BBC News Review 普京宣布选举获胜

Putin claims election

when This is news review from BBC Learning English.

Will we help you understand news headlines in English?

I'm Beth, and I'm Georgie.

Make sure you watch to the end to learn the vocabulary you need to talk about this story, and remember to subscribe to our channel to learn more English from the headlines.

Now today s story. Vladimir Putin has claimed his 5th term as president after winning 87% of the vote.

According to Russian election officials, no credible opposition candidate was allowed to stand.

China and India have congratulated Putin, while Western governments called the election win unfair and undemocratic.

Thousands of Putins critics staged a protest at polling stations on the last day of the election.

You've been looking at the headlines was the vocabulary that people need to understand this new story.

In English we have landslide out.

Fox and Sham. This is news review from BBC Learning English.

Let's have our 1st headline. This one's from Reuters.

Putin wins Russia election in landslide with no serious competition.

Now here we're looking at the word landslide.

Putin has won the election in a landslide.

Now, a literal landslide is when the lands that's the ground beneath your feet literally moves and slides, maybe because of heavy rain or an earthquake, but that's not what's happening here, is it?

No. We also use it in a metaphorical sense, and it means an overwhelming success or victory.

We often use it to talk about elections where the winning candidate receives a large majority of the vote, like in this story.

Putin won 87% of russia's vote, according to russia's election officials.

Now here, it's used as a noun putin wins in a landslide, but it can also be used as an adjective.

We can talk about a landslide victory or a landslide win, but they are both political.

Can we use this word outside of politics?

Yes. Another use is to talk about sports victories.

So you could say that a basketball team secured a landslide victory after defeating all the other teams.

Okay, let's look at that again.

Let's have a look at our next headline.

This once from The Telegraph. Putin strolls to victory, but his opponents humiliate and out fox him.

Now this headline is about protests against Putin.

We're looking at the verb out fox putin's opponents out fox him.

Now, this word has fox in it.

That's an animal a little bit like a dog, and they usually orange or brown in color.

And they're known for being quite clever, aren't they?

Yes. And we have this expression, sly as a fox, which means that someone is clever, often in a sneaky or dishonest way.

And then when we add the prefix out to make it a verb, it has this sense of exceeding something.

It's bigger, greater, more than So if you out fox someone, you do something cleverer or sneakier than them, they think they're clever, but you are cleverer, right?

So even though Putin has control of the media and the election process, this headline implies that his opponents were smarter than him.

They out foxed him, because those protests still went ahead.

Now, georgie, can we hear some more verbs that have that prefix out?

Yes. So if a child outgrows their clothes, they grow beyond the size of their clothes.

They become too big for them.

It's a sad fact both that we often outlive our pets.

We live longer than them we do.

OK, let's look at that again.

Let's have our next headline. This one's from the Independent Western leaders line up to condemn putin's Sham election.

So this headline is about Western leaders who are calling the Russian election undemocratic.

The word we're looking at is Sham Georgie.

What do the headline writers mean by a sham election?

Well, here it's used as an adjective, and it means something is fake or not what it seems to be.

Western leaders have said that the election was neither free nor fair, which is why the word sham has been used

here. They think the election is fake.

Now, another common combination is sham marriage.

This is where two people who are not in a genuine relationship get married for other reasons, like financial gain or to gain residence in another country.

They are both as an adjective, though, sham election and sham marriage.

Are there any other uses? Yes, we can also use it as a noun.

So Western leaders might say that putin's election was a sham.

If a doctor claims to have a miracle cure and he makes lots of money from it, but it turns out not to work.

We could say that is a shab Okay, let's look at that again.

We've had landslide an overwhelming victory or success out Fox act more cleverly than someone and sham fake.

Now, if you're interested in learning more about the language of politics, click here.

And don't forget to click here to subscribe to our channel, so you never MS.

another video. Thanks for joining us.

扫码查看听力音频