The Body Language Book

        So during the summers, I lifeguard for the Town of Babylon, which is fantastic, because I am able to be outside earning money, and there's even time to do some serious reading.  This past summer a friend lent me this great book titled, The Definitive Book of Body Language, however it was toward the end of August and I never had a chance to get through it before the school year began.  Today I opened it back up and happened to be on the Cultural Differences chapter.  How perfect, I began reading again and remembered how easily the amusing, Australian couple, who wrote the book, just suck you in!  There's too much I could write about here, but ill pick one part that stuck out to me.  I know it sounds so obvious, but sometimes I just sit back and think to myself, how incredible it is, that there's an entire world out there, and we are only living on this one continent, in this one state.  Imagine all of the different, unique people and cultures you will never get to experience (not meaning this in a negative way at all)... I mean of course, if you are someone who loves to travel you can provide yourself with opportunities to meet people, but I just mean, it's impossible to meet everyone.  This being said, all of these differences and all, I found the part of the cultural chapter about "cultural basics being almost the same everywhere", pretty fascinating.  The authors mention how, for the most part, the six basic facial expressions register the same to people in 21 different countries.  The only large difference was with the Japanese, who saw surprised when they were shown the fear picture.  Lastly... and most interesting, the same man who carried out this study, Paul Ekman, "went to New Guinea to study the South Fore culture and the Dani people of West Irian who had been isolated from the rest of the world.  He recorded the same results, the exception being that, like the Japanese, these cultures could not distinguish fear from surprise.

Vocabulary


isolated- (adj) Separated from people or things

negative- (adj) Bad 


continent - (n) One of the major land masses on our Earth

earn- (v) To recieve in return for work

lifeguard- (n) A person in charge of water safety

"suck you in"- Catching your interest

"6 basic facial expressions" - happy, sad, angry, fear, surprise, disgust, calm

Matching, match the vocabulary word or phrase to its correct definition

isolated                                              

negative                                             

continent                                           

earn                                                   

lifeguard                                            

"suck you in"                                    

"6 basic facial expressions"   

   

a. catching your interest

b. separated from people or things       

c. bad

d. one of the major land masses on our Earth

e. a person in charge of water safety

f. to receive in return for work

g. happy, sad, angry, fear, surprise, disgust, calm

h.  o

ne 

of the major land masses on our Earth

I used the past tense in my writing, when I wrote, "this past summer, my friend lent me a book".  Please change the following verbs in the past tense, back to their regular form.

1. Watched

2. Cooked

3. Wrote 

4. Celebrated

5. Laughed