单选题 Sign language has become a scientific hot button. Only in the past 20 years have specialists in language study realized that sign languages are unique—a speech of the hand. They offer a new way to probe how the brain generates and understands language, and throw new light on an old scientific controversy-whether language, complete with grammar, is something that we are born with, or whether it is a learned behavior. The current interest in sign language has roots in the pioneering work of one rebel teacher at Gallaudet University in Washington, D.C., the world's only liberal arts university for deaf people.
When Bill Stokoe went to Gallaudet to teach English, the school enrolled him in a course in signing. But Stokoe noticed something odd. among themselves, students signed differently from his classroom teacher.
Stokoe had been taught a sort of gestural code, each movement of the hands representing a word in English. At the time, American Sign Language (ASL) was thought to be no more than a form of pidgin English (混杂英语). But Stokoe believed the "hand talk" his students used looked richer. He wondered, might deaf people actually have a genuine language? And could that language be unlike any other on Earth? It was 1955, when even deaf people dismissed their signing as "substandard". Stokoe's idea was academic heresy
It is 37 years later. Stokoe—now devoting his time to writing and editing books and journals and to producing video materials on ASL and the deaf culture—is having lunch at a care near the Gallaudet campus and explaining how he started a revolution. For decades educators fought his idea that sign languages are natural languages like English, French and Japanese. They assumed language must be based on speech, the modulation (调节) of sound, but sign language is based on the movement of hands, the modulation of space."What I said," Stokoe explains, "is that language is not mouth stuff—it's brain stuff."
单选题 The study of sign language is thought to be ______.
  • A. a new way to look at the learning of language
  • B. a challenge to traditional views on the nature of language
  • C. an approach to simplifying the grammatical structure of a language
  • D. an attempt to clarify misunderstanding about the origin of language
【正确答案】 B
【答案解析】[解析] 推理题。题干意为“对手语的研究被认为是”。A项意为“一种探究语言学习的新方法”；B项意为“对于传统观点中关于语言本质的挑战”；C项意为“一种 简化语言语法结构的方法”；D项意为“尝试澄清对语言起源的误解”。根据题干定位至第一段第三句，句中的they即指sign languages。该句中提到，手语也使一个古老的科学争议重新引起注意，即有完整语法的语言究竟是人们与生俱来的，还是后天习得的。由此推断，对手语的研究挑战了关于语言本质的传统理论。B选项与其意思相近，故B为正确答案。
单选题 The present growing interest in sign language was stimulated by ______.
  • A. a famous scholar in the study of the human brain
  • B. a leading specialist in the study of liberal arts
  • C. an English teacher in a university for the deaf
  • D. some senior experts in American Sign Language
【正确答案】 C
【答案解析】[解析] 细节题。题干意为：“目前对于手语日益增长的兴趣是由谁激发的?” A项意为“一位研究人类大脑的著名学者”；B项意为“一位研究人文科学的重要专家”； C项意为“一位聋哑人大学的英语教师”；D项意为“一些研究美国手语的资深专家”。根据题干线索词The present growing interest in sign language定位至第一段最后一句。句中提到，现在我们对手语的兴趣根源于世界上唯一一所为聋哑人设立的文科大学华盛顿Gallaudet大学的一个具有反叛精神的教师的倡导。而在第二段第一句中又提到Bill Stokoe最初去Gallaudet大学是去教英文的。由此推知，激发对手语研究兴趣的是一位聋哑人大学的英语教师。C选项符合题意，故为正确答案。
单选题 According to Stokoe, sign language is ______.
  • A. a substandard language
  • B. a genuine language
  • C. an artificial language
  • D. an international language
【正确答案】 B
【答案解析】[解析] 细节题。题干意为“Stokoe认为，手语是”。A项意为“一种不很标准的语言”；B项意为“一种真正的语言”；C项意为“一种人造语言”；D项意为“一种国际性语言”。文中第三段第四句，其中提到，Stokoe认为也许聋哑人有自己真正的语言，而那种语言和世界上其他语言都不一样。由此推知，Stokoe认为手语是一门真正的语言。故B为正确答案。
单选题 Most educators objected to Stokoe's idea because they thought ______.
  • A. sign language was not extensively used even by deaf people.
  • B. sign language was too artificial to be widely accepted.
  • C. a language should be easy to use and understand.
  • D. a language could only exist in the form of speech sounds.
【正确答案】 D
【答案解析】[解析] 细节题。题干意为“大多数学者反对stokoe的观点是因为他们认为”。A项意为“手语并没有被聋哑人广泛使用”；B项意为“手语为人造语言，不能被广 泛接受”；C项意为“语言应该很容易地被使用和理解”；D项意为“语言只能以语音的形式存在”。根据题干Most educators objected to Stokoe's idea定位至最后一段第三、四句，其中提到，反对Stokoe的学者认为语音是基于语音，而非手的运动。由此推知，D选项与其意思一致。故D为正确答案。
单选题 Stokoe's argument is based on his belief that ______.
  • A. sign language is as efficient as any other language
  • B. sign language is derived from natural language
  • C. language is a system of meaningful codes
  • D. language is a product of the brain
【正确答案】 D
【答案解析】[解析] 推理题。题干意为“Stokoe的论点是建立在他相信”。A项意为“手语与其他语言一样地有效”；B项意为“手语源自自然语言”；C项意为“语言是由有意义的符号组成的系统”；D项意为“语言是大脑的产物”。文中最后一句中提到，Stokoe解释 说，“语言不是嘴巴的产物，而是大脑的产物”。由此推断，Stokoe认为语言是大脑的产物。故D为正确答案。