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GENERAL ENGLISH · GENERAL ISSUES · ADVANCED (C1-C2)

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1 Warm up

In pairs, discuss the following questions.

1. How do you access the majority of the TV programmes and films that you watch? Why do you
choose this method?
2. How has the way you watch television and films changed in the last ten to fifteen years?
3. What are your favourite programmes to watch? Why?
4. How much time do you normally spend watching television programmes and films each week?
Why?

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2 Focus on Vocabulary

Part A: Match the vocabulary to the definitions.

1. subscribe (v) a. far more of something than you can deal with or
process
2. air (v) b. making you think deeply about a subject

3. binge-watching (n) c. the act of showing a particular group of people and

discussing issues relating to them
4. tune in (phr. v) d. broadcast a television/radio programme or a film

5. flick through (phr. v) e. quickly look through TV programmes or films

without watching a lot of any particular one
6. overwhelming (adj.) f. have access to media on the Internet by paying a
regular fee
7. thought-provoking (adj.) g. watch a particular TV programme

8. representation (n) h. the act of watching multiple episodes of a TV show

in one sitting, usually by streaming or on DVD

Part B: Put the vocabulary from Part A into the correct gaps in the following sentences. You may have
to change the form of the word to fit the sentence.

1. We watched a brilliant documentary on veganism last night which made a really good case for it.
I found it really and it made me wonder if I should stop eating meat.

2. I’ve been the TV channels for the last fifteen minutes and haven’t found a single
thing I want to watch.

3. Do you remember each week to watch the latest episode of Friends? I must have
seen every episode about four or five times since then.

4. The documentary I watched last night looked at the of Asians in films and how
negative it can be, even in recent films.

5. There’s been so much political discussion on the news lately that it’s hard to know the truth. It can
be quite .

6. I was watching Fawlty Towers the other day and it’s still hilarious. I can’t believe the first time it
was in 1975!

7. Simon’s been talking about Stranger Things for ages, so I spent the weekend all
four of the current seasons and now I’m as hooked as he is.

8. We’ve just started to Disney Plus. The kids love it, but I’m not sure that I’m so
keen, to be honest.

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Now in pairs, discuss the following questions.

1. Do you subscribe to any streaming services? Which ones? Why?

2. Do you find you are able to manage your workload easily or do you sometimes find it overwhelming?
What do you do if that happens?
3. What was the last thing you watched or read that you found really thought-provoking?
4. How do you feel about the representation of people from your country in films? Is it usually
negative or positive? How?
5. Do you usually spend a lot of time flicking through the options for something to watch? Or do
you always make a decision first?
6. Do you like to watch programmes as soon as they air? Or do you prefer to see what the critics say
about them first?

3 Listening for general understanding

Listen to the conversation between two students. Tick the box next to the programme if Selma
watched it.

1. The Irishman

2. What The Health

3. Saving Capitalism

4. Hip Hop Evolution

5. Squid Game

6. The Texas Chainsaw Massacre

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4 Listening comprehension

Listen again and decide if the following statements are True (T) or False (F).

1. Rob subscribes to Netflix.

2. Selma loves TV programmes about detectives and the police.

3. Selma enjoyed watching Saving Capitalism.

4. Rob hadn’t heard about the TV programme Squid Game.

5. Selma watches more programmes now than when she watched TV.

6. Selma really enjoys everything she watches on Netflix.

7. Selma doesn’t like films that scare her.

8. Rob wants to get to bed fairly early on Sunday night.

5 Skimming for gist

Read the following extracts and decide where they should go in the article on page five. Two of them
are not used.

• There’s also the way in which it has changed our viewing habits, which doesn’t sit well with
everyone.
• In 2019, the Netflix film, Roma, won an Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film.
• The snowy Norwegian town of Lillehammer was an unlikely place to begin a digital revolution, but
it played its part.
• Netflix has long been a champion of children’s programming, attracting millions of children from
around the world.
• Whatever your view, there’s no doubt that Netflix has come a long way since Frank Tagliano first
entered Lilyhammer and has brought millions of viewers with it.
• Shows such as Never Have I Ever and To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before found an audience of
females in the 14 – 34 range that previously just hadn’t been addressed.
• A lot of criticism followed for the amount of violence portrayed in some of the network’s crime
films.
• It’s not just English language content which has been successful either.

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Netflix and relax?

How the digital streaming site changed the way we view
A. (1) In 2012, when Steven Van Zandt played New York gangster Frank Tagliano, Lilyhammer
was born. Frank was forced to flee to the site of the 1994 Winter Olympics for self-protection after giving evidence
to the NYPD against other mobsters. Yet it wasn’t so much the plot which made Lilyhammer significant, as the fact
that it was the first time Netflix had produced its own content. Prior to high-speed broadband, Netflix started out
as a mail-order DVD service. You indicated your preferences and they would send you a film that you wanted to
watch in the post, and another as soon as you mailed it back. Streaming films and TV shows online, though, was
the company’s real goal. As broadband improved and streaming became possible for greater numbers of people,
they began streaming hit shows like Parks and Recreation, Grey’s Anatomy, Family Guy and Law and Order. It wasn’t
long though before the media companies who owned these shows saw how big Netflix’s viewing numbers were
and started to take them back. Enter Frank Tagliano.
B. Since those early days, Netflix has had some major successes and has attracted big stars to its network, seduced by
its global audience. Martin Scorsese, David Fincher, Jane Campion, and Maggie Gyllenhaal are just some of the big
Hollywood names who have made films and programmes for them, attracting major actors in the process: Robert
De Niro, Robin Wright, Benedict Cumberbatch, and Olivia Colman, to name a few. (2)
Since then, more of its films have received recognition, such as The Irishman, Marriage Story, Mank and The Power
of the Dog.
C. Yet for the vast majority of subscribers, it’s not the access to award-winning fare that keeps them coming back.
What Netflix has been able to do in dealing with viewers on an unprecedented scale, is cater to previously
unnoticed and disregarded audiences. It has been able to attract Black film makers like Ava DuVernay (When
They See Us), Spike Lee (Da 5 Bloods), and Shonda Rimes (Bridgerton) to tell stories from a Black perspective, which
were all critically and commercially successful. Series such as Orange is the New Black, Sex Education and Ru Paul’s
Drag Race were also massively popular and brought issues in the LGBTQ+ community on to people’s screens
throughout the world. (3) For all the enormity of its operation, the success of
Netflix has been in telling us stories that appeal to us as individuals while reaching more of those individuals than
any other media network in history.
D. (4) Netflix has been able to give audiences around the world, particularly
those in the West, access to programmes created in countries they may previously not have thought of as centres
for entertainment. The Korean-made Squid Game became the most watched Netflix programmes of all time in
2021, but Lupin and Money Heist from France and Spain respectively also found huge audiences. People who had
previously never seen a film or television programme that wasn’t in English now had access to a wealth of content
from other countries.
E. As with any large undertaking though, Netflix hasn’t always got it right. In October 2021, Netflix aired a comedy
special by the comedian Dave Chappelle which attracted a lot of negative criticism and walkouts by Netflix’s own
employees due to remarks he made which many viewed as transphobic. In trying to appeal to different groups
of people in its audience, Netflix had inadvertently pitted them against each other, and the negative press was
relentless.
F. (5) Many point to how television used to be a shared experience: a topic of discussion
at work, a meeting of everyone in the family for the latest, weekly episode of a sitcom or soap opera. Now, Netflix
has brought in the era of binge-watching: individuals greedily consuming the whole series of programmes or films
in one sitting. Defenders, however, would say that the diversity Netflix allows and promotes wasn’t present in
shows of old. Equally, no one would complain if you read a novel in one sitting, or read several poems in one go. Is
there a certain cultural snobbery around doing the same with a film or programme being seen as somehow sinful?
G. (6) Its cultural achievements and wounds may be the subject of some debate. Yet
with over 100 million more subscribers than the nearest streaming competitor, it’s not going anywhere anytime

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soon. In ten years, it has transformed the cultural viewing landscape entirely. What will happen next? We may
have to click on the Netflix icon to find out.

Source: The Guardian, Business Insider

6 Reading comprehension

Decide if the following statements are True (T), False (F) or Not Given (NG).

1. Lillyhammer was a crime drama.

2. Netflix started as a company which streamed films and TV programmes on the Internet.

3. According to the article, only one Netflix film has won an Oscar.

4. Netflix attracts more viewers than any other media company has done before.

5. Netflix has created a great deal of interest in Korean-made dramas.

6. Netflix’s own employees went on strike because of some of the content it aired.

7. According to the article, some people believe Netflix is more anti-social because people are often
watching different things alone.

8. The article questions why people look down on reading when they wouldn’t have a negative
attitude towards people watching TV all day.

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7 Skimming for vocabulary

Quickly read the article on page five and find vocabulary which means the same as the following.

1. (v, para. 2): make someone want to do something by making it seem very
desirable
2. (n, para. 3): a type of entertainment

3. (adj., para. 3): not been seen before

4. (phr. v, para. 3): provide something for a particular person or group of people,
sometimes with special requirements
5. (n, para. 5): a particular task or a project, often that’s difficult or challenging

6. (n, para. 5): a group of people leaving a company or a place as a form of

protest at what is happening
7. (phr. v, para. 5): be in a struggle or a contest against another person or group
of people
8. (n, para. 6): the attitude of looking down on certain people or behaviours

8 Talking point

In pairs, discuss the following questions.

1. In your opinion, what are the negative and positive aspects of streaming platforms such as Netflix?
2. Do you agree with the suggestion that watching television is less of a communal activity than it
was before services such as Netflix? Has streaming separated us more? Explain your ideas on this.
3. How do you think the way we watch television and films might develop and change in the future?
4. Do you think Netflix will last as a company, or do you think it might be replaced by another
company in future? Why?

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9 Extended activity/Homework

Read the essay question.

"Although it has brought us greater access to programming from around the world in greater
quantity than ever before, Netflix and other streaming services have reduced the quality of
programming. Sitting down to watch television used to be a family event and although there
was less to watch, it was of far higher quality. Netflix is to entertainment as McDonalds is to
food. Cheap, questionable quality and quickly forgotten."

To what extent do you agree with the above statement?

You should:

• Write at least 250 words,

• Check your grammar, spelling and punctuation.

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