Conectivos em Inglês – Porque são essenciais para a compreensão textual no ENCCEJA?

Nathalie, the swimmer who lost a leg

Nathalie du Toit, the South African swimmer, was only seventeen when she lost her leg in a road accident. She was going to a training session at the swimming pool on her motorbike when a car hit her. Her leg had to be amputated at the knee. At the time she was one of South Africa’s most promising young swimmers. Everybody thought that she would never be able to swim competitively again. But Nathalie was determined to carry on. She went back into the pool only three months after the accident. And just one year later, at the Commonwealth Games in Manchester, she swam 800 meters in 9 minutes 11:38 seconds and qualified for the final – but not for disabled swimmers, for able-bodied ones! Although she didn’t win a medal, she still made history. ‘I remember how thrilled I was the first time that I swam after recovering from the operation – it felt like my leg was there. It still does, says Nathalie. The water is the gift that gives me back my leg. I’m still the same person I was before the accident. I believe everything happens in life for a reason. You can’t go back and change anything. Swimming was my life and still is. My dream is to swim faster than I did before the accident.

Oxeden, C; KOENIG, C. New English File. Intermediate Student’s Book. OXFORD University Press. (3c-47).

No último parágrafo do texto, na frase “Although she didn’t win a medal, she still made history”, o termo destacado indica uma conjunção:

Leia as tiras abaixo para responder a próxima questão.

No terceiro quadro, o termo but expressa:

The ‘favelas’ or shanty towns that surround most Brazilian cities

Brazil might be the leading economy in Latin America and has had a significant performance in reducing poverty in recent years, but it still remains among the countries with the highest inequality in the region together with Guatemala, Honduras and Colombia, points out the UNHabitat report. In all four countries based on 2009 data, the Gini income per capita distribution index stood at 0.56, to which must be added Dominican Republic and Bolivia, two inequality champions with high concentration of wealth. This compares with the US and Portugal Gini indicator of 0.38, two countries that offer no relief since Portugal, for example, has the highest inequality index of the European Union. Nevertheless, Brazil advanced compared to 1990 when it had the highest degree of inequality and stood well ahead from the rest of the continent. But the region continues to have the highest inequality rate in spite of advances in helping income distribution. Among some of the causes for distribution improvement are productivity, upward trend of salaries and workers categories, strong economy and implementation of income transfer programs in several countries, particularly in the two leading economies, Brazil and Mexico. In the case of Brazil, the country’s economy now figures sixth at global level. Former president Lula da Silva and one of the most popular leaders in history of that country based his success precisely on the Bolsa Família Plan, which distributed a monthly basic food basket to millions, helping anywhere from 14 to 22 million climb out of poverty, plus ensuring his Workers Party an encouraging future. The Gini coefficient or index measures the inequality among values of a frequency distribution (for instance, levels of income). A Gini coefficient of zero expresses perfect equality where all values are the same (for instance, where everyone has an exactly equal income). A Gini coefficient of one (100 on the percentile scale) expresses maximal inequality among values (for instance, where only one person has all the income).

(http://en.mercopress.com. Adaptado.)

No início do segundo parágrafo, a palavra nevertheless introduz: