单选题 In 1993, I published a book, The Rage of a Privileged Class, whose central thesis was that even the most gifted African-Americans assumed that they would never crash through America's glass ceiling—no matter how talented, well educated, or hardworking they were. Few people of any race would claim that true equality has arrived; but so much has changed since Rage came out. Color is becoming less and less a burden; race is less and less an immovable barrier.
My new research explores how that phenomenon is changing the way people of all races view the American landscape. I polled two groups of especially accomplished people of color. One is the African-American alumni of Harvard Business School. The other is the alumni of A Better Chance, a program, founded in 1963, that sends ambitious, talented youngsters to some of the nation's best secondary schools.
Generations, I concluded from my study, mattered deeply—with their defining characteristics rooted in America's evolving racial dynamics. Generation 1, in this categorization, is the civil-rights generation—those (born before 1945) who participated in, or simply bore witness to, the defining 20th-century battle for racial equality. It is the generation of whites who, in large measure, saw blacks as alien beings and the generation of blacks who, for the most part, saw whites as irremediably prejudiced. Gen 2s (born between 1945 and 1969) were much less racially constrained—though they remained, in large measure, stuck in a tangle of racial stereotypes. Gen 3s (born between 1970 and 1995) saw race as less of a big deal. And that ability to see a person beyond color has cleared the way for a generation of Believers—blacks who fully accept that America means what it says when it promises to give them a shot.
That new reality made itself clear when I compared black Gen 1 Harvard M. B. A. s with their Gen 3 counterparts. Seventy-five percent of Gen 1s said blacks faced "a lot" of discrimination, compared with 49 percent of Gen 3s. Twenty-five percent of Gen 1s thought their educational attainments put them "on an equal professional footing with white peers or competitors with comparable educational credentials," compared with 62 percent of Gen 3s. Ninety-three percent of Gen 1s saw a glass ceiling at their current workplaces, compared with 46 percent of Gen 3s.
I am not about to make a statistical argument based on these numbers, but the message nonetheless seems clear. In the time since the Gen 1s came on the scene, a revolution has occurred. Those uptight suburbanites who couldn't imagine socializing with, working for, or marrying a "Negro," who thought blacks existed in an altogether different dimension, who could no more see dining with a black person than dining with a giraffe, have slowly given way to a new generation that embraces—at least consciously—the concept of equality. Americans have, in some substantial way, re-created each other—to an extent that our predecessors might find astounding.

单选题 The expression "glass ceiling" probably refers to

【正确答案】 A

【答案解析】第一段第一句中使用了glass ceiling，说美国黑人无论怎样努力，怎样有天赋，受过何种良好的教育，都不能打碎这个glass ceiling，这里ceiling指an upper limit，typically one set on prices，wages，or expenditure(价格、工资和支出的上限)。第一段接着说，现在情况不同了，肤色越来越不是负担，种族不再是一个不可逾越的障碍。由此反推，作者在第一句中实际上是说肤色和种族曾经是障碍。另外，第四段中也使用了这个短语，在这里作者也把glass ceiling与workplace联系在一起。

单选题 The new research indicates

【正确答案】 C

【答案解析】作者在第三段之后提到了研究结果。总体来说，人们属于哪一代非常重要。出生于1970年至1995年的第三代不把种族看做是什么了不起的因素(saw race as less of a big deal)，这些人能超越肤色来看待人，他们真正体现了美国所代表的价值观：当美国说给他们平等机会时(shot在此意为“机会”)，它能说话算数。也就是说，美国人真正能享受种族问的平等。这一发现照应了第一段最后一句中所说的结论：Color is becoming less and less a burden；race is less and less an immovable barrier.