华南理工大2011

华南理工大学2011 华南理工大学2011 Part I. Vocabulary and Grammar (30 points, 1 point for each) Directions: After each statement there are four choices marked A, B, C, and D. Choose the only one choice that best completes the statement. Write your answers on your answer sheet. 1. Please explain your statement. I have no ____ what you are talking about. A. contemplation B. norm C. notion D. imagination 2. On August 18th the president announced a general ____ for political exiles. A. yoga B. ado C. quartet D. amnesty 3. When two straight lines meet, ____ an angle. A. formed B. it is formed C. they form D. to form 4. It is not _____much the language as the background that makes the novel difficult to understand. A. that B. that C. so D. very 5. The machine got somewhat eroded, but this oil will ____ it well. A. extinct B. decorate C. illuminate D. lubricate 6. The digestive enzyme pepsin breaks down proteins into components ____ readily absorbed by the human body. A. that can be B. and are C. which they D. are to be 7. ____ the precise qualities of the hero in literary works may vary over time, the basic exemplary function of the hero seems to remain constant. A. Whatever B. Even though C. In spite of D. Regardless 8. The baby monkey ____ to its mother all day. A. held B. grasped C. clung D. stuck 9. ___at in this way, the situation does not seem so desperate. A. Looked B. Looking C. To look D. Being looked 第 1 页 10. Because caricature tends to emphasize the peculiarities of a subject, ____ an effective vehicle for pictorial satire. A. which is often B. and often seen as C. it is often D. many of which are 11. It is absolutely essential that Mary ____her study in spite of some leaning difficulties. A. will continue B. continued C. continue D. continues 12. Please ＿ the staff that the inspectors will be here on Monday and let them make good preparations. A. modify B. ratify C. rectify D. notify 13. The meeting took on a different ____after his moving speech. A. presage B. posture C. travesty D. trauma 14. In the nineteenth century, Samuel Gridley Howe founded the Perkins School for the blind, ____ for children in Boston, Massachusetts. A. that institutes B. while instituted C. was an institution D. an institute 15. People in prehistoric times created paints by grinding materials such as plants and clay into powder ____. A. water to be added B. for adding water then C. and water added D. and then adding water 16. While she had the fever, she _____for hours. A .raved B. sniggered C. perforated D. tittered 17. Seeing the General coming his way, the soldier stopped and gave him a smart ____. A. toast B. salute C. tribute D. solution 18. Often very annoying weeds, ____ and act as hosts to many insect pests. A. that crowd out less hardy plants than goldenrods B. crowding out less hardy plants by goldenrods C. the goldenrods crowding out of less hardy plants D. goldenrods crowd out less hardy plants 19. If you spill hot liquid on your skin it will ____ you. A. scale B. scald C. shun D. shunt 20. Starting around 7000 B.C., and for the next four thousand years, much of the Northern Hemisphere ____ temperatures warmer than at present. A. with experience of B. experienced C. experiencing D. experience 21. Did you get any ____ when you are dismissed from your job? A. fund B. loan C. bonus D. compensation 22. When you are suffering from_ you have red spots on your skin and you feel as if you have a cold, A. apathy B. schizophrenia C. impotence D. measles 23. He was ____ on the telephone so I asked him to speak more clearly. A. muttering B. grumbling C. groping D. shuddering 24. Now, with the ____ and popularity of the home computer, its advantages and disadvantages have been a subject of discussion. A. adventure B. advance C. advent D. adult 25. They ____ evidence and threatened witnesses not to tell the truth to anyone else. A. produced B. fabricated C. created D. manipulated 26. Is there any possible ____ explanation for his bad health since he seems to have no obvious disease? A. psychiatric B. psychological C. surgical D. physical 27. Many animals display _____ instincts only while their offspring are young and helpless. A. cerebral B. imperious C. rueful D. maternal 28. ____ the bad weather has delayed the flight, so it would be several hours before they could arrive. A. Presumably B. Respectively C. Imaginably D. Plausibly 29. They send information every week, ____ whether its useful or not. A. in consideration of B. irrespective of C. with the exception of D. with regard to 30. Children of poor health are very ____ to colds in winter and should be taken care of particularly. A. willing B. ready C. reluctant D. prone Part II. Reading Comprehension (50 points) Section 1 Multiple choice questions (30 points, 3 points for each) Directions: In this section there are 2 reading passages followed by multiple-choice questions. Read the passages and then write your answers on your answer sheet. Passage 1 Given the lack of fit between gifted students and their schools, it is not surprising that such students often have little good to say about their school experience. In one study of 400 adults who had achieved distinction in all areas of life, researchers found that three-fifths of these individuals either did badly in school or were unhappy in school. Few MacArthur Prize fellows, winners of the MacArthur Award for creative accomplishment, had good things to say about their precollegiate schooling if they had not been placed in advanced programs. Anecdotal reports support this. Pablo Picasso, Charles Darwin, Mark Twain, Oliver Gold smith, and William Butler Yeats all disliked school. So did Winston Churchill, who almost failed out of Harrow, an elite British school. About Oliver Goldsmith, one of his teachers remarked, "Never was so dull a boy." Often these children realize that they know more than their teachers, and their teachers often feel that these children are arrogant, inattentive, or unmotivated. Some of these gifted people may have done poorly in school because their gifts were not scholastic. Maybe we can account for Picasso in this way. But most fared poorly in school not because they lacked ability but because they found school unchallenging and consequently lost interest. Yeats described the lack of fit between his mind and school: "Because I had found it difficult to attend to anything less interesting than my own thoughts, I was difficult to teach.” As noted earlier, gifted children of all kinds tend to be strong-willed nonconformists. Nonconformity and stubbornness (and Yeatss level of arrogance and self-absorption) are likely to lead to Conflicts with teachers. When highly gifted students in any domain talk about what was important to the development of their abilities, they are far more likely to mention their families than their schools or teachers. A writing prodigy studied by David Feldman and Lynn Goldsmith was taught far more about writing by his journalist father than his English teacher. High-IQ children, in Australia studied by Miraca Gross had much more positive feelings about their families than their schools. About half of the mathematicians studied by Benjamin Bloom had little good to say about school. They all did well in school and took honors classes when available, and some skipped grades. 31. The main point the author is making about schools is that A. they should satisfy the needs of students from different family backgrounds B. they are often incapable of catering to the needs of talented students C. they should organize their classes according to the students ability D. they should enroll as many gifted students as possible 32. The author quotes the remarks of one of Oliver Goldsmiths teachers A. to provide support for his argument B. to illustrate the strong will of some gifted children C. to explain how dull students can also be successful D. to show how poor Olivers’ performance was at school 33. Pablo Picasso is listed among the many gifted children who A. paid no attention to their teachers in class B. contradicted their teachers much too often C. could not cope with their studies at school successfully D. behaved arrogantly and stubbornly in the presence of their teachers 34. According to the passage author, the development of highly gifted students is attributed A. mainly to parental help and their education at home B. both to school instruction and to their parents coaching C. more to their parents encouragement than to school training D. less to their systematic education than to their talent 35. The root cause of many gifted students having bad memories of their school years is that A. their nonconformity brought them a lot of trouble B. they were seldom praised by their teachers C. school courses failed to inspire or motivate them D. teachers were usually far stricter than their parents Passage 2 It came as something of a surprise when Diana, Princess of Wales, made a trip to Angola in 1997, to support the Red Cross’s campaign for a total ban on all anti-personnel landmines. Within hours of arriving in Angola, television screens around the world were filled with images of her comforting victims injured in explosions caused by landmines. "I knew the statistics," she said. "But putting a face to those figures brought the reality home to me; like when I met Sandra, a 13- year-old girl who had lost her leg, and people like her." The Princess concluded with a simple message: "We must stop landmines". And she used every opportunity during her visit to repeat this message. But, back in London, her views were not shared by some members of the British government, which refused to support a ban on these weapons. Angry politicians launched an attack on the Princess in the press. They described her as "very ill-informed" and a "loose cannon”. The Princess responded by brushing aside the Criticisms: "This is a distraction we do not need. All I’m trying to do is help." Opposition parties, the media and the public immediately voiced their support for the Princess. To make matters worse for the government, it soon emerged that the Princess’s trip had been approved by the Foreign Office, and that she was in fact very well-informed about both the situation in Angola and the British government’s policy regarding landmines. The result was a severe embarrassment for the government. To try and limit the damage, the Foreign Secretary, Malcolm Rifkidnd, claimed that the Princess’s views on landmines were not very different from government policy, and that it was "working towards" a worldwide ban. The Defence Secretary, Michael Portillo, claimed the matter was "a misinterpretation or misunderstanding." - For the Princess, the trip to this war-torn country was an excellent opportunity to use her popularity to show the world how much destruction and suffering landmines can cause. She said that the experience had also given her the chance to get closer to people and their problems. 36. Princess Diana paid a visit to Angola in 1997 A. to clarify the British government’s stand on landmines B. to establish her image as a friend ’of landmine victims C. to investigate the sufferings of landmine victims there D. to voice her support for a total ban of landmines 37. What did Diana mean when she said "... putting a face to those figures brought the reality home to me" (Paragraph 1)? A. Meeting the landmine victims in person made her believe the statistics. B. She just couldn’t bear to meet the landmine victims face to face. C. The actual situation in Angola made her feel like going back home. D. Seeing the pain of the victims made her realize the seriousness of the situation. 38. Some members of the British government criticized Diana because A. she had not consulted the government before the visit B. she was ill-informed of the government’s policy C. they were actually opposed to banning landmines D. they believed that she had misinterpreted the situation in Angola 39. How did Diana respond to the criticisms? A. She made more :appearances on TV. B. She paid no attention to them. C. She rose to argue with her opponents. D. She met the 13-year-old girl as planned. 40. What did Princess Diana think of her visit to Angola? A. It had caused embarrassment to the British government. B. It had greatly promoted her popularity. C. It had brought her closer to the ordinary people. D. It had affected her relations with the British government. Section 2 Answering questions (20 points, 4 points for each) Directions: Read the following passages and the answer IN COMPLETE SENTENCES the questions following each passage. Use only information from the passage you have read and write your answer in the corresponding space in your ANSWER SHEET. Passage 3 At the University of Virginia in Charlottesville, psychology professor Bella DePaulo got 77 students and 70 twonspeople to volunteer for an unusual project. All kept diaries for a week, recording the numbers and details of the lies they told. One student and six Charlottesville residents professed to have told no falsehoods. The other 140 participants told 1,535. The lies were most often not what most of us would call earth-shattering. Someone would pretend to be more positive or supportive of a spouse or friend than he or she really was, or feign agreement with a relative’s opinion. According to DePaulo, women in their interactions with other women lied mostly to spare the other’s feelings. Men lied to other men generally for self-promoting reasons. Most strikingly, these tellers-of-a-thousand-lies reported that their deceptions caused them “little preoccupation or regret”. Might that, too, be a lie? Perhaps. But there is evidence that this attitude toward casual use of prevarication is common. For example, 20,000 middle-and-high-schoolers were surveyed by the Josephson Institute of Ethics--a nonprofit organization in Marina de Rey, Calif., devoted to character education. Ninety-two percent of the teenagers admitted having lied to their parents in the previous year, and 73 percent characterized themselves as “serial liars”, meaning they told lies weekly. Despite these admissions, 91 percent of all respondents said they were “satisfied with my own ethics and character”. Think how often we hear the expression “I’ll call you” or “The check is in the mail” or “I’m sorry, but he stepped out”. And then there are professions--lawyers,pundits, PR consultants--whose members seem to specialize in shaping or spinning the truth to suit clients’ needs. Little white lies have become ubiquitous, and the reason we give each other for telling fibs are familiar. Consider, for example, a Southern California corporate executive whom I’ll call Tom. He goes with his wife and son to his mother-in-law’s home for Thanksgiving dinner every year. Tom dislikes her “special” pumpkin pie intensely. Invariably he tells her how wonderful it is, to avoid hurting her feelings. “What’s wrong with that?” Tom asked Michael Josephson, president of the Josephson Institute. It’s a question we might all ask. Josephson replied by asking Tom to consider the lie from his mother-in-law’s point of view. Suppose that one day Tom’s child blurts out the truth, and she discovers the deceit. Will she tell her son-in-law, “Thank you for caring so much?” Or is she more likely to feel hurt and say, “How could you have misled me all these years?” And what might Tom’s mother-in-law now suspect about her own daughter? And will Tom’s boy lie to his parents and yet be satisfied with his own character? How often do we compliment people on how well they look, or express our appreciation for gifts, when we don’t really mean it? Surely, these “nice lies” are harmless and well intended, a necessary social lubricant. But, like Tom, we should remember the words of English novelist Sir Walter Scot, who wrote, “What a tangled web we weave, when first we practice to deceive.” Even seemingly harmless falsehoods can have unforeseen consequences. Philosopher Sissela Bok warns us that they can put us on a slippery slope. “After the first lies, others can come more easily,” she wrote in her book Lying: Moral Choice in Public and Private Life. “Psychological barriers wear down; the ability to make more distinctions can coarsen; the liar’s perception of his chances of being caught may warp.” Take the pumpkin-pie lies. In the first place, it wasn’t just that he wanted his mother-in-law to feel good. Whether he realized it or not, he really wanted her to think highly of him. And after the initial deceit he needed to tell more lies to cover up the first one. Who believes it anymore when they’re told that the person they want to reach by phone is “in a meeting”? By itself, that kind of lie is of no great consequence. Still, the endless proliferation of these little prevarications does matter. Once they’ve become common enough, even the small untruth that are not meant to hurt encourage a certain cynicism and loss of trust. “when (trust) is damaged,” warns Bok, “the community as a whole suffers; and when it is destroyed, societies falter and collapse.” Are all white lies to be avoided at all costs? Not necessarily. The most understandable and forgivable lies are an exchange of what ethicists refer to as the principle of caring, “like telling children about the tooth fairy, or deceiving someone to set them up for a surprise party,” Josephson says. “Still, we must ask ourselves if we are willing to give our friends and associates the authority to lie to us whenever they think it is for our own good.” Josephson suggests a simple test. If someone you lie to finds out the truth, will he thank you for caring? Or will he feel his long-term trust in you has been undermined? And if you’re not sure, Mark Twain has given us a good rule of thumb. “When in doubt, tell the truth. It will confound your enemies and astound your friends.” 41. Identify other 4 corresponding synonyms or near-synonyms for the word “lie” in the passage. 42. Please comment on Mark Twain’s rule of thumb: “When in doubt, tell the truth. It will confound your enemies and astound your friends.” Passage 4 On the whole, books are less limited than ourselves. Often they sit on the shelves absorbing dust long after the writer has turned into a handful of dust--and it is precisely the appetite for this posthumous dimension that sets one’s pen in motion. So as we toss and turn these rectangular objects in our hands we won’t be terribly amiss if we surmise that we fondle, as it were, the urns with our returning ashes. After all, what goes into writing a book is, ultimately, a man’s only life. Whoever said that to philosophize is an exercise in dying was right in more ways than one, for by writing a book nobody gets younger. Nor does one become any younger by reading one. Since this is so, our natural preference should be for good books. The paradox, however, lies in the fact that in literature “good” is defined by its distinction from “bad”. What’s more, to write a good book, a writer must read a great deal of pulp--otherwise he won’t be able to develop the necessary criteria. That’s what may constitute bad literature’s best defense at the Last Judgment. Since we are all moribund, and since reading books is time-consuming, we must devise a system that allows us a semblance of economy. Of course, there is no denying the pleasure of holding up with a fat, slow-moving, mediocre novel; but in the end, we read not for reading’s sake but to learn. Hence the need for the works that bring the human predicament into its sharpest possible focus. Hence, too, the need for some compass in the ocean of available printed matter. The role of that compass, of course, is played by literary criticism, by reviewers. Alas, its needle oscillates wildly. What is north for some is south for others. The trouble with a reviewer is threefold: (a) he can be a hack, and as ignorant as ourselves; (b) he can have strong predilections for a certain kind of wri