单选题{{B}}Text 3{{/B}} In Japan many workers for large corporations have a guarantee of lifetime employment. They will not be laid off during recessions or when the tasks they perform are taken over by robots. To some observers, this is capitalism at its best, because workers are treated as people not things. Others see it as necessarily inefficient and believe it cannot continue if Japan is to remain competitive with foreign corporations more concerned about profits and less concerned about people. Defenders of the system argue that those who call it inefficient do not understand how it really works, In the first place not every Japanese worker has the guarantee of a lifetime job. The lifetime employment system includes only "regular employees". Many employees do not fall into this category, including all women. All businesses have many part-time and temporary employees. These workers are hired and laid off during the course of the business cycle just as employees in the United States are. These "irregular workers" make up about 10 percent of the nonagricultural work force. Additionally, Japanese firms maintain some flexibility through the extensive use of subcontractors. This practice is much more common in Japan than in the United States. The use of both subcontractors and temporary workers has increased markedly in Japan since the 1974—1975 recession. All this leads some to argue that the Japanese system is not all that different from the American system. During recessions Japanese corporations lay off temporary workers and give less business to subcontractors. In the United States, corporations lay off those workers with the least seniority. The difference then is probably less than the term "lifetime employment" suggests, but there still is a difference. And this difference cannot be understood without looking at the values of Japanese society. The relationship between employer and employee cannot be explained in purely contractual terms. Firms hold on to the employees and employees stay with one firm. There are also practical reasons for not jumping from job to job. Most retirement benefits come from the employer. Changing jobs means losing these benefits. Also, teamwork is an essential part of Japanese production. Moving to a new firm means adapting to a different team and at least temporarily, lower productivity and lower pay.

单选题Silas Minton's funeral was a quiet {{U}}(37) {{/U}} . It was {{U}}(38) {{/U}} by the only {{U}}(39) {{/U}} he had in the world, his niece and nephew, and by a few friends. The priest who {{U}}(40) {{/U}} {{U}}(41) {{/U}} a hundred miles into this wild part of the county was now getting {{U}}(42) {{/U}} for the simple ceremony. Minton, {{U}}(43) {{/U}} "Minty" as his friends {{U}}(44) {{/U}} call him, {{U}}(45) {{/U}} a hard life {{U}}(46) {{/U}} for gold in a lonely part of Western Australia. He had always refused to work in a gold mine {{U}}(47) {{/U}} he believed that he could do better {{U}}(48) {{/U}} his own. Although he was not a boastful(夸口的)person, he had often declared that one day he {{U}}(49) {{/U}} find a lump (块) of gold as big as his head and {{U}}(50) {{/U}} he would retire and live in {{U}}(51) {{/U}} for the rest of his life. But his dreams of great wealth {{U}}(52) {{/U}} came true. For many years he had hardly earned enough money to keep himself {{U}}(53) {{/U}} . Two men now gently lifted the rough wooden box that {{U}}(54) {{/U}} Minty's body, but they almost dropped it when they heard a loud cry from the grave-digger. His spade (铁锹)had struck something hard in the rocky soil and he was shouting excitedly. Then he held up a large stone. {{U}}(55) {{/U}} it was covered {{U}}(56) {{/U}} dirt, the stone shone curiously in the fierce sunlight: it was unmistakably a heavy piece of solid gold!

单选题 The following five talks are different opinions about working at home instead of working in of rices in the centre of towns. {{B}}Michael{{/B}} People spend a lot of their working day actually getting to and from their place of work, never mind the expense of that. I mean, the rush hours, as everyone knows, are the worst times of day to travel, and millions of people spend their working lives either getting up early to avoid the rush hours or travelling in the middle of them with all the pressures and stress it can cause. {{B}}Jane{{/B}} Now we think the future looks very bad for these people. I mean it sounds extraordinary but you think about it in those technological terms you see. In future a British firm in, for example, London, might employ clerks in Belfast, or a Paris company could have their secretaries in Spain, and then they just dial around for the cheapest labour. {{B}}Lily{{/B}} Such arrangements suit a lot of people, particularly women. If they have young children they don' t want to travel a long way from home. And... uhm... perhaps they want the advantages of flexible-time, where they have a number of hours to do but they can choose when to do them. {{B}}Cathy{{/B}} Now, what is clear is that the new technologies are radically changing the working lives of people. Well, it' s those people who traditionally have had very little say in their conditions of employment. Now it would be very easy for an employer to exploit these people further by keeping them beyond any possible contacts with trade unions. {{B}}Nancy{{/B}} This appears to affect those people in the secretarial and data-processing field. You see there are three million women in Britain whose jobs involve processing information, and many employers would like to have them out of the way at home, with none of the protection they would get if they were in an office.{{I}} Now match each of the persons with the appropriate statement. Note: there are two extra statements. {{/I}} {{B}}Statements{{/B}} [A] Flexible-time offers no job security. [B] Flexible-time gives people much more freedom to organize their lives. [C] Flexible-time reduces expenditure on office renting. [D] Working at home reduces stress and pollution. [E] Flexible-time is risky to certain women workers.[F] Flexible-time may cause decrease in workers' salaries.[G] Working in offices is time-consuming.

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单选题{{I}}Questions 18 to 21 are based on the following dialogue.{{/I}}

单选题We all know that a magician does not really depend on "magic" to perform his tricks, but on his ability to act at great speed. (26) , this does not prevent us from (27) watching a magician produce rabbits from a hat. One of the greatest magician of all time was Harry Houdini, who mastered the art of (28) He could (29) himself from the tight test knots in seconds. (30) no one really knows how he did this, there is no doubt (31) he had made a close (32) of every type of lock ever invented. He liked to carry a small steel needle like toolstrapped to his leg and he used this in (33) of a key. Houdini once asked the Chicago police to (34) him in prison. They (35) him in chains and locked him up, but he freed himself (36) an instant. The police (37) him of having used a tool and locked him up again. This time he wore no clothes and there were chains (27) his neck, waist, wrists, and legs; but he again escaped in a few minutes. Houdini had probably hidden his "needle" in a wax like (39) and dropped it on the floor in the (15) ． (16) he went past, he stepped on it so that it stuck (40) the bottom of his foot. Once he was heavily chained up and enclosed in an empty wooden chest, the lid of (41) was nailed down. The chest was dropped (42) the sea in New York harbor. Just in one minute Houdini had swum (43) the surface.

单选题Captain James' words mean that ______.

单选题 Art is considered by many people to be little more than a decorative means of giving pleasure. This is not always the case, however; at times, art may be seen to have a purely functional side as well. Such could be said of the sandpaintings of the Navaho Indians of the American Southwest; these have a medicinal as well as an artistic purpose. According to Navaho traditions, one who suffers from either a mental or a physical illness has in some way disturbed or come in contact with the supernatural—perhaps a certain animal, a ghost, or the dead. To counteract this evil contact, the iii person or one of his relatives will employ a medical man called a "singer" to perform a healing ceremony which will attract a powerful supernatural being. During the ceremony, which may last from 2 to 9 days, the "singer" will produce a sandpainting on the floor of the Navaho Hogan. On the last day of the ceremony, the patient will sit on this sandpainting and the "singer" will rub the sick or injured parts of the patient's body with sand from a specific figure in the sandpainting. In this way the patient absorbs the power of that particular supernatural being and becomes strong like it. After the ceremony, the sandpainting is destroyed and disposed of so its power will not harm anyone. The art of sandpainting is handed down from old "singers" to their students. The materials used are easily found in the areas the Navaho inhabit: brown, red, yellow, and white sandstone, which is ground by being crushed between 2 stones much as corn is milled into flour. The "singer" holds a small amount of this sand in his hand and lets it flow between his thumb and forefingers onto a clean, flat surface on the floor. With a steady hand and great patience, he is thus able to create designs of stylized people, snakes and other creatures that have power in the Navaho belief system. The traditional Navaho does not allow copying of sandpaintings, since he believes the supernatural powers that taught him the craft have forbidden this; however, such reproductions can in fact be purchased today in tourist shops in Arizona and New Mexico. These are done by either Navaho Indians or by other people who wish to preserve this craft.

单选题Questions 11～13 are based on the following dialogue at a party.