单选题

Intellect

Americans today don"t place a very high value on intellect. Our heroes are athletes, entertainers, and entrepreneurs, not scholars. Even our schools are where we send our children to get a practical education—not to pursue knowledge for the sake of knowledge. Symptoms of pervasive anti-intellectualism in our schools aren"t difficult to find.
"Schools have always been in a society where practical is more important than intellectual," says education writer Diane Ravitch. "Schools could be a counterbalance." Ravitch"s latest book, Left Back: A Century of Failed School Reforms , traces the roots of anti-intellectualism in our schools, concluding they are anything but a counterbalance to the American distaste for intellectual pursuits.
But they could and should be. Encouraging kids to reject the life of the mind leaves them vulnerable to exploitation and control. Without the ability to think critically, to defend their ideas and understand the ideas of others, they cannot fully participate in our democracy. Continuing along this path, says writer Earl Shorris, "We will become a second-rate country. We will have a less civil society."
"Intellect is resented as a form of power or privilege," writes historian and Professor Richard Hofstadter in Anti-intellectualism in American life , a Pulitzer Prize winning book on the roots of anti-intellectualism in US politics, religion, and education. From the beginning of our history, says Hofstadter, our democratic and populist urges have driven us to reject anything that smells of elitism. Practicality, common sense, and native intelligence have been considered more noble qualities than anything you could learn from a book.
Ralph Waldo Emerson and other Transcendentalist philosophers thought schooling and rigorous book learning put unnatural restraints on children: "We are shut up in schools and college recitation rooms for 10 or 15 years and come out at last with a bellyful of words and do not know a thing." Mark Twain"s Huckleberry Finn exemplified American anti-intellectualism. Its hero avoids being civilized—going to school and learning to read so he can preserve his innate goodness.
Intellect, according to Hofstadter, is different from native intelligence, a quality we reluctantly admire. Intellect is the critical, creative, and contemplative side of the mind. Intelligence seeks to grasp, manipulate, re-order, and adjust, while intellect examines, ponders, wonders, theorizes, criticizes and imagines.
School remains a place where intellect is mistrusted. Hofstadter says our country"s educational system is in the grips of people who "joyfully and militantly proclaim their hostility to intellect and their eagerness to identify with children who show the least intellectual promise."

单选题 What do American parents expect their children to acquire in school?

单选题 We can learn from the text that Americans have a history of ______.

【正确答案】 A

【答案解析】[解析] 本题问的是美国曾经有过一段什么历史。原文的第四段谈到了美国的历史。该段的后两句话说到，From the beginning of our history, ...从美国历史一开始，对民主和平民主义的追求就驱使我们拒绝任何带有精英优越论味道的东西。实用、常识、先天的智力被认为是比书本中学到的东西更加高尚的素质。由此可知，美国有史以来就是反对才智主义的。只有A选项的意思与原文最为接近。因此，本题的正确答案为A。

单选题 The views of Ravitch and Emerson on schooling are ______.

【正确答案】 D

【答案解析】[解析] 本题问的是拉维奇和爱默生两个人对学校教育的观点。原文第二段的第一句话明确说到，"Schools have always been in a society where practical is more important than intellectual," says...Ravitch. "Schools could be a counterbalance." 拉维奇指出：学校一直处于一个重实际而轻才智的社会，但学校原本可以成为一种抗衡力。并且根据该段后面的论述可知，拉维奇认为，学校本来是追求才智的，但是无法扭转社会重实际而轻才智的趋势。原文第五段的第一句话说到，Ralph Waldo Emerson...thought schooling and rigorous book learning put unnatural restraints on children...表明，爱默生认为，学校教育和严格的课本学习不自然地禁锢了孩子。由此可知，两人的观点是完全不同的。因此，本题的正确答案为D。

单选题 Emerson, according to the text, is probably ______.

单选题 What does the author think of intellect?

【正确答案】 C

【答案解析】[解析] 本题问的是作者对才智的观点。原文的第一段中作者就提出问题：才智在美国教育中被忽视。然后讨论了这种趋势的影响和原因，并引用了正反很多人的观点来表明自己的态度。原文的最后指出，因为学校掌握在敌视才智的人手中，学校依然不信任才智。结合全文内容可知，作者对学校和社会这种忽视或轻视才智的做法是持批判态度的。也就是说，作者认为才智应该受到尊重。因此，本题的正确答案为C。