16 The individual and society 81 Language in use: Personal freedom Read the text about current living patterns among women. Some words are missing. Choose the correct word (A–L) for each gap (1–9). There are two extra words that you should not use. Write your answers in the boxes provided. The first one (0) has been done for you. Georgie Roles is only 32 and she has decided “to be … 0 for ever”. It’s not that she hasn’t had boyfriends. She lived with two of them in … 1 that lasted about five years each, and her most recent boyfriend was around for 18 months. No, she says, it’s to do with the realisation that her experience of life is … 2 and more fulfilling when she is free to live alone and as she chooses. Roles works as an airline pilot. She qualified in 2009 and now flies Boeing 737s, 757s and 767s for a leading British airline. If this wasn’t achievement enough, she spends her weekends as a skydiving coach and was in a team that almost made it to the World Championships in Formation Skydiving in 2022. Roles grew up thinking that men would … 3 her for doing what she was good at: “The more successful you are, the more attractive you are.” Her experience proved otherwise. “I got the impression with a couple of them that the idea of going out with me was great, because they could say to their mates, ‘I’m going out with a skydiving pilot.’ But the reality was that they couldn’t cope with it.” Her first boyfriend gave her an … 4 : flying or him. “I said to him, ‘I think your bags are on top of the wardrobe.’ The choice was obvious, but the consequences made me sad – that I lose someone to carry on being myself.” There has been a dramatic increase in the number of single women, according to the Office for National Statistics. The number of 18- to 49-year-olds living alone has more than doubled over the past three decades. Dubbed “freemales” and “quirkyalones”, these women tend to be successful metropolitans – the … 5 of sad, single women waiting for Mr Right. Jan MacVarish, a sociologist from the University of Kent, who has spent several years researching the lives of single women aged 30 to 50, believes that the paradigm has shifted. “Women in modern Britain no longer need the … 6 of marriage or a partnership to feed themselves, get a house or have sex. They earn their own money; buy their own homes. … 7 to a mortgage has become more of an adult marker than commitment to a husband or child,” she says. The idea that relationships are … 8 to self-development is very common. “There is a sense that you have to love yourself before anyone can love you – that sounds like a trite self-helpism, but it’s a really common idea – that you can’t function in a relationship without being a fully functioning emotional individual yourself, and that it is something you work on by yourself – that is a huge shift,” she explains. “It’s not just that … 9 provides an opportunity for self-exploration, but that self-exploration should take priority within or over relationships.” (Sally Williams, The Telegraph; adapted and abridged) A admire E hostile I richer 0 J 4 8 B antithesis F institution J single 1 5 9 C commitment G obvious K singleness 2 6 D emotional H relationships L ultimatum 3 7 3 ✔ Nur zu Prüfzwecken – Eigentum des Verlags öbv
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