复合题Directions: In this part there are several passagesfollowed by questions or unfinished statements, each withfour suggested answers marked A, B, C, and D. Choose theone that you think is the best answer. Write your answerson the Answer Sheet.Passage Three(1) At the end of the nineteenth century, a risinginterest in Native American customs and an increasingdesire to understand Native American culture promptedethnologists to begin recording the life stories of NativeAmerican. Ethnologists had a distinct reason for wantingto hear the stories: they were after linguistic oranthropological data that would supplement their own fieldobservations, and they believed that the personal stories,even of a single individual, could increase theirunderstanding of the cultures that they had been observingfrom without. In addition many ethnologists at the turn ofthe century believed that Native-American manners andcustoms were rapidly disappearing, and that it wasimportant to preserve for posterity as much information ascould be adequately recorded before the culturesdisappeared forever.(2) There were, however, arguments against this method asa way of acquiring accurate and complete information,Franz Boas, for example, described autobiographies asbeing “of limited value, and useful chiefly for the studyof the perversion of truth by memory, ” while Paul Radincontended that investigators rarely spent enough time withthe tribes they were observing, and inevitably derivedresults too tinged by the investigator’ s own emotionaltone to be reliable.(3) Even more importantly, as these life stories movedfrom the traditional oral mode to recorded written form,much was inevitably lost. Editors often decided whatelements were significant to the field research on a giventribe. Native Americans recognized that the essence oftheir lives could not be communicated in English and thatevents that they thought significant were often deemedunimportant by their interviewers. Indeed, the very act oftelling their stories could force Native Americannarrators to distort their cultures, as taboos had to bebroken to speak the names of dead relatives crucial totheir family stories.(4) Despite all of this, autobiography remains a usefultool for ethnological research: such personalreminiscences and impressions, incomplete as they may be,are likely to throw more light on the working of the mindand emotions than any amount of speculation form anethnologist or ethnological theorist from another culture.

复合题Passage BAll Eskimos live most of their lives close to salt or fresh water. They may follow game inland for several hundred miles, but they always return to the shores of rivers, lakes, or seas.Eskimo land has a bare look. Large rocks, pebbles, and sand cover much of the surface. Plants called lichen grow right on rock. And where there is enough soil, even grass, flowers, and small bushes manage to live. No trees can grow on Eskimo land, so geographers sometimes call this country the Arctic plains. Some animals, such as rabbits and caribou, eat the plants. Others, like the white fox and grey wolf, eat the rabbits and caribou. The Eskimo is a meat-eater, too, and may even eat a wolf when food is scarce.The Eskimo year has two main parts: a long, cold winter and a short, cool summer. Spring and fall are almost too short to be noticed. Summer is the good time, when food is usually plentiful. But it is also the time when the Eskimos are very busy. Winter is never far away, and the men must bring home extra meat for the women to prepare and store. For seldom can enough animals be killed in winter to feed a family.The Far North is sometimes called the land of the midnight sun. This is true in the middle of summer, for between April 21st and August 21st the sun never sets in Northern Greenland. But in midwinter the Far North is a land with no sun shining at all. Around Oct. 21st the Eskimos of Northern Greenland see the sun setting straight south of them, and they don’ t see it again until February 22nd. All places on earth get about the same amount of daylight during a year. As a result, if summer is lighter, winter has to be darker.Winter nights in the Far North are seldom pitch-black. As in the rest of the world, the stars and moon provide a little light. The northern lights also help the Eskimos to see. And with the ground covered with snow, even a little light is reflected back to the Eskimo’ s eyes.Winter nights are seldom pitch-black in the Far North because of _____.

复合题In the past thirty years, Americans’ consumption of restaurant and take-out food has doubled. The result, according to many health watchdog groups, is an increase in overweight and obesity. Almost 60 million Americans are obese, costing $117 billion each year in health care and related costs. Members of Congress have decided they need to do something about the obesity epidemic. A bill was recently introduced in the House that would require restaurants with twenty or more locations to list the nutritional content of their food on their menus. A Senate version of the bill is expected in the near future.Our legislators point to the trend of restaurants’ marketing larger meals at attractive prices. People order these meals believing that they are getting a great value, but what they are also getting could be, in one meal, more than the daily recommended allowances of calories, fat, and sodium. The question is, would people stop “supersizing,” or make other healthier choices if they knew the nutritional content of the food they’re ordering? Lawmakers think they would, and the gravity of the obesity problem has caused them to act to change menus.The Menu Education and Labeling, or MEAL, Act, would result in menus that look like the nutrition facts panels found on food in supermarkets. Those panels are required by the 1990 Nutrition Labeling and Education Act, which exempted restaurants. The new restaurant menus would list calories, fat, and sodium on printed menus, and calories on menu boards, for all items that are offered on a regular basis (daily specials don’t apply). But isn’t this simply asking restaurants to state the obvious? Who isn’t aware that an order of supersize fries isn’t health food? Does anyone order a double cheeseburger thinking they’re being virtuous?Studies have shown that it’s not that simple. In one, registered dieticians couldn’t come up with accurate estimates of the calories found in certain fast foods. Who would have guessed that a milk shake, which sounds pretty healthy (it does contain milk, after all) has more calories than three McDonald’s cheeseburgers? Or that one chain’s chicken breast sandwich, another better-sounding alternative to a burger, contains more than half a day’s calories and twice the recommended daily amount of sodium? Even a fast-food coffee drink, without a doughnut to go with it, has almost half the calories needed in a day.The restaurant industry isn’t happy about the new bill. Arguments against it include the fact that diet alone is not the reason for America’s obesity epidemic. A lack of adequate exercise is also to blame. In addition, many fast food chains already post nutritional information on their websites, or on posters located in their restaurants.Those who favor the MEAL Act, and similar legislation, say in response that we must do all we can to help people maintain a healthy weight. While the importance of exercise is undeniable, the quantity and quality of what we eat must be changed. They believe that if we want consumers to make better choices when they eat out, nutritional information must be provided where they are selecting their food. Restaurant patrons are not likely to have memorized the calorie counts they may have looked up on the Internet, nor are they going to leave their tables, or a line, to check out a poster that might be on the opposite side of the restaurant.

复合题Directions: In this section, there are 2 passages eachwith 5 questions or incomplete statements. Read thepassage carefully. Then answer the questions or completethe statements in no more than 10 words. Write youranswers on your Answer Sheet.Passage 1The proliferation of information accessible from computersand mobile phones open new worlds and opportunity to youngand old alike. But the vast information and theexpectation that we can now tackle tough questions andfind solutions with just a few clicks or taps also atroubling trend for business.The Pew Internet and American Life Project issued a reportanalyzing how teens approach research and academic work ina digital world. The surveys’ respondents agreed almostunanimously that the internet provides students’limitless access to information, 77% of teachers Pewinterviewed believed that digital technologies had a“mostly positive” impact on how their students conductedresearch.Yet almost the same ratio of teachers agreed with thesuggestion that internet search engines condition studentsto assume that information is always quickly and easilyavailable. Google and Wikipedia have become theauthoritative resources of choice; only 16% of teachers inthe Pew survey believed their student would seek theassistance of a librarian. Overall the survey’ s 50questions reveal a trend that is hardly surprising:students today are far more media and technologically-savvy than ever before, but in some ways are less literateand more distracted than those of prior generations.Meanwhile, Common Sense Media of San Francisco released asimilar study on how the digital age has affectedstudents’ ability to learn. According to 71% of theteachers surveyed, the wide availability of media—including TV shows, video games, texting and social media—has had a significantly negative impact on students’attention spans.By a wide margin, teachers also agree that students’consumption of today’ s digital media has harmed theirability to communicate face-to-face and caused theirwriting skills to suffer. Almost half of the teachers alsobelieve the quality of their students’ homework hasdeclined due to their reliance on new media.Both studies raise a prickly question: is anyoneresponsible for changing how students learn and solveproblem? Or is it up to students to adjust and modify howthey learn in order to meet the needs of today’ sbusiness?Business certainly should take an active role in theircountries’ education systems to ensure that their futureemployees can compete in a more digital, round-the-clockand globalised world. And just as how these newtechnologies have blurred the lines between home and workdue to the ability to check email and update Twitter feedsat a moment’ s notice, students are already living withinthe fuzzy boundaries between the classroom, their home andsocial lives.Are students really “struggling?” The more accurate termwould be “coping” . The world in which many children andteens live today is an exponentially larger and morecomplicated one than just 20 years ago.Therefore, insisting that students adjust their habits tofit the norms of classrooms better suited for a 19thcentury style of learning is akin to shoving toothpasteback in the tube. The technologies that surround us willonly become quicker, more invasive and demand that workersbecome even more productive.To that end, Cathy Davidson, a professor of humanities atDuke University, North Carolina, and co-funder of thecharity HASTAC, rightly places the onus on teachers. It isthe job of teachers to assist students to “learn how tobe successful adults in their future” , she wrote in arecent article on HASTAC’ s blog. “It is not our job topreserve for them some nostalgic vision of the future thatis clearly past. ”Just as the office has long since eliminated carbon paper,typewrites and clunky desktop computers, schools have tomove forward and find a way to educate children intoday’ s environment—minus the calculator, protractor andother leaning tools of days long gone.Nevertheless, business must have a role in an era whereschools are beset by budget cuts and deterioratinginfrastructure. Teachers and administrators, therefore,must welcome them in the classroom and together find waysto groom a labor force that will face new challenges inthe coming decades. Education theory will never go away,yet therefore must evolve; business can be an activepartner by articulating its needs and providing theresources so that teachers can succeed. Our kids, andeconomy, both depend on such cooperation.

复合题Directions: Read the following passages and then answer the questions which follow each passage. Use only information from the passage you have just read and write your answer in the corresponding space on your answer sheet.We might marvel at the progress made in every field of study, but the methods of testing a person’ s knowledge and ability remain as primitive as ever they were. It really is extraordinary that after all these years educationists have still failed to device anything more efficient and reliable than examinations. For all the pious claim that examinations test what you know, it is common knowledge that they more often do the exact opposite. They may be a good means of testing memory, or the knack of working rapidly under extreme pressure, but they can tell you nothing about a person’ s true ability and aptitude.As anxiety-makers, examinations are second to none. That is because so much depends on them. They are the mark of success of failure in our society. Your whole future may be decided in one fateful day. It doesn’ t matter that you weren’ t feeling very well, or that your mother died. Little things like that don’ t count: the exam goes on. No one can give of his best when he is in mortal terror, or after a sleepless night, yet this is precisely what the examination system expects him to do. The moment a child begins school, he enters a world of vicious competition where success and failure are clearly defined and measured. Can we wonder at the increasing number of “drop outs” : young people who are written off as utter failures before they have even embarked on a career？ Can we be surprised at the suicide rate among students？A good education should, among other things, train you to think for yourself. The examination system does anything but that. What has to be learnt is rigidly laid down by a syllabus, so the student is encouraged to memorize. Examinations do not motivate a student to read widely, but to restrict his reading; they do not enable him to seek more and more knowledge, but induce cramming. They lower the standards of teaching, for they deprive the teacher of all freedoms. Teachers themselves are often judged by examination results and instead of teaching their subjects, they are reduced to training their students in exam techniques which they despise. The most successful candidates are not always the best educated; they are the best trained in the technique of working under duress.The results on which so much depends are often nothing more than a subjective assessment by some anonymous examiner. Examiners are only human. They get tired and hungry; they make mistakes. Yet they have to mark stacks of hastily scrawled scripts in a limited amount of time. They work under the same sort of pressure as the candidates. And their word carries weight. After a judge’ s decision you have the right of appeal, but not after an examiner’ s. There must surely be many simpler and more effective ways of assessing a person’ s true abilities. Is it cynical to suggest that examinations are merely a profitable business for the institutions that run them? This is what it boils down to in the last analysis. The best comment on the system is this illiterate message recently scrawled on a wall: “I were a teenage drop-out and now I are a teenage millionaire. ”

复合题Passage 1My suicide attempt when I was a senior in high school must have puzzled those around me. From the outside, it seemed that I had a lot going for me. I lived in a comfortable middle class home with swimming pool. I was active in sports, a member of the National Honor Society, an editor of the school newspaper. But I was also miserable.I was convinced that no one understood me, especially my parents. I didn’t see much of my father, who was busy with his work. My mother had died when I was very young, and my stepmother and I didn’t get along. Our personalities clashed, and I felt she didn’t like me. I remember her once telling me, “I didn’t have to take you, you know.”Socially awkward, I tried to make amends through sports. I remember eagerly waiting for my father to come home from work so I could tell him that I had made the field-hockey team. He just said, “I bet everybody made it.” I interpreted his remark as another message that I was worthless.When I was 15, my parents began to talk about divorce, and I was sure I was the cause. I knew that my father felt caught between my mother and me. He’d yell at me to “shape up,” then I’d hear him in the next room, asking Mother, “Can’t you give the kid a break?” though I thought of running away from home, I was stopped by the horror stories I’d heard of runaway girls, falling prey to drugs and prostitution. But I did wonder if the world would be better off without me.Communication had always been a problem at home. And I was afraid to open up to friends. I felt that if people knew my problems and fears, they’d think less of me. So I nursed my hurts and anxieties into a towering self-hatred.In my junior year, I wrote a paper on Sylvia Plath’s The Bell Jar, an autobiographical novel about despair, which foreshadowed the author’s eventual suicide. Suddenly, suicide seemed a realistic option. My English teacher commented on my report: “You really understand that book!” I thought, you bet I do! I became a closet expert on suicide, looking into serious literature on the topic. Although I wasn’t a drinker and never used drugs, I concluded that a mixture of alcohol and tranquilizers, both available at home, would be my ticket out.Once the school social worker asked me to list all my good qualities, and I came up with only two: blue eyes and good grades. I felt there wasn’t anything good about me.By my senior year I was convinced that I was an outcast, unlovable. Thoughts of suicide were ever-present. Though I had done very well on my college-board exams, I saw no reason to go on tocollege. Sooner or later, I was going to kill myself, so why bother? I applied to college “just in case,”though the idea of going terrified me. I was sure college would be worse than high school. But Icouldn’t take the constant fighting at home. I didn’t see any way out.In February 1981, I chose my date with death. Once I’d picked the time, I felt relieved. I’m sure Iseemed more cheerful to those around me as I began to plan. At about 2 a.m., on my “death date,” Isneaked out of the house and wandered back streets, downing my tranquilizers and rum. I had troubleswallowing all the pills—a handful at a time, then a swig of rum. The last thing I recall is heading forthe reservoir, where I knew wouldn’t be found for a while. I didn’t make it. I passed out on thesidewalk. A man walking his dog found me and called an ambulance.I woke up in the intensive-care unit with tubes up my nose and needles in my arms. I was sent homewith orders to visit a psychologist twice a week. But I resisted her attempts to help me. I was angry Iwas alive.I hoped that my parents would want to discuss the suicide attempt, and finally one night at dinner thesubject came up. “Why did you do such a stupid thing?” my mother asked. My father replied quickly,“I’m sure she had her reasons.” End of discussion. Except for the ever-patient psychologist and socialworker, even in school the subject was not mentioned. I think that upset me as much as failing with thesuicide did. It seemed as if nobody had enough interest in me to want to know why I’d done it.Suicide was still on my mind when I attended an orientation session at a prestigious college where Ihad been accepted. That weekend gave me a glimmer of hope. People there seemed to like me.College could be a chance for a fresh start.In college I began to make some friends, and decided to hand in “a little longer.” I also began to appreciate how my high-school social worker had reached me in ways I hadn’t realized at the time.In class, I opened up a little more and my confidence improved. I moved into a gift clubhouse. Peopleactually wanted me in their group. By my junior year, I was a field-hockey star.At the club I made friends with a girl I’ll call Beth. We shared a dark secret, for she, too, had attempted suicide. Now and then we’d discuss suicide—always in objective, intellectual terms. Then,one winter night in my senior year, a club sister burst into my room, crying: “Beth’s not breathing!”Beth had asked her to call an ambulance, then collapsed on the floor.Rage swept over me, I saw what her death put her friends through. There was a grief and guilt as weasked ourselves how we could have prevented her suicide.I slowly began to realize that taking my own life was no longer an option. I could see what a total waste suicide was. Beth would have made a solid contribution to society.I decided to do something positive with my life. I graduated in 1985. In March 1986 I answered an adasking volunteers for The Samaritans suicide-prevention hot lines, hoping I could prevent others frommaking the desperate decision I’d made.I can understand how I got to the state I was in that night several years ago. I just wish I’d known thenthat it didn’t—and it doesn’t—have to be that way. That’s what I try to tell them when the hot linerings.Which of the following is not a cause of the author’s suicide?

复合题Passage AWith medicine, the benefit of biotechnology has been obvious. People readily accept it when they see how better drugs and clearer diagnoses improve their lives. Why is it different when biotech is applied to agriculture? The answer is that the clearest gains from the current crop of genetically modified (GM) plants go not to consumers but to producers. Indeed, that was what their developers intended: an appeal to farmers offered the suppliers of GM technology the best hope of a speedy return. For consumers, especially in the rich world, the benefits of super-yielding soybeans are less clear: the world, by and large, already has too much food in its stores; developing countries principally lack money, not food as such. Yet companies still pitch their products as a cure for malnutrition even though little that they are doing can justify such a noble claim. In boasting the technology as the only answer to everything from pest control to world hunger, the industry has fed the popular view that its products are unsafe, unnecessary and bad for the environment.Of the two main charges against GM crops, by far the weaker is that they are unsafe to eat. Critics assert that genetic engineering introduces into food genes that are not present naturally, cannot be introduced through conventional breeding and may have unknown health effects that should be investigated before the food is sold to the public. GM crops such as the maize and soybeans that now blanket America certainly differ from their garden variety neighbors. But there is a broad scientific consensus that the present generation of GM foods is safe. Even so, this does little to reassure consumers. Food frights such as “mad cow” disease and revelations of cancer-causing dioxin in Belgian food have sorely undermined their confidence in scientific pronouncements and regulatory authorities alike. GM foods have little future in Europe until this faith can be restored.The second big worry about GM food is that it may harm the environment. The producers argue that the engineered traits—such as resistance to certain brands of herbicide or types of insects and virus—actually do ecological good by reducing chemical use and improving yields so that less land needs to go under the plough. Opponents retort that any such benefits are far outweighed by the damage such crops might do. They worry that pesticide-resistant genes may spread from plants that should be saved to weeds that have to be killed. They fear a loss of biodiversity. They worry that the in-built resistance to bugs that some GM crops will have may poison insects such as Monarch butterfly, and allow other, nastier bugs to develop a natural resistance and thrive.Many of the fears are based on results from limited experiments, often in the laboratory. The only way to discover whether they will arise in real life, or whether they will be any more damaging than similar risks posed by conventional crops and farming practice, is to do more research in the field. Banning the experimental growth of GM plants as some protesters want simply deprives scientists of their most fruitful laboratory.GM crops are crops that _____.

复合题Passage BAll Eskimos live most of their lives close to salt or fresh water. They may follow game inland for several hundred miles, but they always return to the shores of rivers, lakes, or seas.Eskimo land has a bare look. Large rocks, pebbles, and sand cover much of the surface. Plants called lichen grow right on rock. And where there is enough soil, even grass, flowers, and small bushes manage to live. No trees can grow on Eskimo land, so geographers sometimes call this country the Arctic plains. Some animals, such as rabbits and caribou, eat the plants. Others, like the white fox and grey wolf, eat the rabbits and caribou. The Eskimo is a meat-eater, too, and may even eat a wolf when food is scarce.The Eskimo year has two main parts: a long, cold winter and a short, cool summer. Spring and fall are almost too short to be noticed. Summer is the good time, when food is usually plentiful. But it is also the time when the Eskimos are very busy. Winter is never far away, and the men must bring home extra meat for the women to prepare and store. For seldom can enough animals be killed in winter to feed a family.The Far North is sometimes called the land of the midnight sun. This is true in the middle of summer, for between April 21st and August 21st the sun never sets in Northern Greenland. But in midwinter the Far North is a land with no sun shining at all. Around Oct. 21st the Eskimos of Northern Greenland see the sun setting straight south of them, and they don’ t see it again until February 22nd. All places on earth get about the same amount of daylight during a year. As a result, if summer is lighter, winter has to be darker.Winter nights in the Far North are seldom pitch-black. As in the rest of the world, the stars and moon provide a little light. The northern lights also help the Eskimos to see. And with the ground covered with snow, even a little light is reflected back to the Eskimo’ s eyes.In midwinter there is no sun shining in the Far North because _____.

复合题One positive consequence of our current national crisis may be at least a temporary shadow in Hollywood’s culture of violence. Fearful of offending audiences in the wake of the terrorist attack, some moviemakers have postponed the release of film with terrorist themes. Television writers are delaying scripts with warlike and terrorist scenarios. It is probably good thinking. My local video store tells me nobody is checking out “disaster” movies. Says the manager, “Currently, people want comedy. They want an escape from stories about violence and terrorism.” Similarly, in the music business, there’s a run on patriotic and inspirational tapes and CDs.According to The New York Times, the self-scrutiny among these czars of mass-entertainment taste is unprecedented in scale, sweeping aside hundreds of millions of dollars in projects that no longer seem appropriate. A reasonable concern is that this might be a short term phenomenon. Once life returns to something more normal, will Hollywood return to its bad old ways? The Times offers a glimmer of hope. The industry’s titan, it suggests, are struggling with much more difficulties, long range questions of what the public will want once the initial shock from the terrorist attacks wears off. Many in the industry admit they do not know where the boundaries of taste and consumer tolerance now lie.This is an opportunity for some of us to suggest to Hollywood where that boundary of consumer tolerance is, especially those of us who have not yet convinced Hollywood to cease its descent into ever lower of the dumbness of our young.The nonprofit Parents Television Council, which monitors the quality of TV programming, says in its latest report that today’s TV shows are more laced than ever with vulgarities, sexual immorality, crudities, violence, and foul language. The traditional family hour between 8 p.m. and 9 p.m., when the networks used to offer programs for the entire family, has disappeared. The problem looks like it will get worse.That certainly looked to be the case before the Sept. 11th assault. One pre attack New York Times story reported that TV producers were crusading for scripts that include every crude word imaginable. The struggles between net-work censors and producers, according to the report, were “growing more intense”. Producers like Aaron Sorkin of “The West Wing” planned to keep pushing hard. He was quoted as saying, “There’s absolutely no reason why we can’t use the language of adulthood in programs that are about adults”.My guess is that a lot of adults don’t use the language Mr. Sorkin wants to use, and don’t enjoy having their children hear it. At this moment of crisis in our nation’s history, thought has become more thoughtful, prayerful, and spiritual. It may be the time to tell the entertainment industry that we want not a temporary pause in the flow of tastelessness, but a long term clean-up.

复合题Passage BOne of the qualities that most people admire in others is the willingness to admit one’ s mistakes. It is extremely hard sometimes to say a simple thing like “I was wrong about that, ” and it is even harder to say “I was wrong, and you were right about that. ”I had an experience recently with someone admitting to me that he had made a mistake fifteen years ago. He told me he had been the manager of a certain grocery store in the neighborhood where I grew up, and he asked me if I remembered the egg cartons. Then he related an incident and I began to remember vaguely the incident he was describing.I was about eight years old at the time, and I had gone into the store with my mother to do the weekly grocery shopping. On that particular day, I must have found my way to the dairy food department where the incident took place.There must have been a special sale on eggs that day because there was an impressive display of eggs in dozen and half-dozen cartons. The cartons were stacked three or four feet high. I must have stopped in front of a display to admire the stacks. Just then a woman came by pushing her grocery cart and knocked off the stacks of cartons. For some reasons, I decided it was up to me to put the display back together, so I went to work.The manager heard the noise and came rushing over to see what had happened. When he appeared, I was on my knees inspecting some of the cartons to see if any of the eggs were broken, but to him it looked as though I was the culprit. He severely reprimanded me and wanted me to pay for any broken eggs. I protested my innocence and tried to explain, but it did no good. Even though I quickly forgot all about the incident, apparently the manager did not.Which of the following statements is NOT true?

复合题Passage AAccording to the Oxford English Dictionary, portraitureis, “a representation or delineation of a person,especially of the face, made by life, by drawing,painting, photography, engraving. . . a likeness. ” However,this simplistic definition disregards the complexities ofportraiture. Portraits are works of art that engage withideas of identity as they are perceived, represented, andunderstood in different times and places, rather thansimply aim to represent a likeness. These concepts ofidentity can encompass social hierarchy, gender, age,profession, and the character of the subject, among otherthings. Rather than being fixed, these features areexpressive of the expectations and circumstances of thetime when the portrait was made. It is impossible toreproduce the aspects of identity; it is only possible toevoke or suggest them. Consequently, even though portraitsrepresent individuals, it is generally conventional ortypical—rather than unique—qualities of subject that arestressed by the artist. Portrait art has also undergonesignificant shifts in artistic convention and practice.Despite the fact that the majority of portraits portraythe subject matter in some amount of verisimilitude, (anappearance of being true or real) , they are still theoutcome of prevailing artistic fashions and favoredstyles, techniques, and media.Therefore, portrait art is a vast art category whichprovides a wide range of engagements with social,psychological, and artistic practices and expectations.Since portraits are distinct from other genres or artcategories in the ways they are produced, the nature ofwhat they represent, and how they function as objects ofuse and display, they are worthy of separate study. First,during their production, portraits require the presence ofa specific person, or an image of the individual to berepresented, in almost all cases. In the majority ofinstances, the production of portraiture has necessitatedsittings, which result in interaction between thesubject(s) and artist throughout the creation of the work.In certain instances, portrait artists depended on acombination of direct involvement with their subjects. Ifthe sitter is of high social standing or is occupied andunavailable to sit in the studio regularly, portraitistscould use photographs or sketches of their subject. InEurope, during the seventeenth and eighteenth century, thesitting time was sometimes decreased by focusing solely onthe head and using professional drapery painters to finishthe painting. For instance, Sir Peter Lily, the Englishartist, had a collection of poses in a pattern book thatenabled him to focus on the head and require fewersittings from his aristocratic patrons. Portrait painterscould be asked to present the likeness of individuals whowere deceased. In this sort of instance, photographs orprints of the subject could be reproduced. Theoretically,portraitists could work from impressions or memories whencreating a painting, but this is a rare occurrenceaccording to documented records. Nonetheless, whether thework is based on model sittings, copying a photograph orsketch, or using memory, the process of painting aportrait is closely linked with the implicit or explicitattendance of the model.Furthermore, portrait painting can be differentiated fromother artistic genres like landscape, still life, andhistory by its connection with appearance, or likeness. Assuch, the art of portrait painting got a reputation forimitation, or copying, instead of for artistic innovationor creativity; consequently it is sometimes viewed asbeing of a lower status than the other genres. Accordingto Renaissance art theory, (which prevailed until thestart of the nineteenth century) fine art was supposed torepresent idealized images, as well as to be original andcreative instead of to copy other works. Portraiture, incomparison, became linked with the level of a mechanicalexercise as opposed to a fine art. Michelangelos wellknown protest that he would not paint portraits becausethere were not enough ideally beautiful models is only oneexample of the dismissive attitude to portraiture thatpersisted among professional artist—even those who,ironically, made their living from portraiture. In thetime of modernism, during the nineteenth and twentiethcenturies, the attitude towards portraiture was critical.Even so, artists from around the globe kept paintingportraits in spite of their theoretical objections.Picasso, for instance, became renowned for cubist still-life painting early in his career, but some of his mosteffective early experiments in this new style were hisportraits of art dealers.Which of the following best illustrates the development of portrait painting as an art form?

复合题Passage BDavid Landes, author of The Wealth and Poverty of Nations:Why Some Are So Rich and Some So Poor, credits the worlds economic and social progress over the last thousand years to “Western civilization and its dissemination. ” The reason, he believes, is that Europeans invented systematic economic growth. First, science developed as an autonomous method of intellectual inquiry that successfully disengaged itself from the social constraints of organized religion and from the political constraints of centralized authority. Though European lacked a political center, its scholars benefited from the use of single vehicle of communication: Latin. This common tongue facilitated an adversarial discourse in which new ideas about the physical world could be tested, demonstrated, and then accepted across the continent and eventually across the world. Second, Landes espouses a generalized form of Max Webers thesis that the values of work, initiative, and in vestment made the difference for Europe. Despite his emphasis on science, Landes does not stress the nation of rationality as such.In his views, “what counts is work, thrift, honesty,patience, [and] tenacity. ” The only route to economic success for individuals or states is working hard, spending less than you earn, and investing the rest in productive capacity. This is his fundamental explanation of the problem posed by his books subtitle: “Why Some Are So Rich and Some So Poor. ” For historical reasons—an emphasis on private property, an experience of political pluralism, a temperate climate, and an urban style—Europeans have, on balance, followed those practices and therefore have prospered. Third, and perhaps most important, Europeans were learners. They “learned rather greedily, ” as Joel Mokyr put it in a review of Landes book. Even if Europeans possessed indigenous technologies that gave them an advantage (spectacles, for example) , as Landes believes they did, their most vital asset was the ability to assimilate knowledge from around the world and put it to use—as in borrowing the concept of zero and rediscovering Aristotles Logic from the Arabs and taking paper and gunpowder from the Chinese via the Muslim world. Lnades argues that a systematic resistance to learning from other cultures had become the greatest handicap of the Chinese by the 18th Century and remains the greatest handicap of Arab countries today.Although his analysis of European expansion is almost nonexistent, Landes doesnt argue that Europeans were beneficent bearers of civilization to benighted world. Rather, he relies on his own commonsense law: “When one group is strong enough to push another around and standsto gain by it, it will do so. ” In contrast to the new school of world historians, Landes believes that specific cultural values enabled technological advances that in turn made some Europeans strong enough to dominate people in other parts of the world. Europeans therefore proceeded to do so with great viciousness and cruelty. By focusing on their victimization in this process, Landes holds, some postcolonial states have wasted energy that could have been put into productive work and investment. If one could sum up Landess advice to these states in one sentence, it might be “Stop whining and get to work. ” This is particularly important, indeed hopeful, advice, he would argue, because success is not permanent. Advantages are not fixed, gains from trade are unequal, and different societies react differently to market signals. Therefore, not only is there hope for undeveloped countries, but developed countries have little cause to be complacent, because the current situation “will press hard” on them.The thrust of studies like Landess is to identify those distinctive features of European civilization that lie behind.Europes rise to power and the creation of modernity more generally. Other historians have placed a greater emphasis on such features as liberty, individualism, and Christianity. In a review essay, the art historian Craig Clunas listed some of the less well-known linkages that have been proposed between Western culture and modernity, including the propensities to think the quantitatively, enjoys pornography, and consumes sugar. All such proposals assume the fundamental aptness of the question: What elements of European civilization led to European success? It is a short leap from this assumption to outright triumphalism. The paradigmatic book of this school is, of course, The End of History and the Last Man, in which Francis Fukuyama argues that after the collapse of the Nazism and communism in the 20th Century, the only remaining model for human organization in the industrial and communications ages is a combination of market economics and limited, pluralist, democratic government.In discussing Landes’ s work, the author’ s tone is_____.

复合题RogerRosenblatt’sbookBlackFiction,inattemptingtoapplyliteraryratherthansociopoliticalcriteriatoitssubject,successfullyalterstheapproachtakenbymostpreviousstudies.AsRosenblattnotes,criticismofBlackwritinghasoftenservedasapretextforillustratingBlackhistory.AddisonGayle’srecentwork,forinstance,judgesthevalueofBlackfictionbyovertlypoliticalstandards,ratingeachworkaccordingtothenotionsofBlackidentitythatitpropounds.Althoughfictionassuredlyspringsfrompoliticalcircumstances,itsauthorsreacttothosecircumstancesinwaysotherthanideological,andtalkingaboutnovelsandstoriesprimarilyasinstrumentsofideologyavoidscleverlymuchofthefictionalenterprise.Rosenblatt’sliteraryanalysisdisclosestiesandconnectionsamongworksofBlackfictionwhichsolelypoliticalstudieshaveoverlookedorignored.WritingacceptablecriticismofBlackfiction,however,assumesbeforehandgivingsatisfactoryanswerstoanumberofquestions.Firstofall,isthereasufficientreason,otherthantheracialidentityoftheauthors?Second,howdoesBlackfictionmakeitselfdistinctfromothermodernfictionwithwhichitislargelycontemporaneous?RosenblattshowsthatBlackfictionconstitutesadistinctbodyofwritingthathasanidentifiable,coherentliterarytradition.Lookingatnovelswrittenbyblacksoverthelasteightyyears,hediscoversrecurringconcernsanddesignsindependentoftheorderoftime.Thesestructuresarethematic,andtheyspring,notsurprisingly,fromthecentralfactthattheBlackcharactersinthesenovelsexistinpredominantlywhiteculture,whethertheytrytoconform.tothatcultureorrebelagainstit.BlackFictiondoesleavesomeaestheticquestionsopen.Rosenblatt’sthematicanalysespermitsconsiderableobjectivity;heevenexplicitlystatesthatitisnothisintentiontojudgethemeritofthevariousworksyethisreluctanceseemstobeputinthewrongplace,especiallysinceanattempttoevaluatemighthaveledtointerestingresults.Forinstance,someofthenovelsappeartobestructurallydiffuse.Isthisadefect,oraretheauthorsworkingoutof,ortryingtoforge,adifferentkindofaesthetic?Inaddition,thestyle.ofsomeblacknovels,likeJeanToomer’sCane,vergesonexpressionism;doesthistechniqueprovideacounterpointtotheprevalentthemethatportraysthelateagainstwhichblackheroesarepitted,athemeusuallyconveyedbymorenaturalisticmodesofexpression?Inspiteofsuchomissions,whatRosenblattdoesincludeinhisdiscussionmakesforancleverandworthwhilestudy.BlackFictionsurveysawidevarietyofnovels,bringingtoourattentionintheprocesssomefascinatingandlittle-knownworkslikeJamesWeldonJohnson’sAutobiographyofanEx-ColoredMan.Itsargumentistightlyconstructed,anditsstraightforward,clearstyleshowsclear-mindedandpenetratingcriticism.

复合题Passage BFew great architects have been so adamant in their beliefin the integration of architecture and design as CharlesRennie Mackintosh. Clients who tried to modify his grip onevery detail of the structure, interior decoration orfurniture often ended up with the architect losing histemper—and his commission. Now, 63 years after he died,Mackintosh has found the perfect patron, in the form of a56-year-old structural engineer and fellow Glaswegiannamed Graham Roxburgh.The story begins with a competition launched in December1900 by Zeitschrift Fur Innendekoration, and innovativedesign magazine published in the German city of Darmstadt.European architects were invited to design an Art LoversHouse. Mackintosh sent in his entry in March 1901, his onechance to design a house unfettered (解开) by financialconstraints or a conservative client. But he wasdisqualified for failing to include the required number ofdrawing of the interior. He hastily completed theportfolio (作品集) , which he then resubmitted. Delightedwith the designs, the judges awarded Mackintosh a specialprize (there was no outright winner) .Publication of these drawings did much to establishMackintoshs reputation abroad as an original anddistinctive architect, particularly in Austria andGermany. The Art Lovers House is an important twentieth-century building because it anticipates the abstract formsof Modernism. At first glance it could be an illustrationfrom the thirties. Artists of the avant-garde ViennaSecession described Mackintosh as “our leader who showedus the way” —an acclaim that he was never able to gain athome. Rich Glasgow businessmen never quite took himseriously.But today Glaswegians hail Mackintosh as their localgenius. Three years ago, the enterprising Mr. Roxburgh,who has already rescued Craigie Hall, a mansion on theoutskirts of Glasgow that Mackintosh helped design,hatched a plan to build the Art Lovers House—now closeto completion on a site in Glasgows Bellahouston Park.Strathclyde Council, the Scottish Development Agency andthe Scottish Tourist Board have picked up a third of thehefty (相当多的) ￡ 3 million bill. Roxburgh has raised therest through sponsorship and private loans.The original designs contradict each other in places.Details of the elaborate external stone carving and muchof the furniture and fittings for the main interiors—which will be open to the public—are exact, butMackintosh gave no indication of what should be done withthe lower ground floor or the roof spaces. No matter, forthe area will be rented out as offices to recoup some ofthe costs. The plans have been meticulously (仔细地)interpreted by Andy McMillan of Glasgows MackintoshSchool of Architecture and the furniture made by an expertcabinet-maker.The elegant, mysterious music-room is lit by tall windowsalong one side; the vertical lines are repeated in theelongated female figures embroidered on linen that hang inthe recesses, in the clusters of coloured lamps suspendedon slender wires and the uncomfortable high-backed chairs.The whole effect culminates (达到顶点) in the strangesuperstructure of the piano.What would Mackintosh have made of the Art Lovers house?The is a danger it will be all too perfect, like thoseexpensive reproduction Mackintosh chairs you find in shinymagazines or on the dust-free floors of design buffs. YetRoxburghs attention to detail and refusal to cut comersmakes him a man after Mackintoshs heart. He is nowhunting for an extra $300, 000 to complete the interiorsaccording to his exacting requirements.Mackintosh’ s original designs for the Art Lover’ s House _____.

语法与词汇I'll be with you in______.

语法与词汇The police were alerted that the escaped criminal might be in the _____

语法与词汇In order to boost morale, businesses try every effort to find ways to _____ both individual and team performance.

语法与词汇Riot police often use tear gas to the _____ mob.

语法与词汇Our dreams will sometimes be _____ and our ethereal hopes blasted.

语法与词汇The _____ of her elbow made it impossible for her to swim.