单选题 With the usual flood of immigrants from non-English-speaking countries, there comes a multi-cultural work force. Along with this diversity comes resentment felt by natives in the marketplace. Feelings of antagonism surface when accents are strong and foreign languages are used that some workers cannot understand. There is now a clash of forces in the workplace; the battle is centered on English-only policies. A growing number of workers are alleging discrimination on the basis of language.
The federal law prohibiting job discrimination comes under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (Title Ⅶ), which prohibits employment discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex or national origin. National-origin discrimination makes it illegal to discriminate against an individual because of birthplace, ancestry, and culture or linguistic characteristics common to a specific ethnic group. A rule requiring that employees speak only English on the job may violate Title VII unless an employer shows that the requirement is necessary for conducting the business. If the employer believes such a rule is necessary, employees must be informed of when English is required and the consequences for violating the rule.
Donna Fernandez, language rights attorney at the Employment Law Center of San Francisco, finds that language discrimination is very prevalent in the workplace. Fernandez states that the biases may include "English-only policies when the employee"s primary language is other than English" or "some people may be treated differently because they speak with an accent."
It is illegal for an employer to discriminate against an employee because of language. However, the increase in language discrimination suits indicates that employers are treating employees speaking with an accent or in a foreign language differently. "Many companies don"t know they are breaking the law with the English-only policies," says Fernandez. The law in this area is still developing and many courts consider these policies to be a form of discrimination on the basis of race or national origin. (National origin refers to the country that a person, or that person"s ancestors, came from.) Employees can challenge a speak-English-only policy if: the rule is applied to employees who speak no English; they have difficulty speaking English; or the policy creates, or is part of, a work environment that is hostile toward national origin minority employees. An employer must show some "business necessity" for the policy. Even if there is a business need, the policy is still illegal if there are less discriminatory alternative to the policy.
Sibylle Gruber, assistant professor of English at Northern Arizona University, Flagstaff, Ariz., finds that employees may feel they are viewed as less intelligent if they cannot speak English perfectly. "Workers may miss out on promotions to positions of authority if they can"t express themselves or communicate clearly," says Gruber. Often, there are subtle prejudices against some accents more than others. Speaking with a French or British accent is less frowned upon than a Spanish or Vietnamese accent. By not promoting employees because of an accent or language bias, a ghetto effect is created in the work force, keeping certain accents and immigrants in low-level positions.

【正确答案】 B

【答案解析】[解析] 推理判断题。作者在第二段中讲述民权法案中有关于禁止工作上的歧视等相关内容，指出了要求雇员在工作时只能说英语违反了相关规定。据此可知作者可能会同意B选项。文章第三段指出，Donna Fernandez是旧金山就业法律中心的语言权利律师，他发现工作场所普遍存在语言方面的歧视，据此可知A选项错误。文章第四段指出，Fernandez说，“许多公司不知道他们把英语作为工作场所唯一语言的政策违反了法律”，据此可知C选项错误。D选项文中并未提及，故排除。