Working for a goal 
21.01.2009
"We must pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off, and begin again the work of remaking America," President Barack Obama told the millions watching. In his inaugural address, he spoke eloquently about this particular goal. Listen to a short extract from his speech about this ambitious goal — and learn new expressions for talking about goals in general.
For everywhere we look, there is work to be done. The state of our economy calls for action, bold and swift, and we will act — not only to create new jobs, but to lay a new foundation for growth. We will build the roads and bridges, the electric grids and digital lines that feed our commerce and bind us together. We will restore science to its rightful place, and wield technology's wonders to raise health care's quality and lower its cost. We will harness the sun and the winds and the soil to fuel our cars and run our factories. And we will transform our schools and colleges and universities to meet the demands of a new age. All this we can do. All this we will do. |
In this short exercise, we also talk about President Barack Obama’s goals. However, we won’t go into details about his specific goals here, as our focus is on vocabulary that anyone can use to talk about goals in general. You don’t have to be president to have goals in life — or in business.
In Part I, we look at more positive vocabulary, and talk about what can make a goal successful. In Part II, we look at the language used to talk about problems that are caused by ambitious goals.
Our exercise is based on language used in the media to talk about the US administration's objectives.
By the way, you’ll find more on the topic of goals in the Business Skills section of the next Business Spotlight magazine, which goes on sale on 11 February 2009.
Deborah Capras
sich aufrappeln
den Staub aus den Kleidern klöpfen
wiederaufbauen
Antrittsrede
wortgewandt
Ausschnitt
sich aufrappeln
den Staub aus den Kleidern klöpfen
wiederaufbauen
Zustand
mutig
rasch
Fundament, Basis
Wachstum
Stromnetze
Kabel; hier: Vernetzung
füttern; hier: versorgen
verbinden, vernetzen
zurückgeben
rechtmäßig, gebührend
schwingen; hier: einsetzen
Gesundheitswesen
einspannen, nutzbar machen
Erde, Erdreich
mit Kraftstoff versorgen
betreiben
den Anforderungen/Erfordernissen gerecht werden
Regierung
Ziele
COMMENTS
Hi, Deborah
Analyzing Barack Obama's Inaugural Address is a great idea. My students are really interested in what he had/has to say and are also keen on studying his rhetoric style. Can you try to post more sections of his speech? Is something like that in the works there? Linking his commments to normal business situations (attaining goals) was also a very good idea. I get a lot of mileage what from you do in my lessons. Keep up the good work.
Best regards,
Nicholas Krenytzky
Friedrichsdorf, Germany
We've just posted a new exercise that looks at the closing moments of Obama's inaugural address: What a finish!
We hope you — and your students — find it useful.
Kind regards
Deborah