#44 (ENG) "Theme and Struggle"

CLAIRSTONE VOCABULARY PODCAST

Welcome to Clairstone! In this episode, you will learn how to use the English words "theme" and "struggle".
TRANSCRIPT:
Hello everyone, my name is Shivika, and you are listening to the English ClAIRSTONE Podcast, where you can build the cornerstone of your English vocabulary! For all the new listeners, welcome to the community, and for our regulars, hello again! Before we start, I will remind you that we upload new episodes twice a week and there are transcripts for each podcast episode in English, Arabic, and Spanish at our website projectclair.org, so go check that out if you want to follow along!

Today we will be talking about the words ‘theme’ and ‘struggle’

The word theme is spelled as T-H-E-M-E. This word is used as a noun. Theme can mean the subject of the conversation, a piece of writing, or a person’s thought. It is similar to a topic. An example of a sentence with this can be ‘the theme of the speech by the Pope was about unity and peace.’ this can also be given with the example of a topic or an idea that is shown in an essay, for example, ‘Thomas wrote about the theme of love vs. hate.’ Similarly, theme can also be the main idea of a piece of literature, artwork, or piece of music. You could say that the Massacre of the innocents by Peter Paul Ruebens has a dark theme or that the disney princess movies have a theme of happiness. A sentence can be, “The students had to examine the theme of the book they are reading in class.’

The next word, struggle is spelled as S-T-R-U-G-G-L-E. This word can be used as both a verb and a noun. The definitions for both uses of the word are similar. The verb form means doing the action of making forceful and violent efforts to get free of restrainment. Whereas the noun version is simply the act of the action taking place. An example for the verb version can be, “She struggled against the tides she got caught in.” to use it as a noun, a sentence can be, ‘there were signs of a struggle at the crime scene’ Struggle can also mean conflict in its verb form, for example, ‘congressmen and congresswomen were struggling over the votes on the new bill.’ Struggle can again be used as a noun with the definition of a determined effort, for example a scientist's struggle is figuring something out or a dancer's struggle to get her routine perfect. A sentence could be, ‘Sam struggled to get her essay to portray the analysis of the poem well.’

Well, that is it for today’s episode! This was the Clairstone Podcast, and for the full transcript for all our episodes, you can click on the info icon on our platform or go to our website at projectclair.org. I hope you will start to use the words “theme” and “struggle” in your English practice, and I will see you next time! Bye everyone!