In Entertainment today, we go back to the mid-1970s when punk rock and the

British fashion designer Vivienne Westwood ruled the day! ‘Punk’ was a

popular style among young people and it involved shocking the establishment

with rebellious music, shocking behaviour and outrageous clothes!

We hear a description of the ‘punk look’, the punk style of clothes and hair.

And we hear how those clothes made the designer Vivienne Westwood famous.

But the story doesn’t end there – ‘these days’ (that’s a handy expression for

talking about the present time, in comparison with the past) – these days –

Vivienne Westwood is a ‘Dame’ – she’s been honoured by the Queen and

given the title ‘Dame’, and her fashion designs are museum pieces!

Here’s BBC presenter Mark Coles describing punk culture and Vivienne

Westwood’s part in that trend. As you listen, try to catch the verb (it’s US

slang) that Mark uses to explain that punk rockers were disrespectful and

critical of the Queen.

Mark Coles

‘Spiky-haired youngsters running around in tartan bondage trousers, safety pins and spiked

dog collars, dissing the Queen and calling for revolution on the streets! Well, that punk look,

its anarchy symbols and torn clothes, was all Vivienne Westwood. It helped turn her into a

household name – one of the world’s most influential, not to mention, notorious, fashion

designers. These days, more than 30 years on, you’re more likely to find her designs hanging

in prestigious museums like the National Gallery of Australia. She’s also Dame Vivienne

Westwood – honoured by the very Queen that the Sex Pistols savaged back in punk’s

heyday.’ 

Entertainment © BBC Learning English 2007

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Amber: Did you catch it? Mark says punk rockers were ‘dissing’ the Queen. But that

was in ‘punk’s heyday’ (in the 1970s) – the heyday of something is the time of

its greatest popularity.

Listen again and try to catch what the punk rockers looked like!

Mark Coles

‘Spiky-haired youngsters running around in tartan bondage trousers, safety pins and spiked

dog collars, dissing the Queen and calling for revolution on the streets! Well, that punk look,

its anarchy symbols and torn clothes, was all Vivienne Westwood. It helped turn her into a

household name – one of the world’s most influential, not to mention, notorious, fashion

designers. These days, more than 30 years on, you’re more likely to find her designs hanging

in prestigious museums like the National Gallery of Australia. She’s also Dame Vivienne

Westwood – honoured by the very Queen that the Sex Pistols savaged back in punk’s

heyday.’

Amber: So punk rockers wore their hair in ‘spiky’ styles – stuck into sharp points,

sticking upwards! They often wore safety pins and even ‘spiked dog collars’ –

just to shock! Oh, and rather colourful trousers – ‘tartan bondage trousers’.

Tartan is kind of wool fabric with straight patterns, often with a lot of red and

black lines in it. Bondage trousers have lots of zips and rips (they’re often

‘torn’)!

But now, Vivienne Westwood is speaking out again – this time she’s criticising

some forms of popular culture, like the cinema and magazines, and saying

people should go to the theatre and read books instead. She’s launched a

cultural manifesto called ‘Active Resistance To Propaganda’, in which she asks

people to forget commerce, celebrity and conceptual art and immerse

themselves instead in great culture. Here she is. Try to catch why she’s

encouraging people to rebel.

Vivienne Westwood

‘Every time you go to the theatre instead of the cinema, you are active in the theatre, you are

thinking, you are using your imagination. I’m not saying that cinema sometimes maybe can

not be artistic, but usually it’s not. Magazines are mostly for the – not only the illiterate – but 

Entertainment © BBC Learning English 2007

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the visually illiterate. A magazine is something you just wet your finger, and just go through

the pages – flick, flick, flick – there’s not even anything particularly to see in there!’

Amber: So Vivienne Westwood says we should experience forms of art which make

us think and use our imaginations. She says we should be ‘active’ in the arts!

Vivienne Westwood

‘Every time you go to the theatre instead of the cinema, you are active in the theatre, you are

thinking, you are using your imagination. I’m not saying that cinema sometimes maybe can

not be artistic, but usually it’s not. Magazines are mostly for the – not only the illiterate – but

the visually illiterate. A magazine is something you just wet your finger, and just go through

the pages – flick, flick, flick – there’s not even anything particularly to see in there!’

Amber: Now let’s recap the language we focussed on.

‘that punk look’ - the rebellious style of clothes and hair fashionable in the

1970s

to dis – that’s US slang, meaning to be disrespectful, to criticise

‘punk’s heyday’ – the heyday of something is the time of its greatest

popularity.