[00:00.00]By:51VOA.COM [00:11.10]I'm Susan Clark [00:12.50]with the Special English program, [00:14.68]WORDS AND THEIR STORIES. [00:17.04]A woman from Japan was telling a friend [00:20.73]about her trip to the United States. [00:23.15]The woman had visited major businesses [00:26.41]and investment companies [00:27.92]in New York City and Chicago. [00:30.59]"I studied English [00:33.25]before I left home," she said. [00:35.48]"But I still was not sure [00:38.01]that people were speaking English." [00:40.79]Her problem is easy to understand. [00:44.58]Americans in business are like people [00:47.92]who are in business anywhere. [00:50.05]They have a language of their own. [00:53.17]Some of the words and expressions [00:56.14]deal with the special areas of their work. [00:59.30]Other expressions are borrowed [01:01.89]from different kinds of work [01:03.98]such as the theater and movie industry. [01:07.63]One such saying is get your act together. [01:11.98]When things go wrong in a business, [01:15.60]an employer may get angry. [01:18.38]He may shout, [01:20.13]"Stop making mistakes. [01:22.41]Get your act together." [01:25.08]Or,if the employer is calmer, [01:28.87]he may say, [01:30.19]"Let us get our act together." [01:32.99]Either way, [01:35.08]the meaning is the same. [01:37.20]Getting your act together is getting organized. [01:42.30]In business, [01:43.72]it usually means to develop a calm [01:46.54]and orderly plan of action. [01:49.10]It is difficult to tell exactly [01:52.75]where the saying began. [01:54.56]But,it is probable that it was in the theater [01:58.24]or movie industry. [02:00.08]Perhaps one of the actors was nervous [02:03.52]and made a lot of mistakes. [02:05.57]The director may have said, [02:08.00]"Calm down,now.Get your act together." [02:12.29]Word expert James Rogers says the expression [02:17.18]was common by the late nineteen seventies. [02:20.12]Mister Rogers says [02:22.29]the Manchester Guardian newspaper [02:24.60]used it in nineteen seventy-eight. [02:27.42]The newspaper said a reform policy [02:30.62]required that the British government [02:33.07]get its act together. [02:35.06]Now,this expression is heard often [02:38.50]when officials of a company meet. [02:40.71]One company even called its yearly report, [02:44.47]"Getting Our Act Together." [02:46.91]The Japanese visitor was confused [02:51.06]by another expression [02:52.71]used by American business people. [02:54.93]It is cut to the chase. [02:57.67]She heard that expression [03:00.42]when she attended [03:01.45]an important meeting of one company. [03:03.86]One official was giving a very long report. [03:08.30]It was not very interesting. [03:11.23]In fact,some people at the meeting [03:15.33]were falling asleep. [03:17.32]Finally, [03:19.05]the president of the company said, [03:20.75]"Cut to the chase." [03:22.93]Cut to the chase [03:25.86]means to stop spending so much time [03:28.71]on details or unimportant material. [03:32.05]Hurry and get to the good part. [03:35.36]Naturally, [03:37.38]this saying was started by people [03:39.52]who make movies. [03:41.07]Hollywood movie producers [03:44.00]believe that most Americans [03:45.89]want to see action movies. [03:48.49]Many of their movies show scenes [03:51.17]in which the actors chase each other in cars, [03:55.22]or in airplanes or on foot. [03:57.67]Cut is the director's word for stop. [04:02.26]The director means to stop filming, [04:05.44]leave out some material, [04:08.08]and get to the chase scene now. [04:11.59]So,if your employer tells you [04:15.23]to cut to the chase, [04:16.96]be sure to get to the main point [04:20.38]of your story quickly. [04:22.13]£¨MUSIC£© [04:29.79]This WORDS AND THEIR STORIES program [04:32.21]was written by Jeri Watson. [04:34.29]I'm Susan Clark.