) school, with the first two state-run where the majority attend. The comprehensive schools were introduced in the late 1940s to the early 1970s intending to take children from a wide ability range. They teach a comprehensive range of subjects across the academic and vocational spectrum and understandably often teach to classes of a large size. The Grammar schools, which originally meant to educate the young in the grammar of Latin and that of another European language, today teach a highly academic curriculum and teach students to deal with abstract concepts. Secondary school pupils also study vocational subjects such as hairdressing and beauty, construction, woodwork and travel and tourism. All pupils between the age of fourteen and sixteen in England and Wales sit the General Certificate of Secondary Education examinations. Pupils who do the General Certificate of Secondary Education must study English, Mathematics and Science, as well as a number of optional subjects. A student automatically progresses to the next level of year and does not repeat the year even if the student has failed his or her examinations.
Regulated by the Education Reform Act 1988, the National Curriculum was established for each year of compulsory school and all state schools, intended to have an influence on the subject matter of teaching. The programme occupies not less than 70 per cent of the school timetables. The national curriculum also brought in four key stage tests including for ages at the secondary school level. There have been organisational changes to educational institutions at all levels of the system in recent decades. One goal of the 1979-97 Conservative administrations was to reduce public expenditure and to subject public organisations to market competition as a means of increasing their efficiency.
2. Comment on the UK’s achievements in science and technology.
Britain has been a world leader in science and technology, and since the Industrial Revolution the nation has been a pioneer in the use of machinery. The profession of modern engineering emerged from the work of the skilled craftsmen of the 18th and 19th centuries. The British have appreciated and encouraged inventors and scientists, and in pure science, the country has produced a steady stream of solid research. More than 70 British citizens have been awarded the Nobel Prize in science, second only to the United States.
The United Kingdom and the countries that preceded it have produced scientists and engineers credited with important advances, including;
The modern scientific method, developed by English philosopher Francis
Bacon
●The laws of motion and illumination of gravity, by English physicist, mathematician, astronomer Sir Isaac Newton
●The unification of electromagnetism, by James Clerk Maxwell
●The discovery of hydrogen, by Henry Cavendish
●The steam locomotive, by Richard Trevithick and Andrew Vivian
●The world's first working television system, by Scottish engineer and inventor John Logie Baird
●Evolution by natural selection, by Charles Darwin
●The Turing machine, by Alan Turing, the basis of modern computers
●The structure of DNA, by Francis Crick and others
●The development of the World Wide Web, largely attributed to Tim Berners-Lee
●The discovery of penicillin, by Scottish biologist and pharmacologist, Sir Alexander Fleming
●The invention of the first practical telephone, by Alexander Graham Bell
The UK produced some world reputed scientific journals including Nature. In 2006, it was reported that the UK provided 9 per cent of the world’s scientific research papers and a 12 per cent share of citations, the second highest in the world after the US.
* Corrigendum
The heading for the section on secondary education in Unit Nine in the textbook was wrongly printed as “Second education”, which should be “Secondary education.” The publisher sends their apology in this regard.