Social class

Social class are economic or cultural arrangements of groups in society. In Britain, classes are divided into three groups, the upper class, the middle class and the lower or working class.

The upper class generally include very rich people coming for example from aristocracies families. The middle class include people business peoples, or professionals. And the lower class regroup people who work to survive.

Despites people from different class are all human; there are many things that differentiate them. According to the video that has been watched in class Channel4 (2011), they were many differences between a northern working class girls and an urban upper class girl. These differences were mainly based on the gesture, the language, the posture... And what was really surprising above the video were the fact that there is a way to speak that makes people believe that you are coming from an upper class, also the way her teacher were learned her how to turn her mouth when she might wanted to speak in front of people.

Generally, people might define or use the word “posh” for wealthy people with elegant and luxurious house.

References: Channel4 (2011) “Shop girl to It girl”. Available at: http://www.channel4.com/programmes/faking-it/4oD#2922253. Accessed (22/06/2011).

benefits of nhs

The National Health Service (NHS) is a service providing health care to all residents of the United Kingdom. His aim it to make sure that anyone in the UK can receive the medical care they need, regardless of their age, or financial situation. The NHS offers many benefits to all the UK residents.

able to ask advice to a pharmacist depending on the importance of the illness. 

 In term of cost, the NHS provides care free of charge to most UK residents. IT entitles people to diagnostic care and treatment for any illness or health concern. Treatment free of charge can be received from everything from minor ailments such as colds or even serious diseases such as diabetes and cancer.

In term of care, the NHS depending on the nature of people problem offers a range of services to provide the general public with suitable healthcare. It is also designed to offer to people whatever care they need throughout their life.

To benefits from it, all the residents should be registered with a General Practician(GP). And once they seek help because they feel unwell he might also be able to inform them about the care options available for them.

Reference:  Monetos(2011): "Advantages of the NHS". Available at: http://www.monetos.co.uk/insurance/health-insurance/nhs/advantages/. Accessed(28/06/2011)

Media-Newspaper

News is the elements of the mass media which focus on delivering new to a general public. These include print media, broadcast news and the internet.

Print media are the one including newspapers and newsmagazines. In Britain there are a variety of newspapers. Some popular of them are The Guardian, The independent and the Daily telegraph.

Tabloids and broadsheets are both used for news. But some differences between them are:

*Tabloids use more color, have shorter sentence, and use more pictures.

* Broadsheets have longer sentences, use little or no color, and use small picture.

Five different newspapers have been choosing in this case. All of them are dated of Monday 9^th May 2011. These with their headlines are:

 -Western Mail: Work with labour to from new coalition, parties are urged.

-Echo South Wales: This Hilton is “too cheap” for Butetown.

-The daily telegraph: Workers are 40 pc better off in public sector.

-The Guardian: Nato units left 61 migrants to die of hunger and thirst.

-The Independent: Shadow over Sellafield.

While from the same day, each newspaper has him own headline. It easy to recognize the headline with the fact that it is written in big print, followed by a brief summary and also with the expressions “more page…”, “continued on page…” Even if they all have these differences on the headlines, all of them have the same information included.

Sport and competition

In Britain, sport sometimes plays a more important part in people’s lives than in most other countries. British are also the one of the best in the world in a much larger number of different sports than other country. Every year there is a calendar establishing that shows some of the most important sporting events. This month, the next one is The Derby horse racing on the flat and the Wimbledon tennis fortnight.

Wimbledon is the oldest tournament which has been taking place from as early as 1877. It being one of the most loved tournaments of not only the English but the entire world. It is also one of the Grand Slam tennis tournaments along with Australian Open, the French Open and the US Open. Wimbledon held at the end of June and lasts till early July; That is the reason why people call it "Wimbledon tennis fortnight". It lasts for 13 days to be precise, with five major events, four junior events and four invitanional events in the famous tennis club in Wimbledon, South West of London. According to Wimbledon: " the most important dates this year are: Qualifying: 13June-16June, Seeds Announced: 16June, The Championships: 20June-3July, The Draw: 17June". 

One of the most popular tennis man players is Roger Federer and one of the most popular tennis woman players is Serena Williams.

References

Wimbledon (2011) Wimbledon. Available at: http://www.wimbledon.com/en_GB/index.html (Accessed: 07/06/2011).

Crime and Punishment

Crime could be defined as an act of people to commit something bad which is illegal. Usually when people do committed crime they are locked up in a prison and the main purpose of this prison should be punishment.

Nowadays the more common crime is the juvenile crime which is very hard for any government to control. There are some few kinds of common juvenile crime such as joy-riding, vandalism, and graffiti and a punishment which could be helpful and better is to catch these young and keep them for a week in a prison. Political activists also should never break the law because they are the one supposed to give example to the citizens about how to respect the law.

One other big problem in the world is people who drink and drive., the law should be very strict with them because driving while you are drunk could make you made an accident; and to stop` that there should be a law establishing that when you drink and drive the police should take your car to the pound. In the UK, the most serious problem is social security fraud, according to Murphy.R. (2011) “…. Then benefit fraud is 624 times more important than tax evasion”. In Cameroun, both are the most serious because people poor and unemployed people do not receive help from the government and they are really tempted to fraud on everything and a solution to avoid this is to control everything.

Reference:

Murphy R. (2011) Tax research UK. Available at : http://www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2010/07/01/benefit-fraud-is-624-times-more-serious-than-tax-evasion/ Accessed (27/07/2011)

The Entrepreuneur: Global tax evasion in Cameroon. Available at : http://www.entrepreneurnewsonline.com/2010/02/global-tax-evasion-tax-evasion-stifles-poorest-nations.html Accessed (27/07/2011)

Crime and society. Available at: http://www.iea.org.uk/sites/default/files/Crime%20and%20Society.pdf Accessed: (27/07/2011).

Social Secuity

Social security could be define as a program which provide financial assistance and  social protection for people who got socially recognized conditions as poverty, old age, disability, unemployment and others.

In Britain, the social security system is runs by the department of work and pensions. For the government, this department is the single most expensive programme. In Britain the official retirement age is 60 for women and 65 for men. According to the text of the ‘Social Security’, the groups of people whish can benefit from the social security system are the people over 65 and the unemployed people. With estimation it is has been found that a quarter of the population (including 4.5 million children) are on the poverty line. And as the population ages, as the numbers of the sick, poor, disadvantaged and unemployed persist, the social security will become more expensive than now. In this case it may be found that as it will become expensive, some people could benefit like for example according to directgov (2010) “The Basic State Pension will increase by £4.50 to £102.15 Pensioners on a low income will benefit because most people who receive Pension Credit will get a £4.75 increase in guarantee credit".

References:
Directgov (2010) New benefit and pension rates for 2011-2012. Available at: http://www.direct.gov.uk/en/Nl1/Newsroom/DG_193032 (Accessed: 22/05/11).

Media-TV

Television is one of the most popular entertainment activities for peoples in their houses nowadays. But television broadcasting really depends on the country; the way to broadcast might not be the same all over the world just because of some criteria. Here we will talk about UK and Cameroun.
In UK, there are so many British television broadcasting. And the first UK’s broadcasting agency was the BBC (British Broadcasting Company). It is highly independent of government control. But, sometimes although the government can persuade the BBC not to show something, there have also been many occasions when it has refused to give up in front of the government pressure. It also usual in UK to see that BBC does not screen adverts apart from the promotion of its own future programming. But, advertisement revenue provides a significant portion of the funding for most privately owned television networks and for the majority of them, their advertisements do not take long time such from 1 to 3min. And these kind of advertisements are used to promote a wide variety of goods, services and ideas like for example when you watch a movie, it can be cut to shows an advert of a drink, shoes, shop or food. As known, television is not just advertisement; there are also a variety of TV programmes shown such as news, cartoon, documentary, soap, game show... Talking about these programmes there is for example soap operas which are kind of long running series concerned with everyday life, it can also define women in relation to a concern with the family. And the recurrent events in soap opera include marriages, divorces, death, disappearances...

Concerning the TV broadcasting in Cameroon, there are International TV channels and National ones. There is only around 5 national channels and one of them belongs to the Government, its name is CRTV (Cameroon Radio Television). In fact these national TV channel are influenced by the government, every things they show is in accordance with the government. By the way there can also be some international channels also called occidental channels either American channel.  Advertisements are frequent on nationals TV and it is pretty sure that some of them earn a lot in this sector. It is not difficult to send your advert but to make it you should have lot of money because it costs a lot to be promoted which is normal. Basically, adverts cover a wide sector which contains food, clothes, or a business. As general there are a lot of different varieties of program shown: News, Documentaries, Reality shows, Movies, Cartoons, Weather, Music and feuilleton and also, television campaign advertisements are considerers indispensable for a political campaign. In Cameroon the style of soap operas is very simple because it is all about daily life and most of them inspired from a real story. Watching them can help people to understand a few of life; they always carry a lesson to retain.

References: Media UK(2011): "BBC news". Available at:http://www.mediauk.com/tv/28175/bbc-news. Accessed ( 02/06/2011).

The government

The britain government is composed of many politicians namely the Prime Minister and the others members of the cabinet.The cabinet is an informal grouping of important ministers and officials of the royal household with 20 peoples as members who often meet once a week.In the government,there are single party government and coalition government.But,both of them are not the same,the difference between those is that all members of the government belong to the same political party.Therefore,strangly as it can be,the PM has more power than the Queen.In UK, when the government changes the civil service does not changes too.And also,to be a civil servant is better than being a minister because,civil servant have permanant job and high salary.There are many cabinet ministers but we'll talk about :The Rt Hon Cheryl Gilian MP,secretary of state for Wales.
According to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cheryl_Gillan Cheryl Gilian was born on the 21st April 1952 in Cardiff(Wales). She attended the independent Cheltenham Ladies' College , the College of Law and is a Member of the Chartered Institute of Marketing.Before having a political career,she was having a businness career.In this businness career,she joined the International Management group in 1977 before becoming a director with the British Film Year in 1984. In 1986 she was appointed senior marketing consultant at Ernst & Young , becoming marketing director with Kidsons Impey 1991–1993. She became a Freeman of the city of London in 1991 and is a member of the Worshipful Company of Marketors.Then she joined the political career where she served as the chairman of the right-wing Bow-Groupin 1987–1988 and unsuccessfully contested the Greater Manchester Central  seat in the 1989 European Parliament election. She was elected to the House of Commons in the 1992 general election.. In 1994 she was appointed as the Parliamentary Private Secretary to the Leader of the House of Lords and Lord Privy Seal Viscount Cranborne. In July 1995 Cheryl Gillan joined the government as aParliamentary Under Secretary of State in the Department for Education and Emplyment.In December 2003 she became Shadow Minister for Home, Constitutional and Legal Affairs.She was promoted to the Shadow Cabinet in December 2005 as the Shadow Secretary of State for Wales.

References: http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm/cmregmem/110124/part2.htm, http://www.cabinetoffice.gov.uk/sites/default/files/resources/ministers-interests.pdf, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cheryl_Gillan , http://www.parliament.uk/biographies/cheryl-gillan/25627

Education

Many students start their nursery school in Cameroon at the age of three or four. In these schools what they only have to do it is to draw, paint, play, sing,...After nursery time, as the systems is divided into three sectors, we have, primary sector in which people start at the age of three or four and were student have one exam to take when they reach their last year, the secondary sector in which people start at the age of the nine(for the cleaver one),ten or eleven and were students have three exams to take for their two last years, then we have the tertiary sector in which people start at the age of sixteen, seventeen, or heighten, twenty(for the older one's).In Cameroon, there are many private schools more than public schools(schools that belong to the government).Many parents prefer to send their children in these kind of schools because they give a good education there and the teachers are more competent. Sometimes they send their children there because they want them to receive a foreign education. For example in Cameroon we have  an American school, and a French school, is these school students are not receiving the same education as they are not doing the same subjects as students from other schools, but they are taking the same courses, programs that student from USA,UK or FRANCE. To punish the student in class, maybe if they have not done their homework or if they make a lot of noise in class, the schoolteachers can beat them, ask them to kneel down, ask them to leave the classroom or maybe ask them to sweep the floor after the class. University in Cameroon is available only for students who have successfully completed their secondary education y obtained their GCSE. Then there are private university (the more expensive and that belong to somebody or a particular)and public university(the more cheaper and that belong to the government).Usually, when students are at the university they do not have to live whit their parents again since they want them to be independent, responsible of what they do in their life, but it's depend on family and if your university is not far from your house. But actually many university students travel abroad to study mostly when they want to do a specific subject, and usually the most popular country that they choose are UK, Usa, France, Belgium, Canada and South Africa. The most serious problems facing the education system in Cameroon in the infrastructure. However the educational system of East Cameroon followed the methods of French model and the West Cameroon system was based on the British model.
To talk about the British system of education. In the UK, system is divided into three sectors. In the primary sector, children start with the nursery school class at the age of three or four. Then start their preparatory education at the age of five and can end it at the age of thirteen. In the secondary sector of education, students start their secondary school at  the age of eleven or thirteen only when they have successfully completed their primary sector. At this stage, they usually end at the age of sixteen where  they should be prepared to pass one of the different exam as GCSEs, or GNVQs. Between sixteen and eighteen, students have the choice either to leave school and work or starting their school sixth form college where they can obtained their A-levels or equivalents. In the tertiary sector, the typical age to start it is eighteen. In this sector, students after their A-levels start their higher education institution as universities or other higher education institutions. In the Uk, there are two kind of schools. Independent schools is a school that is not financed through the taxation system by local or national government, and is instead funded by private sources. For example we have the Warwick School, one of Britain's oldest independent schools.  Then we have State schools where all children in England between the ages of five and 16 are entitled to a free place at. To control students in their class, teacher in Uk sometimes told them to get out from the class. In the Uk to live with your parent while you are already in the university depend on if your house is not fare from your school, but most student live either on the campus or they share a house/flat whit their friends. And, it's hardly to see students from Uk travelling abroad to study, but if yes the most popular country from them is the Usa.

References: http://www.mapsofworld.com/cameroon/education/, http://www.schoolswork.co.uk/media/files/Undestanding_the_UK_education_system.pdf, http://www.euroeducation.net/prof/ukco.htm, http://www.cameroon-today.com/education-in-cameroon.html.

The Senedd

The Senned,known as the national assembly building, houses the debating chamber and three committee rooms for the National Assembly for Wales. According to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Senedd, the Senned building was opened on 1 March 2006 by Queen Elisabeth II.
According to the Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary, devolution is the moving of power or responsibility from a main organization to a lower level, or from a central government to a regional government. In other words, devolution is a transfer of power from a central to a subordinate level; for example nowadays in our societies, if somebody usually has the power to do something , but after many times, they give that power to another person that he use to manage, now we will talk about devolution. The Senedd has his reception area situated on the first floor. In the Senedd there is also a Plenary meetings which takes place in the Siambr (the Assembly's debating chamber ) on Tuesdays and Wednesdays. When peoples usually visit the Senedd,in public gallery there are headphones that can be use for people who does not understand the language(welsh,english) while visiting, so that they could have it translated through their headphones. All rooms in the Senedd have a least one glass wall .In the committee room, the glass walls is helpful for Welsh people so that the they can come and listen to their representatives make decisions on policies. And they can also see what going on inside, so that it could reflect the transparent democracy which could help people didn't complain about their right to be informed of what happening in the room.
.

Reference:http://www.walesonline.co.uk/, http://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/british/devolution, http://www.assemblywales.org/, http://www.bbc.co.uk/wales/southeast/seneddtour/.

Valentine’s Day is the traditional day in which people usually celebrate love and affection. It is an annual celebration held on February 14. In UK, sending card on that day has been a custom that has been going on at least 150 years. But valentine’s card is really different to cards for another occasion because for valentine’s cards, couples will give them each other and you can also send/receive anonymous card to anyone you secretly loves. It is also popular in UK on Valentine’s Day to send text messages but, it is not really the good way to declare your love to somebody. Except of cards, the commons gifts to give on Valentine’s Day are flowers and chocolate.But there are some interesting valentine's gifts that could be offered such as pampering session at a health club for a women and  a chance to test drive a ferrari for a men.Nowadays,Valentines's day celebration depend on couple; but many peoples to celebrate this day,they went to a restaurant,eat whith candle in a romantic way.Other peoples prefer to participates in valentine's day dance parties or balls usually organised by clubs or hotels.Cinema is also an option to celebrated the Valentine's day

St David's day is the tradional day of the Welsh ccelebrated in Wales on 1 March, in honour of St David (Dewi Sant), the patron saint of Wales.
Saint David (Dewi Sant:welsh name) was living in the sixth century,son of Non(daughter of a local chieftain and niece of King Arthur) and of Sant(son of Ceredig pronce of Ceredignon).The reason why the first of March celebrated as St David's day is because he is reputed to have died on the first of march 589 and the same day,the monastary is said to have been "filled with angels as Christ received his soul".There are two Welsh symbols which are traditionally associated with St David's day :the Leek(Saint David's personal symbol) and the Daffodil(a generic Welsh symbol which is in season during March).
Every year parades are held in Wales to commemorate St. David. The largest of these is held in Cardiff. Celebrations included concerts, a parade and a food festival.Many Welsh people wear one or both of the national emblems of Wales to celebrate St. David or they could also wear the Welsh traditional costumes and this costume consists of a long woollen skirt, white blouse, woollen shawl and a Welsh hat:for girls.

Referenses: http://www.welsh-costume.co.uk/,http://sucs.org/~rhys/stdavid.html,
http://www.stvalentinesday.org/valentines-day-celebration.html

Women MPs

In the UK , there are two Houses of Parliament which are the House of Commons and the House of Lords.But,because he decides national policy, The House of Commons has more power than The house of Lords.There are 659 constituencies in the United Kingdom divided by 529 in England,72 in Scotland, 40 in Wales and 18 in Northen Ireland.All of them are not the same geographical size be cause it depends on their cities.After a general election, the government forms by The Political party with most MP and in this occasion, pepoles are supposed to vote for a person to be the MP for their consticuency and the person who has the most votes wins,even if they have only one vote more than the next person : that is called the "first past the post" system.
In th House of Commons,there are mens and womens mps which are candidate but we will put an interest to Women MPs.

According to this link,there is a list of  Women MPs by date of election :http://www.parliament.uk/documents/commons-information-office/m04b.pdf. At the moment,there are 143 women MPs.In 1919,Countess Constance Moukievicz was the first woman elected to the House of Commons,as she did not take her seat in protest against Britain's policy Ireland.The first woman who was elected and take the seat as a woman MPs was Viscountess Nancy from 15 November 1919 to 1945,and she was represented the Conservative Party..

Advantages and Disadvantages of the E.U

The European Union is a set up with many goals,among to reducts war probablilty,reduces monetary instability, eliminates exchange rates and favors trade,... The six founders are Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, Luxembourg and the Netherlands,and now there are now 27 EU members with a total population of 479.1 million people.
For thoses members there are some disadvantages and advantages of belonging to the EU.
For the disadvantages, we can talk about:-The reduction of sovereinety .
                                                                   -Loss of independence in many areas
                                                                   -After some year will not have traditional thinks for every country.
However,belonging to the EU does not have only bad side,there are some advantages of that also
For the advantages:we can talk about :- High reduction of war probablilty

                                                              - A European currency that reduces monetary instability, eliminates exchange rates and favors trade
                                                              -Europeans can move around freely within the European Union without asking for a visa,then when somebody travel around the Eu he could just have to show his ID card instead of his passport                                                            
                                                              -Elimination of transaction costs.According to http://library.thinkquest.org/19110/english/advantag/advantag.html , "For instance, Uk firms currently spend about £1.5 billion a year buying and selling foreign currencies to do business in the EU.
With the EMU this is eliminated, so increasing profitability of EU firms."

References: http://www.economicshelp.org/europe/disadvantages-eu.html, http://www.bized.co.uk/learn/economics/international/eu/notes/euindex.htm

London visit

London is one of the big city in the world.As our train arrives at Victoria Station at 10:20 and leaves at 17:35,we do not have enough time,but we will enjoy our day.This is my plan.
First of all,we will going to see the the BIG BEN who got the biggest face in the city ,after that we are going to see the Buckingham Palace where the Head of State resides, and you can frequently see the Queen’s car heading down The Mall. and finally we are going to see the Tower London which is one of London’s oldest landmarks, started by William the Conqueror in 1066.   .As we will be around the Tower bridge of London ,we will going to visit the Science museum  and have our lonch there.Before continue we could just stop at Hyde Park place to eat some lunch.After eating,we will go to Oxford streeet to do some shopping at Oxford street.
We will need to take this underground card   with us to know where to take it and depending on the zone we will need to pay £4 or £5 .At the end of our visit,we could just go back to  at Victoria Station 10minutes before 17:35 to ait for our train home.

The People Of Britain

In Britain there are four nations,which are:Wales,Republic of Ireland,England and Scotland which became an independent nation partly because of the dynamic interaction between native tribes and incoming settlers.Peoples usually,in their language describe people who live in Britain as "British Peoples" even if Wales,Ireland an Scotland do not really appreciate it or might be offended if people uses this word to describe them since they like to specified their nationalities.

As Britain has four nations,thoses might have many differences.We can talk about culturals tradition that's why The Scots and Welsh have right to feel aggrieved whenever the term 'English' is used wrongly, to mean all three. We also have food (for example we have Welsh Faggots),languages (in Wales,we have two languages,english and welsh:In 1967 the Welsh Language Act was passed, recognizing the status of Welsh as an official language.).

In UK,there are many national symbols that are used.Among other things,we can talk about for the FLAGS,the red dragon on the Wales's flag,the St Andrew's Cross on the Scotland's flag,the  St Patrick's Cross for the Ireland's flag and the St Georges's Cross for the England's flag;for the COLORS,we have the red,the green(in Wales),Blue(in Scotland).For the FLOWERS we have the Rose(national flower of England),the Thistle(national flower of Scotland),the Daffodil(national flower of Wales) and the Shamrock(national flower of Ireland).Fort the CLOTHES,in England we have many national dress,for example,for the Pearly Kings and Queens,Morris Dancers,....we can see all of them in the link below (http://www.woodlands-junior.kent.sch.uk/customs/questions/costume.html ).In Scotland,the national dress is a kilt and The national costume of Wales is a long skirt, worn with a petticoat and topped with a shawl,and fllowing the link below :( http://www.calicokate.co.uk/images/welsh_costume.jpg ),  we can see the traditional welsh children's costumes.

We also have many national days which are celebrated in the UK,for Wales the national day is St David's day on March 1st,for Northen Ireland the national day is St Patrick's day on March 17,for England the national day is St Georges's day on April 23 and for Scotland the national day is St Andrew's day on November 30.

In Britain, the main language is English (British English),but People in Wales speak a completely different language. About 25% of the people there still speak in their native Celtic tongue called welsh.Even In some regions of Scotland, Gaelic is used as a first language (particularly in some areas of the Highlands and the Western Isles). All over Scotland, the accent varies, some words are different but overall it is not too difficult to understand.

Finally,is common to see people living in Britain who do not belong to any of the "four nations",as there is many nationalities,peoples coming from all over the world :Africa,China,EU,United States,.... that's why we can see people with different complexion.

introduction to british studies

In the United Kingdom,population are over 60million.There are 4 country in the British Isles,which are England,Northen Ireland,Scotland ans Wales.British policemen can't normally carry guns.