Transcript of AE 671: The Real English Discussion Course is Coming!

G'day, guys and welcome to Aussie English. My objective here is to teach you guys the English spoken Down Under. So, whether you want to speak like a fair dinkum Aussie or you just want to understand what the flipping hell we're on about when we're having a yarn, you've come to the right place. So, sit back, grab a cuppa and enjoy Aussie English.

G'day, you mob! How's it going? Welcome to this episode of Aussie English.

Today I've got something different for you guys. So, as you may or may not be aware, I recently was talking about a new course that I am trying to create to help you really improve your listening comprehension. So, this course is going to be called Real English Discussions and it is going to involve 12 different discussions that I have with my father in The Goss episodes, but broken down so that you guys can really hone in.

You can really focus in on an authentic discussion in English, a real English discussion to improve your listening comprehension. So, the idea will be that you will get a new lesson every single week for three months that you can focus heavily on. You'll get a video of the discussion, you'll get a complete transcript of the discussion with vocabulary highlighted in that file, you'll get an MP3 audio file of the discussion, as well as another MP3 audio file of all of the vocab being defined and giving you examples.

And then you'll also get a pronunciation MP3 file to practise your pronunciation. So, the idea will be that it will be a three month course. You will start with short discussions and then as the weeks go forward, the discussions will get longer and longer and more complicated. So, we'll go from about two and a half minutes from the first week to about 14 minutes, 15 minutes in the very last week, 12 weeks later.

So, I'm trying to design it to be a step by step study guide, study course where you guys can really dive in at the moment, especially in quarantine and level up your listening skills in English, as well as expand your vocab as the lessons that I've selected are all related to Australia, they're all about culture and history and current affairs, and they all involve a lot of different vocab, different expressions, all use spontaneously in these real discussions between my father and I were you know, that they're not pre-scripted.

We haven't planned to say anything specific. We're just having a natural discussion anyway in today's podcast, because I want to give you a taste of what's to come in this course. I've finished editing the first week's material, the discussion, the pronunciation and the vocabulary file, and I'm going to include them in today's podcast episode, I'm going to let you listen to the discussion first, after that, I'm going to play the vocabulary file for you, and then I'm going to play the pronunciation file for you, and then I'll play the discussion one more time just so that you can hear it all in that kind of order in one place, as opposed to me uploading multiple episodes for these files.

So, I hope you enjoy it, guys. I would love your feedback on what you think of the course, what you think of the idea. I've already had about 50 of you say that you would like to purchase this course and said it's a really good idea and it's something that you would love. So, I'm looking forward to completing it and making it available for you guys. Anyway, let's get into it, guys.

Week one - bushfires and Australia's ecosystems.

What do you see happening with the Australian wildlife in this sort of area or the ecosystems in your lifetime or in my lifetime? Do you think it's only going to get worse and we're going to see mass extinction happen?

Oh, look, it will. And there's almost nothing we can do about that in the general sense, other than doing things like major change on, major changes of policy and practise on fire is a good example of that. We can't recover ecosystems from fire if they have completely destroyed the ecosystem.

We could go and replant, but that's yeah, that's a century long solution. It's not a solution that any government, certainly any government in this political environment is going to be able to to get away with doing. So, they are going to disappear and so on, which means that it's important for us to try and do whatever we can to maintain areas in a way that we're not going to have these catastrophic disasters going through them.

So, having controlled burns and doing those sort of things where we're actually trying to replicate the historical and evolutionary environment that these ecosystems have grown up in, because for decades, certainly and possibly longer than that, we have allowed fires to occur, and in fact, we've deliberately lit fires not recently, but in decades past, in order to clear land.

And, so clearing in the past is something that's happened. We can't change that. But what we can do is to say we want to be able to maintain these ecosystems in a way that means that we can we can have controlled fires, but they're not going to have if there is a bushfire comes by accident or, heaven forbid, by some idiot lighting it, that they are not going to turn into catastrophic events like we've had recently.

Some story I was reading about a guy in South Australia who lit six fires and was 79 years old, running around lighting the fires two days ago or something in a 40 degree days.

There is always idiots doing that and you can't account for individual human stupidity.

They literally... the expression 'this guy just wants to watch the world burn'.

Yeah. And you can't account for individual stupidity where you've got, you've got a handful of people out of a population of 25 million who are going to do something stupid. You can't legislate against stupidity.

This is almost like, I guess, Australia's equivalent of America's high school shooters, right? We've got our own arsonists. Where it's...

We've got our own idiots.

You can't, you don't know who's going to do it before they do it.

No. Exactly. And they say you can't legislate against stupidity, but what you can do is you can mitigate the effect that either natural or human stupidity is going to act to create a weak one vocabulary.

G'day, you mob and welcome to week 1 - Bushfires and Australia's Ecosystems vocabulary audio file. So, in this lesson, I'm going to go through each of the pieces of vocabulary that were highlighted in blue in our first lesson for week one.

Let's get into it.

So, wildlife, wildlife. Wildlife includes animals that live in nature. If I go into the bush in Australia, I want to see wildlife. A lot of people go camping because they want to see wildlife, things like koalas and platypus and kangaroos and possums, all of those are animals and they are all wildlife and ecosystem.

An ecosystem. An ecosystem is a biological community of interacting organisms and their physical environment. So, if I go into the forest, the ecosystem in the forest involves the trees, the moss, the animals, the plants, everything that's interacting in that biological community.

Mass extinction, mass extinction. Mass extinction is an event where you have the complete dying out of a large number of species all at the same time. So, some people say that at the moment the world is experiencing a mass extinction because so many species of plants, animals of fungi, of plenty of other organisms are all dying out because of humans. They're being wiped out. They are going extinct and because they're so many of them doing it at the same time, it's mass extinction.

To recover ecosystems from fire, to recover ecosystems from fire. This is where you allow an ecosystem, a biological community to regenerate after being damaged by bushfire or by some kind of wild fire. So, you allow that environment, all of the plants, the animals, the fungi, the bacteria, every single organism in that community that interacts the ecosystem there to recover. It can regenerate itself after a fire.

To replant something, to re plant something. This is just to plant something, but we're using the prefix 're' in front of 'plant', replant, meaning to plant again. So, if you replant something, you provide an area with new plants or trees. So you are yourself planting trees or shrubs or small plants again after they've been destroyed for whatever reason.

A political environment, a political environment. A political environment is the current state of the government and its institutions and legislations. So, it is the state of the government, it is how the government is functioning, the institutions and legislations, everything like that, how they're set up currently and running, that is the current political environment.

To get away with something, to get away with something. This is a good phrasal verb, to get away with something is to do something and then have no repercussions. So, you usually do something like, say, commit a crime. You know, maybe you rob a bank. If you get away with the crime, if you get away with robbing the bank, it is that no one catches you. There's no punishment, there's no repercussions, right? You got away with the crime. You got away with the stolen goods, you got away with robbing the bank.

Catastrophic, catastrophic. Catastrophic is involving or causing sudden great damage or suffering. So, if a tornado blows through town and destroys numbers of houses, heaps of people are injured and harmed, maybe there's some deaths it involves or causes sudden great damage or suffering. It is catastrophic, the tornado was catastrophic, it was a catastrophic event.

A controlled burn, a controlled burn. A controlled burn is a fire that is lit to clear an area but is under control. So, we use controlled burns in Australia to try and remove all of the leaf litter, all of the fuel that's on the ground, like branches and sticks and leaves, anything that can burn, we try and use controlled burns in winter to clear that fuel away so that in summer, if there are bushfires, they're not going to have as much stuff to burn. So, we use controlled burns, we control those fires and we use them to clear away the fuel.

To grow up, to grow up in something. If you grow up, you get older or you become mature, and if you do that in a situation or environment, then you're growing up in something, right? So, I grew up in Australia. I grew up in a liberal political environment, I grew up in a country where we use controlled burns to try and mitigate bushfires during summer.

In decades past. In decades past. If something happens in decades past, it happens in periods of decades, 10 years in the past. So, it could have been in the 50s, the 1950s, it could have been in the 60s, it could have been in the 70s, it could have been in the 80s or 90s. Any of those decades in the past a decade being a period of 10 years.

Clearing. Clearing is the removal of trees or other vegetation from areas of land. So when Australia was first colonised by Europeans, a lot of them used clearing in order to establish farms. So, they cleared away trees, they cut the trees down, they then burnt the land, probably with controlled burns in order to clear the land they used clearing to clear the land so that they could then farm that land. So, clearing is the removal of trees and other vegetations from land.

A controlled fire. A controlled fire. Now, this is the same as a controlled burn, a burn that is lit and then monitored safely by someone. And it is used to clear an area, but it's under control. It is monitored safely by usually, firies, which is the Australian slang term for firemen. 'A firey' is a fireman, someone who puts out fires or who uses controlled fires or controlled burns to remove fuel.

Heaven forbid, heaven forbid. This is a good expression, and it's used to express a fervent wish that something doesn't happen. So, heaven forbid there's a horrible bushfire this year. You know, it's like 'I really hope there isn't a horrible bushfire this year'. I'm wishing that that thing won't happen. Heaven forbid there's a car accident and someone dies. Heaven forbid Corona virus kills more people. Heaven forbid. Heaven forbid.

It's kind of like you're asking God or, you know, whoever's in the heavens to forbid that thing from happening, to stop that thing from happening.

Running around doing something. Running around doing something. If you're running around doing something, it's that you're going from place to place, completing tasks. You're going from place to place, you're moving from place to place. It isn't literally that you're running, although, you know, you could be running. But running around is kind of like going from place to place quickly and running around doing something is going from place to place quickly whilst completing a task, whilst doing something.

Some people just want to watch the world burn. Some people just want to watch the world burn. Now, this expression is used quite often when talking about people who just want to see things get destroyed. They just want to see situations go from bad to worse, they want to watch the world burn. Some people just want to watch the world burn.

To account for something, to account for something. If you account for something, you provide an explanation for something so minor, you would use an accountant to account for your business's income, in a literal sense. But figuratively, maybe I have a party with my family and I invite everyone to to come to the house and one person's missing and no one can account for that person, it means they can't provide an explanation for why that person isn't there.

They can't account for that person, they can't account for that person's absence. We don't know why it happened, we can't account for it, we can't provide an explanation.

To legislate against something, to legislate against something. This is where you make or enact laws to prevent something. So, if you want to legislate against, well, spreading the corona virus at the moment, you pass a law that says that people can't gather together in groups of more than two. Or maybe if you want to stop people dying in car accidents, you legislate against speeding. You know, you pass a law that prevents people driving at a certain speed to try and legislate against people dying, people dying in car accidents. So, it's enacting a law to prevent something.

A high school shooter, a high school shooter. This is a person generally in America, although, obviously, we have high schools all around the world and people with guns all around the world, so it can happen anywhere. But usually if someone's talking about a high school shooter, it's a person who goes into a school to kill their classmates in an act of anger or revenge.

And they're doing it with a gun, hence being a shooter, right? And so this seems to be this weird phenomenon that happens in the U.S. where because of their gun laws and the prevalence of guns in the United States, they're easy for people to get their hands on. And if you have a kid who is psychologically disturbed, he can get a gun, he can go to his high school, he can shoot people, that's a high school shooter.

And the last one, guys, is to mitigate something, to mitigate something. If you mitigate something, you make something that's bad less severe. You make it less serious, you make it less painful. So, you might take morphine in a hospital to mitigate the pain, so you want to reduce the pain. You want to make it less serious, less severe, less painful. You want to mitigate the pain.

So, there you go, guys. Hopefully you've learnt a whole bunch of new vocabulary. Go back, listen to this episode for the rest of this week, study the vocab, learn all of the new words and expressions used and just keep repeating, repeating, repeating to really work on your listening comprehension. And I'll see you next week.

Week one - Pronunciation lesson.

In this lesson, guys, I'm going to repeat 10 different phrases that include some of the vocabulary from weak ones, discussion episode, bushfires and Australia's ecosystems. So, I'm going to say each of these phrases three times, guys, listen and repeat after me to focus on my intonation, my pronunciation and the rhythm. Let's go.

What do you see happening with Australia's wildlife in the future?

What do you see happening with Australia's wildlife in the future?

What do you see happening with Australia's wildlife in the future?

We can't recover ecosystems from fire.

We can't recover ecosystems from fire.

We can't recover ecosystems from fire.

Having controlled burns prevents catastrophic disasters.

Having controlled burns prevents catastrophic disasters.

Having controlled burns prevents catastrophic disasters.

In decades past, clearing forests was commonplace.

In decades past, clearing forests was common place.

In decades past, clearing forests was commonplace.

Heaven forbid ( not sure if it needs a comma here) some idiot deliberately starts a bushfire.

Heaven forbid some idiot deliberately starts a bushfire.

Heaven forbid some idiot deliberately starts a bushfire.

Some people just want to watch the world burn.

Some people just want to watch the world burn.

Some people just want to watch the world burn.

You can't legislate against stupidity.

You can't legislate against stupidity.

You can't legislate against stupidity.

A seventy nine year old was running around lighting fires two days ago.

A seventy nine year old was running around lighting fires two days ago.

A seventy nine year old was running around lighting fires two days ago.

It's Australia's equivalent of America's high school shooters.

It's Australia's equivalent of America's high school shooters.

It's Australia's equivalent of America's high school shooters.

You can mitigate the effect that a the natural or human stupidity is going to create.

You can mitigate the effect that either natural or human stupidity is going to create.

You can mitigate the effect that either natural or human stupidity is going to create.

Well done, guys! So, I've tried to say these different phrases two times. At the start they're more slowly, and then the last time, more naturally, as I would say it, sometimes with contractions. So, things like 'want to', becomes 'wanna' and 'going to' becomes 'gonna'. So, go over this exercise, guys, and try and use it as a shadowing exercise where you practise how I am saying these phrases, my pronunciation, the rhythm, the connected speech, the intonation. Focus on all of it.

Week one - bushfires and Australia's ecosystems.

What do you see happening with the Australian wildlife in this sort of area or the ecosystems in your lifetime or in my lifetime? Do you think it's only going to get worse and we're going to see mass extinction happen, you know, further and further and further?

It will. And there's there's almost nothing we can do about that in the general sense, other than doing things like major change on, major changes of policy and practise on fire is a good example of that. We can't recover ecosystems from fire if they have completely destroyed the ecosystem. We could go and replant, but that's yeah, that's a century long solution.

It's not a solution that any government, certainly any government in this political environment is going to be able to to get away with doing so. They are going to disappear and so on, which means that it's important for us to try and do whatever we can to maintain areas in a way that we're not going to have these catastrophic disasters going through them.

So, having controlled burns and doing those sort of things where we're actually trying to replicate the historical and evolutionary environment that these ecosystems have grown up in, because for decades, certainly and possibly longer than that, we have allowed fires to occur, and in fact, we've deliberately lit fires not recently, but in decades past in order to clear land.

And, so clearing in the past is something that's happened. We can't change that. But what we can do is to say we want to be able to maintain these ecosystems in a way that means that they can we can have controlled fires, but they're not going to have if there is a bushfire comes by accident or, heaven forbid, by some idiot lighting it, that they are not going to turn into catastrophic events like we've had recently.

Some story I was reading about a guy in South Australia who lit six fires and was 79 years old, running around lighting the fires two days ago or something in a 40 degree days.

There is always idiots doing that. You can't account for individual human stupidity.

They... Literally, like the expression 'this guy just wants to watch the world burn'.

Yeah. And you can't account for individual stupidity where you've got, you know, you've got a handful of people out of a population of 25 million who are going to do something stupid. You can't legislate against stupidity.

This is almost like, I guess, Australia's equivalent of America's high school shooters, right? We've got our own arsonists. Where it's...

They are our own idiots.

You can't... you don't know who's going to do it before they do it.

No. Exactly. And they say you can't legislate against stupidity, but what you can do is you can mitigate the effect that either natural or human stupidity is going to create.

Alright, guys. So, that is a taste of The Real English Discussions course that will be out soon. I'm currently working on all of the different week modules, so there's going to be 12 of them. I'm actually going to include some bonus modules as well On the war on drugs and on coronavirus. Assuming that you haven't had enough of corona virus already.

But I'm looking forward to your feedback, guys. I really, really hope that this course is going to be something that you will purchase, that you will use to really improve your listening comprehension and just get used to those really tricky conversations where there are two people or more talking at the same time.

It can be difficult at times, but that's the kind of sticking point. That is where a lot of you guys seem to be getting stuck, it's when there are multiple people talking together in these kinds of natural discussions, you tend to be able to find it pretty easy to listen to me on this podcast, talk by myself, but I get a lot of messages from you guys saying that English discussions amongst many people is where you get really, really stuck.

So, guys, please let me know what you think and if you're looking forward to purchasing this course, send me an email, theaussieenglishpodcast@gmail.com and I will talk to you soon. All the best!

G'day, mate. Thanks for listening to the Aussie English podcast. If you'd like to boost your English whilst also supporting the podcast and allowing me to continue to bring you awesome content, please consider joining the Aussie English Academy at www.aussieenglish.com.au. You'll get unlimited access to the premium podcast as well as all of my advanced English courses, and you'll also be able to join three weekly speaking calls with a real English teacher. Thanks so much, mate, and I'll see you soon.