Conversation 1
Eric: Hi, Professor Mason, do you have a minute?
Pro: Yeah, of course, Eric. I think there was something I wanted to talk to you about too.
Eric: Probably my late essay.
Pro: Ah, that must be it. I thought maybe I’d lost it.
Eric: No, I'm sorry. Actually it was my computer that lost it, the first draft of it. And, well, anyway, I finally put it in your mail box yesterday.
Pro: Oh, I haven't checked the mail box yet today. Well, I'm glad it's there. I will read it this weekend.
Eric: Well, sorry again. Say, I can send it to you by email too if you like.
Pro: Great. I'll be interested to see how it all comes out.
Eric: Right. Now, ah, I just have overheard some graduates students talking. Something about a party for De Adams?
Pro: Retirement party, yes, all students are invited. Wasn't there notice on the Anthropology Department's bulletin board?
Eric: Ah, I don't know. But I want to offer help with it. You know whatever you need. De Adams, well, I took a few anthropology classes with her and they were great, inspiring. That's why I want to pitch in.
Pro: Oh, that's very thoughtful of you, Eric, but it will be low key, nothing flashy. That's not her style.
Eric: So there's nothing?
Pro: No, we'll have coffee and cookies, maybe a cake. But actually couples of the administrative assistants are working on that. You could ask them but I think they've got covered.
Eric: Ok.
Pro: Actually, oh, no, never mind.
Eric: What's it?
Pro: Well, it's nothing to do with the party and I'm sure there are more exciting ways that you could spend your time. But we do need some help with something. Work pilling a database of articles the anthropology faculty has published. There is not much glory, but we are looking for someone with some knowledge of anthropology who can enter the articles. I hesitate to mention it. But I don't suppose it's something you would
Eric: No, that sounds like cool. I would like to see what they are writing about.
Pro: Wonderful. And there are also some unpublished studies. Do you know De Adams did a lot of field research in Indonesia? Most of them haven't been published yet.
Eric: No, like what?
Pro: Well, she is really versatile. She just spent several months studying social interactions in Indonesia and she's been influential in ecology. Oh, and she's also done work in south of America, this is closer to biology, especially with speciation.
Eric: ah, not to seem uninformed
Pro: Well, how's species form? You know, how two distinct species form from one. Like when population of the same species are isolated from each other and then developed into two different directions and ended up with two distinct species.
Eric: Interesting.
Pro: Yes, while she was there in the south of America, she collected a lot of linguistic information and sounds, really fascinating.
Eric: Well. I hate to see her leave.
Pro: Don't worry. She'll still be around. She's got lots of projects that she's still in the middle of.
【Lecture 1 Theater History】
Pro: The 19 century was the time that thought what we called: Realism developing in European in theater. Um… to understand this though, we first need to look at the early form of drama known as the well-made play, which basically was a pattern for constructing plays, plays that the beginning with some early 19 century’s comedies in France proved very successful commercially. The dramatic devises use here word actually anything new, they have been around for centuries. But the formula for well-made play required certain elements being included, in a particular order, and most importantly, that everything in the plays be logically connected. In fact, some of the player writes would start by writing the end of the play. And the word “backward” toward the beginning, just to make sure each event let logically from what has gone before. Ok, what are the necessary elements of well-made play? Well, the first is logical exposition. Exposition is whatever background information you have to review to the audience. So, they all understand what is going on. Before this time, exposition might come from the actors simply giving speeches. Someone might watch out the stage and see: “lyric quotation”. And until all about the felting family of Romeo and Julie, but for the well-made play, even the exposition had to be logic, believable. So, for example, you might have two servants gossiping as they are cleaning the house. And one says, Oh, what a shame master sound still not married. And the other might mention that a rumor about the mysterious a gentle men who just moved into the town with his beautiful daughter. These comments are parts of the play logical exposition. The next key elements of the well-made play refer to as the inciting incidents. After we have the background information, we need a king moment to get things moving, they really make the audience interested in what is happened to the characters we just heard about it. So, for example, after the two servants review all this background information, we need the young man. Just is he first lies eyes on the beautiful woman, and he immediately falls in love. This is the inciting incidence. It sets off, the plot of the play. Now, the plot of well-made plays is usually driven by secrets. Things, the audiences know, but the characters often don’t know. So, for example, the audience learned through a letter or through someone else’s conversation. Who is the mysterious gentle man is, and why he left the town many years before. But the young man doesn’t know about this. And the woman doesn’t understand the ancient connection between her family and he is. Before the secret are reviewed to the main character, the plot of the play perceived as the series of the sorts of the up and down moments. For example, the woman first appears not to even notice the young man, and it seems to him like the end of the world. But then, he learns that the she actually wants to meet him too. So, life is wonderful. Then, if he tries to talk with her, maybe her father get furious, for no apparent reason. So, they cannot see each other. But, just the young man has almost loved all hopes, he finds out, well you get the idea, the reversal the fortune continue, increasing the audience’s tension and excitement. They can wonder that everything is going to come out or care it not. Next come in, elements known as the: An obligatory scene. It’s scene, a moment in which all the secrets are reviewed. In generally, things turn out well for the hero and others we are care about, a happy ending of some sorts. This became so popular that the playwright almost had to include it in every play which is why is called: the obligatory scene. And that’s followed by the final dramatic element---the denouement or the resolution, when all the lucent have to be tight up in the logical way. Remember, the obligatory scene gives the audience emotional pleasure. But the denouement offers the audience a logical conclusion. That’s the subtle distinction we need to try very hard to keep in mind. So, as I said, the well-made play, this form of playwriting, became the base for realism in drama, and for a lot of very popular 19 century plays. And also, a pattern we find in plots of later many play, and even movies that we see it today.
【Lecture 2 Biology】
Pro: So, that is how elephant uses infrasound. Now, let’s talk about the other and the acoustic spectrums, sound that is too high for humans to hear---ultrasounds. Ultrasound is used by many animals that detected and some of them seen out very high frequency sounds. So, what is a good example? Yes, Kayo.
Kayo: Well, bats, since there is all blind, bets have to use sound for, you know, to keep them from flying in the things.
Pro: That is echolocation. Echolocation is pretty self-explanatory; using echoes reflected sound waves to located things. As Kayo said that bat used for navigation and orientation. And what is else. Make.
Make: Well, finding food is always important, and I guess not becoming food for other animals.
Pro: Right, on both accounts. Avoiding other predators, and locating prey, typically insects that fly around it at night. Before I go on, let me just respond something Kayo was saying--- this idea that is bats are blind. Actually, there are some species of bats, the one that don’t use echolocation that do rely on their vision for navigation, but its true for many bats, their vision is too weak to count on. Ok, so quick some rays if echolocation works. The bats emit the ultrasonic pulses, very high pitch sound waves that we cannot hear. And then, they analyze the echoes, how the waves bound back. Here, let me finish the style diagram I started it before the class. So the bat sends out the pulses, very focus birds of sound, and echo bounds back. You know, I don’t think I need to draw the echoes, your reading assignment for the next class; it has diagram shows this very clearly. So, anyway, as I were saying, by analyzing this echo, the bat can determine, say, if there is wall in a cave that needs to avoid, and how far away it is. Another thing uses the ultrasound to detect is the size and the shape of objects. For example, one echo they quickly identified is one way associated with moff, which is common prey for a bat, particularly a moff meeting its wings. However, moff happened to have major advantage over most other insects. They can detect ultrasound; this means that when the bat
approaches, the moff can detect the bat’s presence. So, it has time to escape to safety, or else they can just remain motionless. Since, when they stop meeting their wings, they will be much hard for the bat to distinguish from, oh… a leave or some other object. Now, we have tended to underestimate just how sophisticated the ability that animals that use ultrasound are. In fact, we kinds of assume that they were filtering a lot out. The ways are sophisticated radar on our system can ignore the echo from the stationary object on the ground. Radar are does this to remove ground clutter, information about the hills or buildings that they doesn’t need. But bats, we thought they were filtering out kinds of information, because they simply couldn’t analyze it. But, it looks as we are wrong. Recent there was the experiment with trees and specific piecies of bat. A bat called: the laser spear nosed bat. Now, a tree should be use and acoustic challenge for bat, right? I mean it got all kinds of surfaces with different shapes and angles. So, well, the echoes from trees are going to
be massive and chaotic acoustic reflection, right, not like the echo from the moff. So, we thought for a long time that the bat stop their evaluation as simply that is tree. Yet, it turns out that is or at least particular species, cannot only tell that is trees, but can also distinguish between a pine tree, deciduous tree, like a maple or oak tree, just by their leaves. And when I say, leaves, I mean pine needles too. Any idea on how we would know that?
Stu: Well, like with the moff, could be their shape?
Pro: You are on the right track---it actually the echo of all the leaves as whole the matters. Now, think, a pine trees with little densely packed needles. Those produced a large number of fain reflection in which what’s we called as: a smooth of echo. The wave forms were very even, but an oak which has fewer but bigger leaves with stronger reflections, produces a gigots wave form, or what we called: a rough echo. And these bats can distinguish between a two, and not just was trees, but with any echo come in smooth and rough shape.
Conversation 2
Stu: Hi, I am a new here and I couldn't come to our student orientation and I'm wondering if you can give me a few quick points just about library. I’d really appreciate it.
Pro: Sure. I will be glad to. What's your major area of study?
Stu: Latin American Literature.
Pro: OK. Well, over here's the section where we have language, literature and arts. And if you go down stairs you will find history section. Generally, the students who concentrated in Latin American literature find themselves research in history section a lot.
Stu: Hum, you are right. I am a transfer student and I've already done a year in another university so I know how the research can go that spent a lot of time on history section. So how long can I borrow books for?
Pro: Our loan period is a month. Oh I should also mention that we have an inter-library loan service. If you need to get to hold a book that not in our library, there is a truck that runs between our library and a few public and university libraries in this area. It comes around three times a week.
Stu: It's great! At my last school, it takes really a long time to get the materials I needed. So when I had a project, I had to make a plan away in advance. This sounds much faster. Another thing I was wondering is: is there a place where I can bring my computer and hook it up?
Pro: Sure. There is a whole area here on the main floor where you can bring a laptop and plug it in for power but on top of that we also have a connection for the internet that every seat.
Stu: Nice, so I can do the all research I need to do right here in the library. All I have the resources, all the books and the information I need right here in one place.
Pro: Yeah. That's the idea. I am sure you'll need photo copiers too. There is down the hall to the left. We have system where you have to use copy cards so you'll need to buy a card from the front desk. You would insert it into the machine and you read it into the copies.
Stu: How much do you get charge?
Pro: Seven cents a copy.
Stu: Hum, that is not too bad. Thanks. Hum, where is the collection of the rare books?
Pro: Rare books are upon the second floor. There is in the separate room where the temperature controlled, to preserved old paper in them. You need to get special permission to access, and then you have to need to wear gloves to handle them because the oil in our hands, you know, can destroy the paper. And gloves prevent that so we have a basket of gloves in the room.
Stu: Ok. Thanks. I suppose that all I need to know. You've been very helpful. Thanks.
Pro: Anytime. Bye
Stu: Bye.
【Lecture 3 Anthropology】
The focus on Iroquois and Hooray peoples. They lived in the northeastern great lakes region of North America. Now, back then, their lives depended on the natural resources of the forests, especially the birch tree. The birch tree can grow in many different types of soils and it's prevalent in that area. Now can anyone here describe the birch tree?
Stu: They are tall and white, the bark, I mean.
Pro: Yes. The birch tree has white bark, and this tough protective outer layer of the tree, this white bark, is waterproof. And this waterproof quality of the bark, it made it useful for ** things like cooking containers, a variety of utensils. And if you peel birch bark in the winter, we call it ‘the winter bark', another layer a tougher inner layer of the tree adheres to the bark, producing a stronger material. So the winter bark was used for larger utensils and containers.
Stu: I know people make utensils out of wood, but utensils out of tree bark?
Pro: Well, birch bark is pliable and very easy to bend. The Native Americans would cut the bark and fold it into any shape they needed, then secure with cords until it dried. They could fold the bark into many shapes.
Stu: So if they cooked in bowls made of birch bark, wouldn't that make the food taste
funny?
Pro: Oh, that's one of the great things of birch bark. The taste of the birch tree doesn't get transferred to the food. So it was perfect for cooking containers. But the most important use of the bark, by far, was the canoe. Since the northeastern region of North American is interconnected by many streams and waterways, water transportation by vessels like a canoe was most essential. The paths through the woods were often over-grown, so water travel was much faster. And here's what the Native Americans did. They would peel large sheets of bark from the tree to form light-weight yet sturdy canoes. The bark was stretched over frames made from tree branches, stitched together and sealed with resin. You know that sticky liquid that comes out of the tree? And when it dries, it's watertight. One great thing of these birch bark canoes was that they could carry a large amount of cargo. For example, a canoe weighing about 50 pounds could carry up to nine people and 250 pounds of cargo.
Stu: Wow! But how far could they drive that way?
Pro: Well like I said, the northeastern region is interconnected by rivers and streams and the ocean at the coast. The canoes allow them to travel over a vast area that today it would take a few hours to fly over. You see, the Native Americans made canoes of all types, for travel on small streams or on large open ocean waters. For small streams, they made narrow, maneuverable boats, while a large canoe was needed for the ocean. They could travel throughout the area only occasionally having to portage, to carry the canoe over a land short distance to another nearby stream. And since the canoes were so light, this wasn't a difficult task. Now how do you think this affected their lives?
Stu: Well if they could travel so easily over such a large area, they could trade with people from other areas which I guess would lead them to form alliances?
Pro: Exactly. Having an efficient means of transportation, well, that helps the Iroquois to form a federation linked by natural waterways. And this federation expanded from what is now Southern Canada all the way south to the Dalever River. And this efficiency of birch bark canoe also made an impression on newcomers of the area. French traders in the 17 century modeled their...well they adopted the design of Yreka’s birch bark canoes, and they found they could travel great distances more than 15 kilometers a month. Now besides the bark, Native Americans also used the wood of the birch tree. The young trees were used to support for loggings with the waterproof bark used as roofing. Branches were folded into snow shoes and the Native American people were all adept to running very fast over the snow in these birch brand snow shoes which if you ever tried walking in snow shoes you know wasn't easy.
【Lecture 4 Geology】
Last time, we started to talk about the glaciers, and how these masses less forms from crystallized snow, and some of you were amazed at how huge some of the these glaciers are. Now, even though it may be difficult to understand how a huge mass less can move or flow, in another word for it, it’s really known that the secret that the glaciers flow, because of gravity. But how they flow, and why they flow needs some explaining. Now, the first type of the glaciers flow is called: basal slip. Basal slip or its sliding as it’s often called, basically refers to the slipping or sliding of glacier across bedrock, actually across the thin layer of water, on top of the bedrock. So, this process shouldn’t be too hard to imagine. What happens is that the ice of the base of the glacier is under gradual depression-- the depression coming from the weights of the overlaying ice. And you probably know that the under pressure, the melting temperature of water as the ice I mean, is reduced. So, ice at the basis of glacier melts, even though it’s below zero degree thaws. And this results in thin layer of water between the glacier and ground. This layer of water reduces friction is... is like a lubricant.
And it allows the glacier to slat or slip over the bedrock. Ok, now the next type movement we will talk about is called: deformation. You already known that the ice brittle, if you heated with hammer, it will shatterly glass. But ice also plastic, you can change the shapes without breaking. If you leave, for example, a bar of ice supported only at one end, they end, they unsupported end will deform under its own way due---kind of flatten out one in to get stored it deformed it. Think deformation a very slow oozing. Depending on the stresses on the glacier, the ice crystal was in the re-organized. And during this re-organization the ice crystal re-allied in a way that allows them to slide pass each other. And so the glacier oozes downhill without any ice actually melting. Now, there are a couple of the factors that affects the amounts of deformation that takes place or the speed of the glaciers movement for example. Deformation is more likely to occur the thicker the ices, because at the gravity of the weight its ice. And temperature also plays part here, in that XX does not moves easily. As the ice that is close to the mounting points, in fact, it is not to different from… the weight oil is, thicker at the lower temperature. So, if you had a glacier in the slightly warmer region, it will flow faster than the glacier in the cooler region. Ok, um… Now, let’s touch briefly on extension and compression. You textbook includes this as type as a particular type of glacier movement, but you will see that these are … cause many textbooks that omitted as type of movement as included. And I might not include right now, if there won’t in your textbooks. But, basically, the upper parts of the glacier have less pressure on them. So, they don’t deform easily, they tend to be more brittle. And crevasses can form in this upper layer of glacier. When the glacier comes into contact with bedrock walls or the otherwise under some kinds of stresses, but can deform quickly enough. So, the ice would expand or constrict, and that can cause XXX be crack to form in the surface of the layer of ice, and that brittle the surface ice moving, is sometimes considered a type of glacier movement depending on which source you can thaw to. Now, as you probably know, glaciers generally move really slowly. But sometimes, they experience surges, and during these surges, in some places, they can move its speeds as high as 7000 meters per year. Now, a speed like that are pretty unusual, 100 of times faster than the regular movement of glaciers, but you can actually see glacier move during these surges, though it is rare.
