Welcome to English as a Second Language podcast number 1183, Air and Water Pollution.
This is English as a Second Language podcast episode 1183.
I'm your host, Dr Jeff McQuillan, coming to you from the Center for Educational Development in beautiful Los Angeles, California.
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This episode is all about air and water pollution.
Sounds like fun.
Let's get started.
Stop poisoning us!
Stop poisoning us!
Why are you picketing in front of this factory?
This factory is polluting our air and water.
They're responsible for contaminating the environment with dangerous chemicals and waste.
What's more important is their health.
The air quality in general and out of this factory is at toxic levels and it's endangering their health, not to mention what it's doing to the ozone.
That's terrible.
Maybe I should help you pick it.
Here's a sign.
Okay, but maybe picketing is taking things a little too far.
No way.
Did you know that runoff from the factory has tainted the groundwater?
Did you know that workers and people in the community are breathing in dangerous particulate matter?
I didn't know that.
Do you have proof of all that?
Of course I have proof.
Environmental groups have done independent tests.
Then it's actually dangerous for me to be standing here talking to you and breathing in this toxic air.
That's true, and your willingness to help me picket is really commendable.
Hey, where are you going?
Julia begins our dialogue by shouting.
She's shouting, saying in a very loud voice, To poison P-O-I-S-O-N someone is to make someone sick or even kill them by exposing them or giving them some sort of dangerous chemicals.
Robert asks Julia, A factory, F-A-C-T-O-R-Y, is a place where things are made.
To picket P-I-C-K-E-T means to stand in front of a building, usually carrying signs and shouting your disagreement about something that is going on inside the building.
Another verb we might use here is to demonstrate.
Julia says, To pollute, P-O-L-L-U-T-E, means...
To make the air, the water and or the land dirty and unsafe, usually because you're using some sort of unhealthy or harmful substance.
We usually refer to polluting the environment, the world around us, the air, the land, the water that we have in our environment, in the area around us, in the place where we live.
Julia says they're responsible for contaminating the environment with dangerous chemicals and waste.
To contaminate C-O-N-T-A-M-I-N-A-T-E means to make something unsafe by mixing something in that doesn't belong there, something harmful.
It's often used to mean the same as to pollute.
Julia is complaining about the company contaminating the environment, the natural world, with dangerous chemicals and waste.
Chemical C-H-E-M-I-C-A-L here refers to some sort of substance or material that has been prepared artificially by man, by human beings.
Although the word chemical has a much broader definition.
It could refer to things that you find in nature as well, in the human body, for example.
Waste, W-A-S-T-E, can mean garbage or trash.
In general, it refers to things that you no longer are using anymore, or perhaps things that are produced when you are making something else that you can't use and you want to get rid of.
Robert says to Julia.
Robert is concerned that Julia is picketing a place where her own family members work.
Julia is not.
She says what's more important is their health.
She's saying their health is more important than any harm that could come to them, any trouble they could get into, because she is there picketing.
The air quality in and out of this factory is at toxic levels and it's endangering their health, not to mention what it's doing to the ozone.
Air quality refers to how clean the air is, if you want to think of it that way.
Big cities like Los Angeles often have poor air quality, although the air quality in Los Angeles has gotten a lot better in the past 25 years or so.
Julia thinks the air quality inside as well as outside of the factory is at toxic levels.
Toxic T-O-X-I-C means poisonous, something that could harm you or kill you, like listening to Britney Spears, for example.
Definitely toxic.
Julia says the air quality is endangering her family's health, the ones that work there at the factory.
To endanger means to put someone in a situation where they could get harmed, or to put someone in a dangerous situation.
Julia thinks that the factory is endangering the health of her family members, not to mention that which here means, in addition to what it's doing, to the ozone O-Z-O-N-E.
Ozone is a gas, but here Julia is using ozone as a shorter form of ozone layer, which is gas that is high up in the atmosphere.
There is a concern that certain chemicals that we use here on Earth might damage the ozone layer and that might cause us further problems here on Earth.
Robert says, that's terrible.
Maybe I should help you pick it.
Julia says, here's a sign, S-I-G-N.
A sign is a thick piece of paper or cardboard or metal that has words or images on it in order to communicate a certain message.
People picketing a company will often walk around with signs that are on sticks or pieces of metal, and they hold the signs up in the air so people can see them as they're driving by or walking by.
Robert says, okay, but maybe picketing is taking things a little too far.
To take something too far means to go beyond the limit of what is acceptable or even what is a good idea in order to get what you want to get.
Julia disagrees.
She says, no way.
Did you know that runoff from the factory has tainted the groundwater?
Runoff R-O-N-O-F-F is water that drains away from or flows away from an area of land or a building.
The water could have other chemicals in it, other things that may pollute the The water.
If the water then goes into a lake or a river or down into the ground, it could pollute other water, water that you use to drink.
That's what Julia is concerned about here.
She's concerned about the groundwater, G-R-O-U-N-D-W-A-T-E-R.
Groundwater is water that is found far below the surface of the earth and that is sometimes used for drinking.
Julia is concerned that the water coming from the factory has tainted the groundwater.
To taint, T-A-I-N-T, here means the same as to contaminate.
She says did you know that workers and people in the community are breathing in dangerous particulate matter?
Particulate, P-A-R-T-I-C-U-L-A-T-E, matter are very small pieces of something.
Robert says, I didn't know that.
Do you have proof of all that?
Proof, P-R-O-O-F, is evidence, something that demonstrates that something is true.
Julia says, of course I have proof.
I read it on the internet.
No, she doesn't say that.
She says, I have proof environmental groups have done independent tests.
Something that is independent, I-N-D-E-P-E-N-D-E-N-T, is separate from the things around it.
It's not connected to the things around it or the organizations around it.
Here.
I'm guessing that she means that these environmental groups have done tests not in conjunction with, or perhaps even with the approval of the company that is supposed to be polluting in our dialogue.
Don't confuse the word independent with another term objective, O-B-J-E-C-T-I-V-E.
Objective would refer to something that is just the facts, that only has the factual information or evidence and isn't trying to give you a certain conclusion, regardless of what the facts are.
Independent just means it was done by someone not in the company in this case.
That person may still have their own particular biases, of course.
Robert says.
Robert realizes that if what Julia says is true, he shouldn't even be there talking to her because the air is toxic.
Julia says, And your willingness to help me pick it is really commendable.
Commendable, C-O-M-M-E-N-D-A-B-L-E, means admirable or worthy of praise.
Something that you would congratulate someone on because they are doing a good thing.
Julia is congratulating or thanking Robert for being there with her, even though it's dangerous.
Then she realizes that Robert is not, in fact, going to stay there.
She says, hey, where are you going?
Meaning, of course, that Robert is now walking away from Julia.
He's not going to stand there if he is going to be in any danger.
Now let's listen to the dialogue, this time at a normal speed.
Stop poisoning us!
Stop poisoning us!
Why are you picketing in front of this factory?
This factory is polluting our air and water.
They're responsible for contaminating the environment with dangerous chemicals and waste.
But your entire family works here.
Aren't you concerned you'll cause trouble for them and the other workers?
What's more important is their health.
The air quality in and out of this factory is at toxic levels and it's endangering their health, not to mention what it's doing to the ozone.
That's terrible.
Maybe I should help you picket.
Here's a sign.
Okay, but maybe picketing is taking things a little too far.
No way.
Did you know that runoff from the factory has tainted the groundwater?
Did you know that workers and people in the community are breathing in dangerous particulate matter?
I didn't know that.
Do you have proof of all that?
Of course I have proof.
Environmental groups have done independent tests.
Then it's actually dangerous for me to be standing here talking to you and breathing in this toxic air.
That's true, and your willingness to help me pick it is really commendable.
Hey, where are you going?
If you want proof about ESL Podcast and whether it works or not, listen to the wonderful scripts by our wonderful script writer, Dr Lucy Say, and you'll have all the proof you need.
From Los Angeles, California, I'm Jeff McQuillan.
Thanks for listening.
Come back and listen to us again right here on ESL Podcast.
English as a Second Language podcast is written and produced by Dr Lucy Say, hosted by Dr Jeff McQuillan.
Copyright 2015 by the Center for Educational Development.
