Shadowing Practice: Why British cities make no sense - Learn English Speaking with Video
Creating lesson...
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How would you define a city?
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It's what you do on a cherry.
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How would you define a city?
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An inhabited place of greater size, population or importance than a town or village.
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That's better, but wrong.
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Welcome to Map -ow!
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Welcome to Mapmen.
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We're the men.
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And here's the map.
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In the majority of the world, where it's not Britain, the definition of city is reasonably reasonable.
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In Japan, a city is any settlement with more than 50 ,000 people.
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In the USA, a city is anywhere with its own incorporated government.
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But Britain, as per usual, has its own special way of doing things.
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Here is a map of all 76 places in the UK that are officially classed as cities.
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The usual ones you heard of are there, Liverpool, Manchester, Bradford, Leeds and so on.
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But among them are some surprising and seemingly unworthy cities.
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Ely, with just 20 ,000 people, Ripon with just 16 ,000 people, and St David's with less than 1 ,500 people, barely enough for a flash mob.
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And oppositely, there are some very notable places that are mysteriously not on this map.
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Where's Reading? Or Northampton? Or Bournemouth?
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The most surprising omission from this list is none other than London.
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Britain's capital city is technically not a city.
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Although confusingly, Greater London contains within it the City of Westminster and the tiny, confusingly named City of London, which is not the same as London.
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So what's going on?
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If British cityness is clearly nothing to do with size, then what is the criteria?
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What makes a British city a city?
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I think I know this one.
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I think you don't.
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It's something to do with cheese.
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Let's deal with some common misconceptions.
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Cathedral Contrary to popular wrongness, city status in the UK has nothing to do with having a cathedral.
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There are 12 cities without a cathedral of any kind.
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And 32 non -cities with a cathedral of any kind.
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Yay.
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University Another common assumption is that you can't spell university without city.
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But, just as with cathedrals, there are multiple examples proving that this is not the case, including 17 UK cities that do not have universities.
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Can you name three?
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Hard Knocks Cooper Jones.
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And Rippon, Wakefield and St. Asaph.
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Correct, and for a bonus, can you also name three non -cities that do have universities?
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Northampton, Reading and Ipswich.
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And that's our bonus word of the day!
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And it's where you'll be spending an all -expenses -paid weekend trip to Ipswich with your mother, brought to you by the town of Ipswich.
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Meh.
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In an admittedly nowhere near as common as the other two
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but we're going to deal with it anyway misconception Just
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because you're at mayor doesn't mean the thing you're at mayor
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of is a city For two examples Ramji Chauhan is the old -timey ceremonial red -robed
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and gold -chain Lord Mayor of Harrow
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Which is a dull suburban borough not a city
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and Oliver Coppard is the democratically elected Metro Mayor of South Yorkshire A massive political region comprising mostly countryside
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which is even more not a city The term mayor in Britain is almost as confusing useless
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and vague as city itself So then, what is the answer?
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What decides whether a place makes the official British list of cities?
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The surprisingly simple answer is...
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The King!
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In a tradition going back to the 10th century, city status in Britain is granted by personal command of the sovereign and conferred by letters patent.
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Do you know what that means?
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I do.. not.
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The long version is this, and the short version is Every city on the official list has been put there by the monarch.
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It's as simple as that.
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On the list, city.
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Not on the list, not a city.
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So why then do so many people think it's about cathedrals?
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Because it used to be.
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In the olden days, all settlements by today's standards were rather small.
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With Britain's population being overwhelmingly rural, cities weren't considered important if they were big, but if they were powerful.
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Back then, power came from the church.
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Big cathedrals such as Wells, Ely and St Albans, which oversaw large chunks of the surrounding countryside, made the settlements they were in important settlements.
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And so the then monarch awarded these places city status, which they retain to this day.
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But what about all those cities with city status that don't have cathedrals?
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When did the monarch start awarding city status to them and why?
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In the 19th century and because...
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The arrival of the Industrial Revolution caused some towns to turn into manufacturing powerhouses and go through smoky growth spurts.
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By the 1850s the little town of Birmingham was now bursting with factory workers
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and had outgrown the nearby cities of Lichfield and Leicester.
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The citizens insisted that the Synod slanted system that saw sensible cities for several consecutive centuries suddenly seemed silly.
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Well done.
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And demanded that their town be given the city status it deserved.
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So, the Prime Minister, Lord Salisbury, decided the time had come to change the cathede rules.
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Oh, excellent, that's really good.
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Thank you, thank you.
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Tom, Tom, one of your five.
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And reinvented the meaning of city.
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Incidentally, that's the same Lord Salisbury who, at the same time, reinvented the meaning of the word county.
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In 1889, Birmingham's size and industrial importance was officially acknowledged
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when it became the first place without an Anglican cathedral to gain city status.
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Confusingly, Birmingham's church turned into a cathedral later in 1905, but for an explanation of how that works, ask a priest.
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Father, what's the difference between a church and a cathedral?
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Errr.. something to do with bishops?
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Birmingham was quickly followed by cathedral -free Sheffield, Bradford, Hull, Nottingham, and a slow trickle of other godless heathen towns that had recently become large, joining throughout the 20th century.
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The list was gradually starting to make more and more sense.
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Until 1994, when a completely good run of sensible cityings was ruined by the tiny Welsh village of St. David's for no good reason.
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Apparently the Queen just liked it.
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The thing that makes this otherwise logical list illogical is these pesky small cities that ruin it for the proper big ones.
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So can a place lose its city status if it doesn't deserve it anymore?
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Welcome back to Stranded With Songs.
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Now before the break my guest Jimothy Twigg's five song choices
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to be stranded on a desert island with were The Ketchup Song by Las Ketchup four times
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and The Ketchup Song Christmas Remix.
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I regret nothing.
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Now, as you know, as well as the five songs, you also get to take with you one luxury item to the island.
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What luxury item will you...
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I will take Surfshark VPN.
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Literally any luxury item you can think of.
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I will take Surfshark VPN.
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Why do you want to take Surfshark VPN?
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Because it's marvellous.
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Surfshark VPN allows you to virtually change your location, so your browser thinks you're in another country.
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And that means you can access content and discounts that are normally blocked in your country, so you can watch shows and movies on American Netflix that aren't available on UK Netflix.
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There's no internet on the desert island.
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Not only that, Surfshark masks your IP address and keeps you safe online from trackers and hackers, and you can use just one account on an unlimited number of devices.
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You won't have your phone or laptop.
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And it's affordable too!
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Mapmen viewers can get a special deal by using the code MAPMEN, or by clicking the link in the description below to get an extra three months for free.
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You're allowed to take your wife.
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And there's a 30 day money back guarantee, which effectively makes it a free trial.
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Jimothy Twig, you've been a weird guest.
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Right, take him away.
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Where am I going?
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Desert Island.
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But I thought the island on Desert Island Discs was only a hypothetical island.
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This isn't Desert Island Discs.
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Hey, get off me!
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Oh, I said it!
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Ah!
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Surfshark VPN.
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Literally all you need to survive.
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In 1998, Little Rochester and Kent, which had been a city since 1211, merged its local council with its neighbours to form the modern unitary authority of Medway.
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What they didn't realize was doing this effectively removed Rochester from the official list of British cities.
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The new council of Medway could have retained city status simply by filling in a bit of paperwork, but they forgot, making poor Rochester the only place in the UK ever to lose its city status.
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Luckily, the Rochesterians didn't have to wait very long for a chance to put things right.
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The year 2000 was the roundest date in the calendar in living memory, even for trees.
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The government celebrated this milestone with a big blancmange, a bicycle wheel, and the announcement of a bidding round for city status.
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Three new cities were to join the list, and for the first time ever, any town with ambitions to become a city could apply to be one, and size did not matter.
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The criteria they were looking for were notable features, historic features, royal features, and a forward -looking attitude.
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And so, lots of towns submitted bids, each having to provide a 25 -page pamphlet and lots of photos explaining why they were worthy.
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A hot favourite to win was Reading, the largest town in England with a fast -growing tech sector.
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It boldly ticked all these boxes.
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And the winners of Millenium City Status 2000 are Inverness, Brighton & Hove and Wolverhampton.
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Oh, what the...
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The national bidding for city status frenzy was so much fun, the government decided to make it a semi -regular thing, every time the Queen had a party.
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Newport, Newry, Preston, Sterling and Lisbon.
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Lisbon?
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Lisburn.
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Oh, Lisburn.
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Chelmsford, Perth, and St. Asif.
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St. Asif?
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Wales run out of big towns.
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Bangor, Colchester, Doncaster, Dunthirman, Milton Keynes, Rexham, and South Island.
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And that brings us to today's grand total of 76 cities.
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8 in Scotland, 7 in Wales, 6 in Northern Ireland, and 55 in England.
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The question we need to ask, other than why did the Queen hate Reading so much, is why bother bidding?
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Submitting a bid is an expensive business, with tens of thousands of pounds being spent on Printer Inc alone.
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So what are the advantages of being a city instead of a town?
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Extra government funding?
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No. Extra local powers?
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No. Extra promotion for tourism?
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No. Who was that?
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Sorry, typo.
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The clue is in the name, city status.
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That's a very good word for it because that's literally all it is.
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And that's why every town that bids has a different justification for why their bid was bother -worthy.
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Preston said gaining city status in 2002 put them on the map, even though our research has shown that Preston was already on most maps.
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Perth claimed that in the decade since becoming a city in 2012, its economy grew 12 % which would be impressive
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if it weren't for nearby Dundee also growing by about 12
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% Towns don't even need to win to benefit from bidding
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The parish council of Marazion in Cornwall submitted a no -hoper
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underdog bid without their bosses in Cornwall ever knowing about it They were quickly disqualified, but not before the subsequent publicity resulted in a mini -boost
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in tourism The people who seem to get the most tangible benefit from the bidding process are the government themselves
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Awarding city status to an unsung town is a way to appear to show support for it
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and get some positive PR without having to commit any time or money.
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But is this okay?
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Is it right that the government of the day gets to mess with the dictionary definition of a geographical word?
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Is it perhaps time we dropped this nonsense of a system and replaced it with something more meaningful?
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Naaah.
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The government has 8 ,007 more important things to worry about than what the meaning of city is.
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Once those have been sorted, yes, we might look at redefining the definition.
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And even then, we probably shouldn't.
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After all, a vague, archaic, mostly harmless tradition fraught with pomp and ceremony
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and mawkish self -aggrandizing with a bit of royalty thrown in is about the most British thing imaginable, and would never happen in a boring, sensible country like Germany.
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Regular rounds of royal city status -ing look set to be with us for many jubilees to come.
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So, if you want your town to become a city, just sit tight and wait, and rest assured that at this rate, every corner of the country will become a city by the year 3000.
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And the winner is...
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Newport Faculty Services of Year 1!
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Except Reading.
Who Is This Video For?
This video is perfect for intermediate to advanced English learners aiming to boost their english speaking practice and cultural knowledge. It’s ideal for those prepping for IELTS speaking practice too, as it exposes you to conversational debates, idiomatic expressions, and real-world topics—key skills for fluency. The casual yet informative tone makes it great for shadowing, helping you mimic natural speech patterns.
Words & Idioms Worth Stealing
The video is packed with standout phrases. "Seemingly unworthy" (appearing not to deserve a status) and "mysteriously not on this map" (unexplainably missing) add flair to descriptions. "Barely enough for a flash mob" (just enough for a small, sudden gathering) is a playful way to highlight small size. "Common misconceptions" (widely held wrong ideas) is essential for discussing myths, and "all-expenses-paid" (free of charge) is useful for talking about trips. These phrases work in both casual and formal contexts, making them versatile for english speaking practice.
How to Get the Accent Right
The speakers use a clear British accent with relaxed intonation—perfect for improve english pronunciation through shadowing. Focus on reducing stress in function words like "of" and "the" to match their flow. Notice how they emphasize key terms like "city status" and "cathedral" to highlight contrasts. For the shadowing technique, pause the video after short segments (e.g., "In the majority of the world...") and repeat, mimicking their rhythm and pitch. A shadowing site with slow-motion options can help master tricky parts, like the quick delivery of "Ripon, Wakefield and St. Asaph." Practice daily to internalize the natural cadence, which will boost your confidence in real conversations.
What is the Shadowing Technique?
Shadowing is a science-backed language learning technique originally developed for professional interpreter training and popularized by polyglot Dr. Alexander Arguelles. The method is simple but powerful: you listen to native English audio and immediately repeat it out loud — like a shadow following the speaker with just a 1–2 second delay. Unlike passive listening or grammar drills, shadowing forces your brain and mouth muscles to simultaneously process and reproduce real speech patterns. Research shows it significantly improves pronunciation accuracy, intonation, rhythm, connected speech, listening comprehension, and speaking fluency — making it one of the most effective methods for IELTS Speaking preparation and real-world English communication.