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AMERICAN MOSAIC1 -May 3, 2002: George Mason / Music from The Band / Question About the
International Space Station


HOST:
Welcome to AMERICAN MOSAIC

VOA’s radio magazine in Special English.
(THEME)
This is Doug Johnson. On our program today we:
Play some music from The Band ..
.
Answer a question about the International Space Station ..
.
And learn about a little known hero of American history.


George Mason

HOST:

Washington, D.C., has many memorials. Some honor former presidents. Others honor Americans who fought in
wars.

Recently, a crowd gathered near the Potomac River for the opening of the George Mason National Memorial. It
is in a garden, near colorful flowers and a water fountain. A metal statue of a man sits on a seat. A few of his
most famous writings are on a nearby stone wall. George Mason was responsible for the first American bill of
rights. Shep O’Neal tells us about him.

VOICE:

George Mason held few public offices. Yet his ideas influenced both the Declaration2 of Independence and the
Bill of Rights in the United States Constitution. Later, his ideas were used in the United Nations Universal
Declaration of Rights.


George Mason was born in the colony of Virginia in Seventeen-Twenty-Five. He
studied law and supervised3 his family’s property. Mister Mason became active
in his community. He was famous for opposing the British colonial4 government.
However, he refused public office many times. He enjoyed being a private
citizen.

Finally, George Mason became a delegate5 to the Virginia Convention6 in
Seventeen-Seventy-Five. The following year, he was chosen to write Virginia’
s
Declaration of Rights. It became his most important work.

The Virginia Declaration of Rights has been called the first American bill of
rights. The declaration called for freedom of the press. It called for an official policy that permitted different
religions. It also declared an individual’s right to a fair and speedy trial.

A few years later, George Mason took part in creating the United States Constitution. However, he strongly
disagreed with parts of it. He objected to a compromise that permitted the importation of slaves to continue until
Eighteen-Oh-Eight. Mister Mason owned slaves, but he was one of the few southern state delegates7 to oppose
slavery. He believed that slaves should be educated and later freed. George Mason had other concerns about the
proposed Constitution. He wanted a bill of rights to protect individuals against possible interference by the
federal government.


George Mason refused to sign the Constitution. And he opposed the document when it was offered to the states
for approval. But he lived to see the Bill of Rights added to the Constitution in Seventeen-Ninety-One. That was
one year before George Mason died.

International Space Station

HOST:

Our VOA listener question this week comes from Laos. Bouahom Damrong asks about the International Space
Station.

Some scientists have called the International Space Station the largest and most
important international scientific project in history. The Space Station will be a
permanent laboratory to test new industrial materials and communications devices
and to carry out medical research. The space station will be used for such research
because gravity, temperature and pressure can be controlled and changed in ways
impossible to do in laboratories on Earth.

The building of the International Space Station began in Nineteen-Ninety-Eight with
the launch of the Zarya spacecraft from Russia. Project planners say it will take
about forty-four launches of Russian rockets and American space shuttles to complete the structure. They hope to
have the work done by Two-Thousand-Four.

The complete space station will be one-hundred-nine meters across and eighty-eight meters long. It will weigh
more than four-hundred-fifty-thousand kilograms.

Large devices that collect sunlight and change it to electric power will extend over an area of almost one -half
hectare. The space station will provide working and living areas for a crew of up to seven astronauts and
scientists. These areas will be about the same size as two huge passenger planes.

The International Space Station is a joint8 effort of the United States, Canada, Japan, Russia, Brazil and eleven
members of the European Space Agency. Many of these countries build parts for the space station. Each piece is
then taken into space and linked together by astronauts.

American astronauts and Russian cosmonauts have been living on the space station for more than a year. They
have already completed several scientific experiments. The first crew of three to live on the space station left
Earth in October, Two-Thousand and spent more than one-hundred-thirty-eight days there. The fifth group is
expected to arrive in June and leave in October.

The United States space agency’s Kennedy Space Center Internet Web site provides much more information
about the International Space Station. The Internet address is www.ksc.nasa.gov.

The Band

HOST:

A famous rock and roll group called the Band was popular in the nineteen-sixties and nineteen-seventies. It is
popular again because of a movie and an album called “The Last Waltz.

Mary Tillotson tells us more.

ANNCR:

The members of the group first started performing with singer Ronnie Hawkins as the Hawks9. Then Bob Dylan
asked them to perform with him. In Nineteen-Sixty-Eight, they began performing on their own as the Band. The
Band’s songs are like many traditional American songs --they tell stories. This song is about the Civil War
between the northern and southern states in the Eighteen-Sixties. It is called “The Night They Drove Old Dixie
Down.

((CUT ONE: THE NIGHT THEY DROVE OLD DIXIE DOWN))

The Band decided10 to stop performing in Nineteen-Seventy-Six. The members held one last concert in San



Francisco, California. They asked several famous artists to perform with them.


Bob Dylan, Eric Clapton, Neil Young, Joni Mitchell and Muddy Waters appeared
with them. A famous Hollywood movie director, Martin Scorsese, filmed the
concert.

Some critics have called “The Last Waltz”
one of the greatest rock and roll

movies of all time. It is now being shown again in several American cities. A new
album of music from the concert also has been released. Here is one of the songs
from the movie and the album. It is called “Rag Mama Rag.

((CUT TWO: RAG MAMA RAG))

Experts say the Band’s music influenced many other performers. They say its music still
sounds powerful and new, more than twenty -five years later. We leave you now with the
Band performing “It Makes No Difference.

((CUT THREE: IT MAKES NO DIFFERENCE))

HOST:


This is Doug Johnson. I hope you enjoyed our program today. And I hope you will join us again next week for
AMERICAN MOSAIC

VOA’s radio magazine in Special English.

This AMERICAN MOSAIC program was written by Shelley Gollust, George Grow and Nancy Steinbach. Our
studio engineer was Curtis Bynum. And our producer was Paul Thompson.


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点击收听单词发音收听单词发音  

1 mosaic CEExS     
n./adj.镶嵌细工的,镶嵌工艺品的,嵌花式的
参考例句:
  • The sky this morning is a mosaic of blue and white.今天早上的天空是幅蓝白相间的画面。
  • The image mosaic is a troublesome work.图象镶嵌是个麻烦的工作。
2 declaration rxrxj     
n.宣布,宣告,宣言,声明(书),申报
参考例句:
  • We read the declaration posted on the bulletin board.我们读了贴在布告板上的声明。
  • At the recent convention a declaration was adopted.在最近举行的大会上通过了一项宣言。
3 supervised cec2158311659e4fa817f25aad310c2f     
v.监督,管理( supervise的过去式和过去分词 )
参考例句:
  • The architect supervised the building of the house. 建筑工程师监督房子的施工。 来自《简明英汉词典》
  • He supervised and trained more than 400 volunteers. 他指导和培训了400多名志愿者。 来自辞典例句
4 colonial Hq9zJ     
adj.殖民地的,关于殖民的;n.殖民地,居民
参考例句:
  • The natives were unwilling to be bent by colonial power.土著居民不愿受殖民势力的摆布。
  • The people of Africa have successfully fought against colonial rule.非洲人民成功地反抗了殖民统治。
5 delegate 8xxxQ     
n.代表,会议代表;vt.委派...为代表,授权
参考例句:
  • They drafted her to serve as their delegate.他们选她当代表。
  • The Chinese people delegate their power to the People's Congress.中国人民授权人民代表大会。
6 convention KYFza     
n.惯例,习俗,常规,会议,大会
参考例句:
  • How many delegates have checked in at the convention?大会已有多少代表报到?
  • He sets at naught every convention of society.他轻视所有的社会习俗。
7 delegates f6181d3345b223dc5fcaf31ceaaa79c3     
代表,代表团成员( delegate的名词复数 )
参考例句:
  • The conference was attended by delegates from 56 countries. 此次会议有来自56个国家的代表出席。
  • Delegates expressed strong opposition to the plans. 代表强烈反对这些计划。
8 joint m3lx4     
adj.联合的,共同的;n.关节,接合处;v.连接,贴合
参考例句:
  • I had a bad fall,which put my shoulder out of joint.我重重地摔了一跤,肩膀脫臼了。
  • We wrote a letter in joint names.我们联名写了封信。
9 hawks c8b4f3ba2fd1208293962d95608dd1f1     
鹰( hawk的名词复数 ); 鹰派人物,主战派人物
参考例句:
  • Two hawks were hover ing overhead. 两只鹰在头顶盘旋。
  • Both hawks and doves have expanded their conditions for ending the war. 鹰派和鸽派都充分阐明了各自的停战条件。
10 decided lvqzZd     
adj.决定了的,坚决的;明显的,明确的
参考例句:
  • This gave them a decided advantage over their opponents.这使他们比对手具有明显的优势。
  • There is a decided difference between British and Chinese way of greeting.英国人和中国人打招呼的方式有很明显的区别。

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