2018年4月30日 星期一

British Home Secretary Amber Rudd has resigned, but Theresa May remains under fire



(德國之聲中文網) 英國內政大臣路德 (Amber Rudd)在29日請辭。導火線是英國政府將久居英國的非裔加勒比海移民稱為非法移民。此舉被視為不當對待移民,掀起反對首相德蕾莎·梅伊政府的聲浪。
首相辦公室稍後表示德蕾莎·梅伊接受了路德的辭呈。
英國在二戰後滿目瘡痍。「疾風世代」 (Windrush generation)指的是英國自殖民地招募來進行重建的移民。過去幾天,英國政府一直遭質問,為什麼"疾風世代"後裔被歸類為非法移民。
根據《衛報》報導,有加勒比海移民因為無法提出在英居留證明文件而被拒於醫療照顧門外,甚至被驅逐出境。英國政府不當對待移民問題也因此蔓延。
影子內政大臣阿博特 (Diane Abbott)在路德辭職後說,「這場風暴無可避免。我倒很驚訝這麼久才爆发。」她表示,「危機製造者德蕾莎·梅伊現在必須站出來,清楚誠實地說明這種不可原諒的情況是如何在她的控管下发生。」

反對派工黨多次呼籲路德下台。她將在30日向議會发表相關聲明。
過去幾天,路德和梅首相都曾多次向「疾風世代」道歉。
26日,英國非裔加勒比海移民報《聲音》,刊登了梅首相的一封信。上面寫道,「讓你們失望了,我深感抱歉...但是,光道歉不夠,我們必須緊急糾正這一個歷史性錯誤。」
路德上週告訴國會議員說,政府沒有為驅逐移民人數訂下標准。不過在一封她給首相的信中,卻寫說增加移民強制驅逐人數這個目標「宏偉但可行」。
在給首相的辭呈中,她說自己誤導了國會。
「我必須辭職,因為我無意中誤導了內務事務專責委員,說政府沒有訂定驅逐移民人數目標。」她也寫道, 「我應該意識到這一點,並且承擔全部責任。」
面對一片奉勸她辭職的聲音,路德在27日還曾拒絕和发推特表示,「我會努力確保英國移民政策公平且符合人道精神。」
54歲的路德是梅首相內閣中最支持歐盟的內閣官員,2016年7月被任命為內政大臣。
英國預計在2019年3月退出歐盟。路德本是英國脫歐談判大將。她的請辭對梅首相是一大打擊。
英國外交大臣約翰遜 (Boris Johnson)和環境部長戈夫 (Michael Gove)在路德請辭後分別在社群網站上稱贊路德擔任內政大臣的表現。

Morris dancing. Invented tradition; Home truths: five ‘English’ traditions that aren’t from England




  1. 也許今年可邀女性共舞,是千年來的突破。
    British Museum
    #MayDay is traditionally celebrated with Morris Dancing in some parts of the UK, as shown in this 18th century illustration by Charles Grignion. Dancers often wear bells around their ankles or knees, creating a jangly, jovial spectacle. This drawing was based on an ‘ancient window’ in a house in Staffordshire – now on display at the Victoria and Albert Museum.
    Discover more about how this festival has been celebrated over thousands of years: http://ow.ly/5mxK30bfLEK


  2. Invented tradition - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invented_tradition

    Hobsbawm "contrasts invented traditions with what he calls 'the strength and ... oftradition in colonial Africa," and Eric Hobsbawm's "Mass-producing traditions:  ...


Home truths: five ‘English’ traditions that aren’t from England

From the WI to morris dancing to tennis – some of England’s most prized traditions and institutions originate overseas


Punch and Judy
 Mr Punch is actually Italian. Photograph: Alamy

English culture is the sum total of all the bits and pieces that have been borrowed, adapted and appropriated from other places and cultures, stitched together to form something different and distinctive. The result is that, when you try to define Englishness or try to defend some kind of pure Englishness (there is, of course, no such thing), the whole thing slips through your fingers.
Here are five institutions you might have thought were English but which actually originated elsewhere.

Morris dancing (Italian)

As with so many of the traditions that seem to be cornerstones of English life, it is difficult to trace the real origins of morris dancing. Some sources suggest it arrived in England via Italian dancers during the renaissance. Others contend that the word originally derived from “Moorish”, adopted at a time when Moorish decorations were suddenly fashionable. Even if the morris dancers were dramatising an English tradition, therefore, the bells on their ankles may have made them seem exotically foreign. It’s a mystery, but not a wholly English one.

Pigeon racing (Belgian)

Pigeon racing first attracted attention during the siege of Paris in 1870-71. The English that were present watched entranced as French pigeons carried more than a million messages to and from the city, crossing Prussian lines. But the sport of racing pigeons was developed by the Belgians, and it was only when the king of Belgium, Leopold II, gave the British royal family breeding stock that the sport took off in Britain. The first race was held there in 1881, inspired by the Belgians who would start their races in the south of England.

Punch and Judy (Italian)

Mr Punch is Italian. He derives from the commedia dell’arte and the Italian Renaissance, a direct descendent of the character Pulcinella; the show owes much to the presence of itinerant Italian players in London during the 16th century. When Samuel Pepys saw his first Punch and Judy show in Covent Garden on 9 May 1662, performed by an Italian puppeteer called Pietro Gimonde, he described it as “an Italian puppet show”.

The Women’s Institute (Canadian and a bit Welsh)

The WI began in Canada. To be precise, it was formed in 1897 in Stoney Creek, Ontario by Adelaide Hoodless, after she gave a talk at the Farmers’ Institute about domestic science and agriculture. Even when, in 1915, the movement arrived in the UK, its first branch wasn’t in England but in Llanfairpwllgwyngyll, Anglesley, where it was set up to encourage more women to get involved in food production.

Tennis (Basque, Welsh and English)

Around 1859, a Birmingham solicitor called Harry Gem and his Spanish friend Augurio Perara combined the best of rackets with the best of pelota – a Basque ball game – to create tennis. They played it on the croquet lawn at Edgbaston. When they moved to Leamington Spa in 1872, they took the game with them and founded the world’s first tennis club. The following year, Walter Wingfield, a Welsh inventor and army officer, patented a similar game which he called stické, borrowing from the Greek word sphairistiké (meaning “the art of playing ball”) and from the rules of real tennis. The two were combined, creating the game that is now played at Wimbledon and around the world.
There is no evidence that beer is anything other than English, though tea (China) and marmalade (Portuguese and other nationalities) come from overseas. As for King Arthur (partly French, partly Welsh) and Henry V (very Welsh), don’t get me started. And don’t mention bungalows (Indian), or umbrellas (French), or Christmas trees (German) …
What the English can’t do is to complain that “foreignness” begins at Calais, or that borders should be put up to protect English culture from foreign influences. Those influences, to a large degree, are English culture.
 David Boyle’s How to Be English is published by Square Peg.

2018年4月16日 星期一

BBC事實核查:關於英聯邦你可能不知道的七件事

【你可能不了解的英聯邦】英聯邦占世界土地面積的四分之一。全球74億人中,大約有24億人生活在英聯邦的53個國家。英國仍是英聯邦最大的經濟體,但或許在今年,就會被超過了...
對於這個以英國女王為元首的國際組織,你了解多少?
BBC.COM

2018年4月12日 星期四

舊版10英鎊

倫敦藍牌導遊 Lisa Lin
這幾天陸續聽到「店家不收我們的英鎊」的聲音。才知道原來台灣的某些銀行在換滙的時候,仍舊換舊版10英鎊給客人。 但這個版本在今年(2018年3月1日)後就不流通了。 除非是佛心的店家(得跑趟銀行存錢),不然舊英鎊是無法在英國使用的。
相片中的左邊是舊版的£10和£5, 右邊是新版的。 但除非是客人特別要求要換小鈔,台灣的銀行通常會換給£50或£20 。 £20在英國很容易找開,真的不需要換幣值更低的紙鈔。舊版的£20不流通很久了,所以外國銀行多數會換新版的。
跟我們換是可以吶~ 但我們身上也不會帶那麼多現鈔在身上。 拿回去要是銀行不認舊鈔也麻煩。所以換滙時眼睛要睜大一點, 不要拿到舊版啊~
#舊版是紙;新版是塑膠材質一摸就能分辨哦

2018年4月1日 星期日

the 'winner takes all' :First Past the Post (FPTP) electoral system

First Past the Post (FPTP) FPTP is the voting system used for the election of MPs to 'seats' in the UK Parliament. It is a system in which the 'winner takes all' and usually gives a clear majority both at constituency and national level.

BBC - Higher Bitesize Modern Studies - Electoral systems, voting and ...

www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/higher/modern/uk_gov_politics/elect_vote/revision/1/



In Britain’s electoral system, seats won at a general election are not shared out between the parties proportionally nationwide. Instead each one of the 650 constituencies is self-contained, meaning any vote not used to win a seat is in effect wasted