All Articles

Letters to the Professor

When listening to native speakers they do not seem to say one hundred or one kilometre properly. The 'one' sounds more like an 'er' sound. Can you please explain to me why this is and if I should try to do it too?
Malgorzata J., Warszawa.

Touching Base

The city of Kutno once more brought together Junior and Little baseball players from Europe, Asia, the Middle East and Africa (all, oddly enough, included in the European Region!) this July and August, when it played host to three of Europe's most prestigious baseball tournaments - the Transatlantic Regional, the Junior League Regional and the Little League European Regional.

Tapping into Talent

Inspired! Dazzling! Brilliant! The Gaelforce Dance Company gave fans of Irish culture an exquisite opportunity this September to see some of the best Irish dancing in the world.

The Wild West of England.

Despite its historical wealth and numerous attractions for tourists, the county of Cornwall, at the far end of England's southwestern peninsula, has long been in economic decline. Recently it achieved European Objective 1 status, if it can be called an achievement to be officially recognized as one of the poorest areas in the European Union.

Taking the FCE

Paper 1: Use of English

This paper consists of five parts, each very different, but all with the aim of testing your knowledge of English grammar, vocabulary and word formation.

Part 1

This is a multiple choice gap-fill exercise which involves knowing not only the meaning of words but also collocations and grammatical patterns. The extract below is the first paragraph of a typical part 1 text.

The London Tea Trade

Przekładaniec

Słowa dotrzymuję. Przynajmniej się staram. Przekładaniec przekładany dziś będzie krajobrazami i historiami z Irlandii oraz tak zwaną kompetencją. Wykazaliście się nią, ku naszej ogromnej radości. Wspaniałych prac konkursowych nadeszło ponad czterdzieści. I każdą przeczytaliśmy z należytą uwagą.

The Evolution of English

The English language originated in Britain, of course, but who will influence the direction it is taking now, the Americans or the British?

The popularity of English in the world is indisputable. However, it isn't the most widely spoken language. Mandarin Chinese is spoken by about 70 per cent of China's one billion people, whereas English is spoken by no more than 500 million. Of course, no statistics on the spread of English are authoritative today because of changes in the world in the twilight of the last century.

Museums of London

The British Museum | Tate Modern and Tate Britain | The Science and Natural History Museum | Imperial War Museum | Buckingham Palace | The Museum of London |
The Tower of London | Madame Tussaud's and the Planetarium

Past Deeds, Future Dreams

Travel writer Olgierd Budrewicz took a trip to Pennsylvania for a walk down memory lane with his old friend Ed Piszek, founder of the Copernicus Foundation and the World of English.

The Very Best of Ireland

Thank You, Ireland!

Genome in a Bottle

At last the new millennium seems real. With the completion of the Human Genome Project we are finally entering the new age we all thought began on January 1 2000. For good or ill, we all will soon feel the innovations this leap in biological understanding is bringing.

England's Eco-warriors

The environment is a hot issue in the UK. Since the 1980s, awareness has grown of the consequences of industrial pollution, nuclear waste, carbon dioxide emissions and global warming. More recently, the BSE beef crisis and the GM food controversy have made the British public even more sensitive to the appliance of science and agricultural error. We are turning into a nation of eco-worriers.

Extreme Vacations

The summer is here and the travel bug has been biting everyone. Roads and airports will soon be packed with vacationers, and beaches, resorts and theme parks are ready for the tourist season. But for some folks there's no fun in those places. While people might still want the same things - relaxation, adventure or love - nowadays a summer trip's got to be further, faster or just plain freakier. Vacations ain't what they used to be, writes Steve DeBretto.

For the person who has everything

Ringing in the Millennium

The Liberty Bell will ring for the first time in over 150 years in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania for the New Millennium.

Nina Kaczorowski

Austin Powers 3: Goldmember opens in Polish cinemas on September 13. The film stars Mike Myers and Polish-American actress and rising star in Hollywood, Nina Kaczorowski. When she was in Poland recently Nina talked to journalist Monika Jaworska for The World of English. She tells us about her Polish origins, working in Hollywood, and what Tom Cruise and Ben Affleck are really like!

This is America

What is the world's best-known country? Most people around the world these days would reply: the United States of America. Variously known as the U.S., U.S.A., the States or simply America, this is the most heavily populated country of North America, although Canada to the north, which has fewer people than Poland, is far bigger territorially. Second question: who, or what, is an American? Read on and you'll find out.

Footbal Means Violence

Why does football breed hooliganism? Looking at the nature of the phenomenon we ask whether it can ever be eradicated.

The Notting Hill Thrill

Perhaps made famous to foreigners thanks to Hugh Grant and Julia Roberts in the film of the same name, this part of London is really on the map because of the annual carnival in August, second only to Rio de Janeiro's.

If you imagine the Notting Hill Carnival as a colourful, loud and fast moving pageant, you are wrong. It is far more resplendent and clamorous, and way too crowded to move with any speed at all - the streets are not as wide as in Rio!

Book Review: Lord Jim

Those who read me, know my conviction that the world ... rests on a few very simple ideas ... It rests, notably ... on the idea of Fidelity." So wrote Joseph Conrad (1857-1924), the Polish-born writer whose novels in the English language have come to be regarded as some of the greatest in English literature. Born in what is now the Ukraine, Conrad grew up with the name Konrad Korzeniowski, only changing it to be easier for English tongues to pronounce. At the age of seventeen he went away to sea, and for the next twenty years the naval life with all its hardships was to be his world.

Frodo, friends and foes

December 19th saw the worldwide release of The Lord Of The Rings - The Fellowship Of The Ring, J.R.R. Tolkien's epic saga of Good and Evil, peopled with Hobbits, Elves, Orcs, Goblins and other beasts (including humans!) and it has just hit cinemas in Poland. So what is it this "ring thing"? The whole world is talking about it, it's overtaking Harry Potter at the box office, and countless millions are watching a literary legend take shape on the big screen.