新视野大学英语3课文辅导unit4.doc

《新视野》第三册第四单元
Unit 4 Section A Five Famous Symbols of American Culture
1. Pre-reading
Background information
American Gothic (美国哥特式) The Buffalo Nickel (野牛镍币)
Uncle Sam:Symbols of . Government:
Uncle Sam, a figure symbolizing the United States, is portrayed as a tall, white-haired man with a goatee. He is often dressed in red, white, and blue, and wears a top hat.
The exact origins of Uncle Sam as a symbol for the United States are unknown. But the most widely accepted theory is that Uncle Sam was named after Samuel Wilson.
During the War of 1812, Samuel Wilson was a businessman from Troy, NY that supplied the . Army with beef in barrels. The barrels were labeled "." When asked what the initials stood for, one of Wilson's workers said it stood for Uncle Sam Wilson. The suggestion that the meat shipments came from "Uncle Sam" led to the idea that Uncle Sam symbolized the Federal Government and association stuck. In 1961, Congress passed a resolution that recognized Samuel Wilson as the inspiration for the symbol Uncle Sam.
But Sam Wilson looked nothing like the Uncle Sam pictured above. Uncle Sam's traditional appearance, with a white goatee and star-spangled suit, is an invention of artists and political cartoonists. One of these political cartoonists was named Thomas Nast. Nast produced many of the earliest cartoons of Uncle Sam.
The most famous picture