搜索关注在线英语听力室公众号:tingroom,领取免费英语资料大礼包。
(单词翻译)
By Phil Mercer
Sydney
21 September 2009
Rehearsals1 are underway for Australia's first indigenous2 opera. "Pecan Summer" tells the story of a historic Aboriginal3 protest in the late 1930s. Over the years Aboriginal performers have been drawn4 to rock music as well as reggae and hip5 hop6 but few have been attracted to opera.
"Pecan Summer" tells the story of a demonstration7 at the Cummeragunja Mission, which was part of a system to house and assimilate Aborigines.
Many indigenous people resented the missions and demanded their own land. Colonial administrators8 responded by setting up special reserves for Aborigines.
In 1939, a large group of indigenous Australians walked off the reserve at Cummeragunja in protest at their squalid living conditions and the treatment they endured at the hands of European settlers.
They had complained of shortages of food and of widespread disease.
The story is now being told through dramatic art.
Rehearsals have started under the guidance of Deborah Cheetham, who for the past decade has been Australia's only professional Aboriginal opera singer.
She says this type of creative expression is a perfect way to explain indigenous history.
"Opera, if you think about it, is just storytelling through music, drama and dance and singing, and we've been doing that for thousands of years as well so it made sense to me that to find other opera singers perhaps I'd have to create a vehicle for them and that's 'Pecan Summer,' said Cheetham."
Historians consider the Cummeragunja protest to be the first mass strike by Australia's Aborigines, which sparked a nationwide movement for basic rights.
"We must raise our expectations for indigenous people because if we raise our expectations we will change the outcomes," she said.
Indigenous communities suffer high rates of unemployment, imprisonment9 and ill-health. Aborigines have a life expectancy10 17 years below that of most other Australians.
"Pecan Summer" is due to open in the southern city of Melbourne late next year.
1 rehearsals | |
n.练习( rehearsal的名词复数 );排练;复述;重复 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
2 indigenous | |
adj.土产的,土生土长的,本地的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
3 aboriginal | |
adj.(指动植物)土生的,原产地的,土著的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
4 drawn | |
v.拖,拉,拔出;adj.憔悴的,紧张的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
5 hip | |
n.臀部,髋;屋脊 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
6 hop | |
n.单脚跳,跳跃;vi.单脚跳,跳跃;着手做某事;vt.跳跃,跃过 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
7 demonstration | |
n.表明,示范,论证,示威 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
8 administrators | |
n.管理者( administrator的名词复数 );有管理(或行政)才能的人;(由遗嘱检验法庭指定的)遗产管理人;奉派暂管主教教区的牧师 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
9 imprisonment | |
n.关押,监禁,坐牢 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
10 expectancy | |
n.期望,预期,(根据概率统计求得)预期数额 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
本文本内容来源于互联网抓取和网友提交,仅供参考,部分栏目没有内容,如果您有更合适的内容,欢迎 点击提交 分享给大家。