BBC 英语学习 News Review 全球物价上涨

Prices are rising around the world.

Now interest rates are going up

to deal with the crisis. This is news review from

BBC Learning English. I'm Neil, and I'm Beth, and we'll be looking at the vocabulary being

used to talk about the global economy.

Remember, there's a quiz on our website about the vocabulary in this program.

But now

some more on that story. Food and energy prices are rising across the world, meaning millions now face tough choices in their daily lives.

Economists blame a combination of covet, the war in Ukraine and poor harvests.

Now, central banks are putting up interest rates to try to control the crisis.

You ve been looking at the headlines.

What's the vocabulary? We have the spectre of something into the Maya and tight rope.

This is news review from BBC, learning English.

Let's have a look at our 1st headline.

This one comes from The Guardian.

Fight against Inflation raises spectre of global Recession.

Now, the expression that we're looking at is the spectre of something.

A spectre is a ghost, isn't it?

Yeah, that's absolutely right. And you're probably wondering, neil, why are we talking about ghosts?

Yeah, I am. Is it because a ghost is a scary thing?

Well, yes, it is. The spectre of something is the possibility of something bad happening.

So in this case, it's a possible recession.

So e.g. we could talk about the specter of climate change or the specter of nuclear war.

These are really serious things. But could we also use this for more light hearted situations, e.g.

the spectre of my dentist appointment next week?

No, not really. We use this expression for unpleasant things that may happen in the future, and will probably happen to a lot of people.

And by the way, there's a spelling difference.

So spectre in British English ends in R-E, but in the US, it finishes with E-R OK.

Let's have a look at that again.

Time now for our next headline.

This one comes from City A-M Inflation and recession Concoction sends global markets into the Maya.

The expression here is into the Maya.

And the Maya is an area of muddy, dirty, swampy ground, difficult to move through.

You can get stuck. Yeah, that's right.

But in this case, and in this headline, we're not talking about a physical place, but we're talking about a tricky or difficult situation.

So if the global markets are in the mire, it means they're in a bad situation.

Can we talk about people, though, using this expression, in to the mire or mired in something?

Yes, we can. And we do very often hear this with politicians.

So if there's some kind of political scandal, we can say that the politician is mired in scandal, and there's an element of them doing something bad, or they've done something unpleasant.

OK, let's take a look at that again.

Now, for our next headline, please.

This one comes from The Indian Express.

Partisan writes The Inflation Titro Tight rope.

Beth. Have you ever been to the circus?

Um? I have when I was a child, but I really didn't like the clouds.

What's wrong with the clouds? Do you know what I really like, though?

It's that act where you walk along a road, you could fall off, there's danger on either side.

Now that is called a tight rope.

And in the headline we saw, tight Rope used to talk about the situation where even a little mistake can lead to disaster.

So what the headline writer is saying is that dealing with inflation can be very difficult to do successfully.

There is risk. There is danger.

There's also a longer version of this expression To walk a tight rope, that's right.

And to walk a tight rope is to deal with a very difficult situation.

So imagine that you're planning a wedding.

You've got to think about who you're going to invite, and also, how much money do you have, and who are you going to leave off that guest list?

Okay, let's have a look at that again.

We've had the spectre of something, a bad thing, that is coming your way into the Maya in a bad, difficult, perhaps scandalous situation, and a tight, a small mistake in everything

could go wrong. So don't get stuck in the Maya with your English.

Head over to our website or our app, where you can practice all of the vocabulary from this program with a quiz.

And there's more examples there as well.

Thank you for joining us. And goodbye,

bye.

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