Nomadland wins at the Oscars: BBC News Review

Hello and welcome to News Review from BBC Learning English. I'm Neil.

Joining me today is Catherine. Hello, Catherine.

Hello Neil, and hello everybody.

Yes, Oscars news today: Chloé Zhao has become the first woman

of colour and only the second woman ever to win the best director Oscar.

If you want to test yourself on any vocabulary that you

hear in our programme today,

there's a quiz on our website at: bbclearningenglish.com.

Now, let's find out some

more about that Oscar victory from this BBC News report:

Yes. So, the Oscars on Sunday night and director Chloé Zhao,

who was born in Beijing, won the best director Oscar.

Now, she is the first woman of colour to win this award and she

is only the second woman in 93 years to win this particular Oscar.

Now, Nomadland did really well at the Oscars: not only did we get this one,

but also it won in the best picture category

and Frances McDormand won the best actor award.

OK. Well, you've been looking around the various news websites

and checking out what language is useful for talking about this story.

What have you got?

We have: 'glory', 'upsets' and 'snubs'.

'Glory', 'upsets' and 'snubs'.

Let's start with your first headline then, please.

OK. So, we are right here in the UK with the BBC – the headline:

'Glory' – praise and honour for a great achievement.

Yes, it's a noun. It's spelt: G-L-O-R-Y – 'glory'.

Now, we often use this word with 'the' in front of it.

If you get 'the glory' for something, you get all the praise,

you get all the recognition, everybody says how great you are.

Remember that show you made, Neil – English for Cats?

Ahhh! The glory!

The glory! Everybody thought it was wonderful... not.

And everyone said how great it was, and how wonderful you were.

You were the man of the moment for a while.

You got 'the glory' for that wonderful achievement.

It was my 'moment of glory'.

Yes, good phrase.

If you have 'a moment of glory' or if something is 'your moment of glory',

that's a time when you do something fantastic and everybody recognises

it. Everyone says how great you are, how great the thing you did was.

Yeah – your 'moment of glory'.

Yes. Now, a common adjective that is connected to this word is 'glorious'.

Yes, if something's 'glorious',

it's wonderful, it's fantastic, it's amazing, it's super.

Doesn't always have to be an achievement, though. You can open

your window one morning and look out and it'll be a beautiful...

the weather can be 'glorious'. It means absolutely wonderful.

Not an achievement: weather's just weather.

But when it's a really lovely day, you can say,

'The weather is glorious.'

Yeah. And if we want to say that

something is probably a bit better than it really is.

Well, yes. You can 'glorify' something.

And this is often to say, as you say – and this happens a

lot in advertising – something's absolutely wonderful and fantastic,

and it's actually maybe just average. You can 'glorify' something.

Yeah... I went to a fast food outlet recently and I wanted to buy

the absolutely magnificent 'Glory Burger'.

The 'Glory Burger'... yes.

But actually it was just a not very nice piece of – possibly – beef

with a kind of soggy bun and a splodge of ketchup.

I think – I think it had been 'glorified'.

Yes, it doesn't sound very 'glorified'...

it doesn't sound very 'glorious', but if the promotion 'glorified' it

or they did something to it and said it was better than it was, then yeah,

you had a 'glorified' burger.

I did indeed have a 'glorified' burger.

How disappointing.

And the noun for that is 'glorification'.

Yes, 'glorification' – when you try to make something,

or you say something, is better than it really is.

OK. Let's get a summary:

We have a programme about a moment of sporting glory, don't we Catherine?

Yes, we do: Rafa Nadal – his 20th Grand Slam win.

If you want to know more about this story, just click the link.

OK. Let's have a look at our next headline, please.

And we're still in the UK, this time with the Guardian – the headline:

'Upsets' – occasions when someone wins something another

person or team was expected to win.

Yes. OK. The spelling: U-P-S-E-T-S.

This is a plural noun and it's pronounced 'upsets'.

'Upsets' as opposed to 'upset'... because that's a different word.

Yes... it is. It's the same spelling, but it's a verb.

In the verb form it's 'to upset', and the adjective form

– if you are 'upset', you're not happy about something.

But in the noun form, it's an 'upset' with the stress on the 'up-'.

Yeah. So, an 'upset' is when the team that is supposed to have won,

or the person who is supposed to have won, doesn't win.

Exactly that.

And I'm afraid I'm going to mention...

our Brazilian – our Brazilian followers might want to cover their eyes.

Or ears...!

I'm going to mention the World Cup 2014

when Brazil were playing against Germany in the semi-final.

Everybody thought Brazil was going to win and what happened?

It was a big 'upset': 7–1. They lost 7–1.

Terrible, terrible.

Big 'upset' for Brazil: they were expected to win,

but they lost by six goals in – the final score was 7–1 to Germany.

All the Brazilian supporters were very 'upset' about that 'upset'.

Yeah. Yes, indeed.

And 'upset' there as an adjective meaning sad, basically.

Yeah, yeah.

But all of these words are connected, aren't they? They're all connected

and the key is that word 'set' that you find in the middle.

Yes, exactly. And 'set' means settled or secure. But if you

'upset' something, you unsettle it or you make it not secure.

So, whether it's the noun, the verb, or the adjective, that's the idea.

Something that was secure and settled now isn't secure and settled,

  and that has an effect.

Yeah. So, for example, global warming has 'upset' the climate.

Yes.

And it doesn't mean that the climate is sad.

No, the climate isn't crying.

No, but the climate has been badly affected, and probably again

people are 'upset' about the effects of the 'upset' to the climate.

Absolutely. OK. Now, let's get a summary:

Now, you probably saw the word 'coup' in that last headline and we have a

News Review where we talked about the various uses of the word 'coup'.

Yes. To find out more about how to use the word 'coup',

just click the link to go to the programme.

OK. Let's have a look at our next headline, please.

Now, we're in the USA with Variety and the headline:

'Snubs' – actions that insult someone by not including them.

Yes, the spelling this time: S-N-U-B-S – 'snubs'.

It's a plural noun in this headline,

but you can also use it as a 'verb': 'snubs'.

Yeah. So, we're talking about when it's expected that somebody would

be included at a certain event, for example, and they are not.

And they're not included, yeah.

And it's always done or perceived to be an insult.

So, it's not a pleasant thing to do: 'to snub' somebody is rude.

It's not nice 'to be snubbed' – and that's the passive verb form – if

you 'are snubbed', generally you will be angry and upset about it.

Yeah. Like all of our vocabulary today,

quite commonly used in the world of sport.

Yes, it can be. Yes, if somebody's left out of a team, for example,

they can be 'snubbed'. If somebody decides not to play in a...

participate in a particular event, that can be seen as 'a snub'.

So, if you don't invite somebody, you 'snub' them;

if you refuse an invitation, you 'snub' them that way as well.

And yeah, we see it in sporting events.

Yeah, and competitions in general.

For example, the 'International Biscuit Eating Championship'.

Well, what an 'upset' that was – my goodness! Tell us more, Neil.

Well, I mean, there was only really one obvious winner, wasn't there?

Rob? I mean... participant, even.

Unfortunately, Rob was not even invited to take part.

What a 'snub' was that! My goodness. Yes, Rob was 'snubbed' by the

'International Biscuit' organising body, but I think they'll invite

him next year, though. I think they'll realise their mistake.

They will. But I think he's going to get his revenge by 'snubbing' them.

Most probably, yeah. I wouldn't blame him.

Now, more seriously, this word is actually quite journalistic, isn't it?

It is. It's nice and short. It's very dramatic.

It's the stuff that, you know, gossip columns love – the idea

of people 'snubbing' each other, 'celebrity snubs'. Not quite used

in gossip in this sense, but it is very headline-friendly, yes.

Yeah, but that's not to say that this can't be used for ordinary people.

You don't have to be famous to 'snub' or 'be snubbed'.

Absolutely, yeah. You can 'snub somebody' by not inviting

them to drinks after work, you know.

You can use it in everyday English very easily.

OK. Let's get a summary:

Just time now then for a recap of our vocabulary please, Catherine.

Yes, we had: 'glory' – praise and honour for a great achievement.

We had: 'upsets' – occasions where someone wins something

another person or team was expecting to win.

And we had: 'snubs' – actions that insult someone by not including them.

You'll probably want to test yourself on this

vocabulary and you can do, on our website at bbclearningenglish.com.

And you can find us all over social media.

Thank you for joining us. Stay safe and goodbye.

Goodbye.