Learn English Vocabulary: The Dark Side of Politics

It is important to know what is going on in the world, but reading an English newspaper can be scary for learners. Watch this video to learn important vocabulary that you will find in newspapers, on news websites, and on TV. In this lesson, I'm focusing on words that have to do with the negative side of politics and power. These are words that you'll come across all the time, but it seems like they are being used currently even more than usual. So watch this video and learn the words and phrases. Once you do, go read some news stories. It's a great feeling to be able to understand something that you wouldn't have been able to just a short time ago, so I really hope you'll watch, learn, and then put it to use by reading, listening, and watching!

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TRANSCRIPT

A warm welcome back to engVid. Today I'm presenting a series of vocab and phrases to help you understand what is happening in the news. It's important to know what's going on in the world, and if you can read a newspaper in English then you will develop an enormous sense of satisfaction because that will show that your level of English is right up there.

Okay, let's start with "unethical". So, we can see a shorter word within the longer word: "ethic". Now, a person's ethics are the ideas that they live by. So we say: "A code of ethics". For example, to say please and thank you. If you want to know more about this, then perhaps watch my lesson on social etiquette. Okay? It's to do with the kind of ideas and beliefs a person has. If something is unethical, then basically it means it's wrong, it's bad. Evil's quite a strong word, but it's along those lines.

"Illicit" is something banned, something not allowed. So if a politician took some illicit substances, then that would show that they had been taking some drugs that are not legal in the country they are in. Okay? "Illegal", "illicit", a synonym would be: "illegal", "banned".

"Allegation", so we have a noun here. An allegation-I'll just write in that that's the noun-is something that someone said about something else. For example, an allegation that Boris Johnson has had an affair. Someone is saying that Boris Johnson has had an affair. It doesn't mean that they have had an affair, it just means that someone is saying they have had an affair. "An affair" is when you cheat on someone. Okay?

"Alleged", okay? To allege, you are saying the rumour, you are saying what you think happened. "Alleged", so that is the past tense version of the verb. "To allege" is the present tense. But it's most often seen in the past tense. "Journalists alleged that"... "Allegedly", okay? So here's the adverb. "Allegedly Boris Johnson has done this." It's not saying definitely. It's saying it might have happened.

Okay, "a disclosure". This is making a secret public. Okay? So, Boris Johnson tells a friend that he has been putting lots of money in a bank account in Switzerland or in an offshore bank account. The friend then is quite nasty to Boris, because he makes the secret public. He discloses some information. Okay? "Disclosure", the noun; the verb, "to disclose". And if we look a little bit more carefully there, your prefix "dis" and the main part of the word "close", so something is close and now it is open. So we had a secret and now we don't have a secret.

"Libel". "Libel" is a published fake statement that damages someone's reputation. Okay? So, who says "fake" a lot? Donald Trump. "Fake news! That's fake news. Don't listen to him, that's fake news." Okay? So, "fake" means made up. So, libel, you can accuse someone of libel if they write something about you that is not true.

"To be embroiled in a scandal". So, "a scandal" is something regarded, something thought of as wrong which causes a public outrage. "Outrage" is when we are angry. So the politician... Let's just explain this word, sorry. "Embroiled" means caught up in. I'll write that there. "To be embroiled in a scandal", you're surrounded by something that is making the public very angry. And I've got quite a few examples of those just to come in a moment.

A "P.R. disaster". So, the P stands for "public", the R stands for "relations". If you work in P... If you work in PR, then you are promoting people all the time and you are saying: "This person is fantastic dah-dah-dah-dah-dah-dah-dah". But a P.R. disaster is when it goes into the newspapers some bad press. "Bad press" is something written that makes that politician look bad. Not necessarily politician, can apply to someone else.