Part ⅠListening Comprehension (40 min)

In Sections A, B and C you will hear everything ONCE ONLY. Listen carefully and then answer the questions that follow. Mark the correct response to each question on your Coloured Answer Sheet.

SECTION A TALK

Questions 1 to 5 refer to the talk in this section. At the end of the talk you w ill be given 15 seconds to answer each of the following five questions. Now listen to the talk.

1. The technology to make machines quieter ___.

A. has been in use since the 1930’s

B. has accelerated industrial production

C. has just been in commercial use

D. has been invented to remove all noises

2. The modern electronic anti-noise devices ___.

A. are an update version of the traditional methods

B. share similarities with the traditional methods

C. are as inefficient as the traditional methods

D. are based on an entirely new working principle

3. The French company is working on anti-noise techniques to be used in all EXCEPT ___.

A. streets

B. factories

C. aircraft

D. cars

4. According to the talk, workers in “zones of quiet” can ___.

A. be more affected by noise

B. hear talk from outside the zone

C. work more efficiently

D. be heard outside the zone

5. The main theme of the talk is about ___.

A. noise-control technology

B. noise in factories

C. noise-control regulations

D. noise-related effects

SECTION B INTERVIEW

Questions 6 to 10 are based on an interview. At the end of the interview you will be given 15 seconds to answer each of the following five questions. Now listen to the interview.

6. Employees in the US are paid for their time. This means that they are supposed to ___.

A. work hard while their boss is around

B. come to work when there is work to be done

C. work with initiative and willingness

D. work through their lunch break

7. One of the advantages of flexible working hours is that ___.

A. pressure from work can be reduced

B. working women can have more time at home

C. traffic and commuting problems can be solved

D. personal relationships in offices can be improved

8. On the issue of working contracts in the US, which statement is NOT correct?

A. Performance at work matters more than anything else.

B. There are laws protecting employees’ working rights.

C. Good reasons must be provided in order to fire workers.

D. Working contracts in the US are mostly short-term ones.

9. We can be assumed from the interview that an informal atmosphere might be found in ___.

A. small firms

B. major banks

C. big corporations

D. law offices

10. The interview is mainly about ___ in the USA.

A. office hierarchies

B. office conditions

C. office roles

D. office life

SECTION C NEWS BROADCAST

Question 11 is based on the following news. At the end of the news item, you will be given 15 seconds to answer the question. Now listen to the news.

11. Senator Bob Dole’s attitude towards Clinton’s anti-crime policy is that of ___.

A. opposition

B. support

C. ambiguity

D. indifference

Questions 12 and 13 are based on the following news. At the end of the news item, you will be given 30 seconds to answer the questions. Now listen to the news.

12. Japan and the United States are now ___.

A. negotiating about photographic material

B. negotiating an automobile agreement

C. facing serious problems in trade

D. on the verge of a large-scale trade war

13. The news item seems to indicate that the agreement ___.

A. will end all other related trade conflicts

B. is unlikely to solve the dispute once and for all

C. is linked to other trade agreements

D. is the last of its kind to be reached

Questions 14 and 15 are based on the following news. At the end of the news item, you will be given 30 seconds to answer the questions. Now listen to the news.

14. According to the news, the ice from Greenland provides information about ___.

A. oxygen B. ancient weather C. carbon dioxide D. temperature

15. Which of the following statements is CORRECT?

A. Drastic changes in the weather have been common since ancient times.

B. The change in weather from very cold to very hot lasted over a century.

C. The scientists have been studying ice to forecast weather in the future.

D. The past 10,000 years have seen minor changes in the weather.

SECTION D NOTE-TAKING AND GAP-FILLING

Fill in each of the gaps with ONE word. You may refer to your notes. Make sure the word you fill in is both grammatically and semantically acceptable.

At present companies and industries like to sponsor sports events. Two reasons are put forward to explain this phenomenon. The first reason is that they get (1) ___ throughout the world. 1.___

The second reason is that companies and industries (2) ___ money, 2.___ as they get reductions in the tax they owe if they sponsor sports or arts activities.

As sponsorship is (3) ___, careful thinking is required in deciding 3.___ which events to sponsor.

It is important that the event to be sponsored (4) ___ the product (s) 4.___ to be promoted. That is, the right (5) ___ and maximum product coverage 5.___ must be guaranteed in the event.

Points to be considered in sports sponsorship. Popularity of the event

International sports events are big (6) ___ events, which get extensive 6.___ coverage on TV and in the press.

Smaller events attract fewer people. Identification of the potential audience

Aiming at the right audience is most important for smaller events.

The right audience would attract manufacturers of other related products like (7) ___, etc. 7.___ Advantages of sponsorship

Advantages are longer-term.

People are expected to respond (8) ___ to the products promoted. 8.___ And be more likely to buy them.

Advertising is (9) ___ the mind. 9.___

Sponsorship is better than straight advertising: a) less (10) ___ 10.___

b) tax-free

Part ⅡProofreading and Error Correction (15 min)

The following passage contains TEN errors. Each line contains a maximum of ONE error. In each case, only ONE word is involved. You should proofread the passage and correct it in the following way. For a wrong word, underline the wrong word and write the correct one in the blank provided at the end of the line. For a missing word, mark the position of the missing word with a “∧”sign and write the word you believe to be missing in the blank provided at the end of the line. For an unnecessary word cross out the unnecessary word with a slash “/’ and put the word in the blank provided at the end of the line.

Example

When∧art museum wants a new exhibit, (1) an

it never／buys things in finished form and hangs (2) never

them on the wall. When a natural history museum

wants an exhibition, it must often build it. (3) exhibit

The hunter-gatherer tribes that today live as our prehistoric 1.___

human ancestors consume primarily a vegetable diet supplementing 2.___

with animal foods. An analysis of 58 societies of modem hunter-

gatherers, including the Kung of southern Africa, revealed that one

half emphasize gathering plant foods, one-third concentrate on fishing

and only one-sixth are primarily hunters. Overall, two-thirds

and more of the hunter-gatherer’s calories come from plants. Detailed 3.___

studies of the Kung by the food scientists at the University of

London, showed that gathering is a more productive source of food

than is hunting. An hour of hunting yields in average about 100 4.___

edible calories, as an hour of gathering produces 240. 5.___

Plant foods provide for 60 percent to 80 percent of the Kung 6.___

diet, and no one goes hungry when the hunt fails. Interestingly, if

they escape fatal infections or accidents, these contemporary

aborigines live to old ages despite of the absence of medical care. 7.___

They experience no obesity, no middle-aged spread, little dental

decay, no high blood pressure, on heart disease, and their blood

cholesterol levels are very low ( about half of the average American 8.___

adult), if no one is suggesting what we return to an aboriginal life 9.___

style, we certainly could use their eating habits as a model for 10.___

healthier diet.

Part ⅢReading Comprehension (40 min)

SECTION A READING COMPREHENSION (30 min)

In this section there are four reading passages followed by a total of fifteen multiple-choice questions. Read the passages carefully and then mark your answers on your Coloured Answer Sheet.

TEXT A

Ricci’s “Operation Columbus”

Ricci, 45, is now striking out on perhaps his boldest venture yet. He plan s to market an English language edition of his elegant monthly art magazine, FMR, in the United States. Once again the skeptics are murmuring that the successful Ricci has headed for a big fall. And once again Ricci intends to prove them wrong.

Ricci is so confident that he has christened his quest “Operation Columbus” and has set his sights on discovering an American readership of 300,000. That goal may not be too far-fetched. The Italian edition of FMR — the initials, of course, stand for Franco Maria Ricci-is only 18 months old. But it is already the second largest art magazine in the world, with a circulation of 65,000 and a profit margin of US $ 500,000. The American edition will be patterned after the Italian version, with each 160-page issue carrying only 40 pages of ads and no more than five articles. But the contents will often differ. The English-language edition will include more American works, Ricci says, to help Americans get over “an inferiority complex about their art.” He also hopes that the magazine will become a vehicle for a two -way cultural exchange — what he likes to think of as a marriage of brains, culture and taste from both sides of the Atlantic.

To realize this vision, Ricci is mounting one of the most lavish, enterprising — and expensive-promotional campaigns in magazine — publishing history. Between November and January, eight jumbo jets will fly 8 million copies of a sample 16-page edition of FMR across the Atlantic. From a warehouse in Michigan, 6.5 million copies will be mailed to American subscribers of various cultural, art and business magazines. Some of the remaining copies will circulate as a special Sunday supplement in the New York Times. The cost of launching Operation Columbus is a staggering US $ 5 million, but Ricci is hoping that 60% of the price tag will be financed by Italian corporations.“ To land in America Columbus had to use Spanish sponsors,” reads one sentence in his promotional pamphlet. “We would like Italians.”

Like Columbus, Ricci cannot know what his reception will be on foreign shores. In Italy he gambled — and won — on a simple concept: it is more important to show art than to write about it. Hence, one issue of FMR might feature 32 full-colour pages of 17th-century tapestries, followed by 14 pages of outrageous eyeglasses. He is gambling that the concept is exportable. “I don’t expect that more than 30% of my reader... will actually read FMR,” he says. “The magazine is such a visual delight that they don’t have to.” Still, he is lining up an impressive stable of writers and professors for the American edition, including Noam Chomsky, Anthony Burgess, Eric Jong and Norman Mailer. In addition, he seems to be pursuing his won eclectic vision without giving a moment’s thought to such established competitors as Connoisseur and Horizon. “The Americans can do almost everything better than we can,” says Ricci, “But we (the Italians) have a 2,000 year edge on them in art.”

16. Ricci intends his American edition of FMR to carry more American art works in order to___.

A. boost Americans’ confidence in their art

B. follow the pattern set by his Italian edition

C. help Italians understand American art better

D. expand the readership of his magazine

17. Ricci is compared to Columbus in the passage mainly because___.

A. they both benefited from Italian sponsors

B. they were explorers in their own ways

C. they obtained overseas sponsorship

D. they got a warm reception in America

18. We get the impression that the American edition of FMR will probably ___.

A. carry many academic articles of high standard

B. follow the style of some famous existing magazines

C. be mad by one third of American magazine readers

D. pursue a distinctive editorial style of its own

TEXT B

My mother’s relations were very different from the Mitfords. Her brother, Uncle Geoff, who often came to stay at Swimbrook, was a small spare man with thoughtful blue eyes and a rather silent manner. Compared to Uncle Tommy, he was a n intellectual of the highest order, and indeed his satirical pen belied his mil d demeanor. He spent most of his waking hours composing letters to The Times and other publications in which he outlined his own particular theory of the development of English history. In Uncle Geoff’s view, the greatness of England had risen and waned over the centuries in direct proportion to the use of natural manure in fertilizing the soil. The Black Death of 1348 was caused by gradual loss of the humus fertility found under forest trees. The rise of the Elizabethans two centuries later was attributable to the widespread use of sheep manure.

Many of Uncle Geoff’s letters-to-the-editor have fortunately been preserved in a privately printed volume called Writings of a Rebel. Of the collection, one letter best sums up his views on the relationship between manure and freedom.

He wrote:

Collating old records shows that our greatness rises and falls with the living fertility of our soil. And now, many years of exhausted and chemically murdered soil, and of devitalized food from it, has softened our bodies and still worse, softened our national character. It is an actual fact that character is largely a product of the soil. Many years of murdered food from deadened soil has made us too tame. Chemicals have had their poisonous day. It is now the worm’s t urn to reform the manhood of England. The only way to regain our punch, our character, our lost virtues, and with them the freedom natural to islanders, is to compost our land so as to allow moulds, bacteria and earthworms to remake living s oil to nourish Englishmen’s bodies and spirits.

The law requiring pasteurization of milk in England was a particular target of Uncle Geoff’s. Fond of alliteration, he dubbed it “Murdered Milk Measure”, and established the Liberty Restoration League, with headquarters at his house in London, for the specific purpose of organizing a counteroffensive. “Freedom not Doctordom” was the League’s proud slogan. A subsidiary, but nevertheless important, activity of the League was advocacy of a return to the “unsplit, slowly smoked fish” and bread made with “English stone-ground flour, yeast, milk, sea s alt and raw cane-sugar.”

19. According to Uncle Geoff, national strength could only be regained by ___.

A. reforming the manhood of England

B. using natural manure as fertilizer

C. eating more bacteria-free food

D. granting more freedom to Englishmen

20. The tone of the passage can most probably be described as___.

A. facetious B. serious C. nostalgic D. factual

TEXT C

Interview

So what have they taught you at college about interviews? Some courses go t o town on it, others do very little. You may get conflicting advice. Only one thing is certain: the key to success is preparation.

There follow some useful suggestions from a teacher training course coordinator, a head of department and a headteacher. As they appear to be in complete harmony with one another despite never having met, we may take their advice seriously.

Oxford Brookes University’s approach to the business of application and interview focuses on research and rehearsal. Training course coordinator Brenda St evens speaks of the value of getting students “to deconstruct the advertisement, see what they can offer to that school, and that situation, and then write the letter, do their CVs and criticize each other’s.” Finally, they role play interviewer and interviewee.

This is sterling stuff, and Brookes students spend a couple of weeks on it. “The better prepared students won’t be thrown by nerves on the day,” says Ms St evens. “They’ll have their strategies and questions worked out.” She also says, a trifle disconcertingly, “the better the student, the worse the interviewee.” She believes the most capable students are less able to put themselves forward. Even if this were tree, says Ms Stevens, you must still make your own case.

“Beware of infernality,” she advises. One aspirant teacher, now a head of department at a smart secondary school, failed his first job interview because he took his jacket off while waiting for his appointment. It was hot and everyone in the staffroom was in shirtsleeves but at the end of the day they criticized h is casual attitude, which they had deduced from the fact that he took his jacket off in the staffroom, even though he put it back on for the interview.

Incidentally, men really do have to wear a suit to the interview and women really cannot wear jeans, even if men never wear the suit again and women teach most days in jeans. Panels respond instantly to these indicators. But beware: it will not please them any better if you are too smart.

Find out about the people who will talk to you. In the early meetings they are likely to be heads of departments or heads of year. Often they may be concerned with pastoral matters. It makes sense to know their priorities and let them hear the things about you that they want to hear.

During preliminary meetings you may be seen in groups with two or three other applicants and you must demonstrate that you know your stuff without putting your companions down. The interviewers will be watching how you work with a team

. But remember the warning about informality: however friendly and co-operative the other participants are, do not give way to the idea that you are there just to be friends.

Routine questions can be rehearsed, but “don’t go on too long,” advises the department head. They may well ask: “What have been your worst/best moments w h en teaching?”, or want you to “talk about some good teaching you have done.” The experts agree you should recognize your weaknesses and offer a strategy for over coming them. “I know I’ve got to work on classroom management — I would hope for some help,” perhaps. No one expects a new teacher to know it all, but they hope for an objective appraisal of capabilities.

Be warned against inexpert questioning. You may be asked questions in such a way that it seems impossible to present your best features. Some questions may be plain silly, asked perhaps by people on the panel who are from outside the situation. Do not be thrown, have ways of circumnavigating it, and never, ever le t them see that you think they have said something foolish.

You will almost certainly be asked how you see the future and it is import ant to have a good answer prepared. Some people are put off by being asked what they expect to be doing in five or ten years’ time. On your preliminary visit, says the department head, be sure to give them a bit of an interview of your own, to see the direction the department is going and what you could contribute to it.

The headteacher offers his thoughts in a nine-point plan. Iron the application form! Then it stands out from everyone else’s, which have been folded and battered in the post. It gives an initial impression which may get your application to the top of the pile. Ensure that your application is tailored to the particular school. Make the head feel you are writing directly to him or her. Put yourself at ease before you meet the interviewing panel: if you are nervous, you will talk too quickly. Before you enter the room remember that the people are human beings too; take away the mystique of their roles. Listen. There is a danger of not hearing accurately what is being said. Make eye contact with the speakers, and with everyone in the room. Allow your warmth and humanity to be seen. A sense of humour is very important.

Have a portfolio of your work that can link theory to practice. Many schools want you to show work. For a primary appointment, give examples from the range of the curriculum, not just art. (For this reason, taking pictures on your teaching practice is important. ) Prepare yourself in case you are asked to give a talk. Have prompt cards ready, and don’t waffle.

Your speech must be clear and articulate, with correct grammar. This is important: they want to hear you and they want to hear how well you can communicate wit h children. Believe in yourself and have confidence.

Some of the people asking the questions don’t know much about what you do. Be ready to help them.

Thus armed, you should have no difficulty at all. Good luck and keep your jacket on!

21. Ms. Brenda Stevens suggests that before applying job applicants should ___.

A. go through each other’s CVs

B. rehearse their answers to questions

C. understand thoroughly the situations

D. go to town to attend training course

22. Is it wise to admit some of your weaknesses relating to work?

A. Yes, but you should have ideas for improvement in the future.

B. Yes, because it is natural to be weak in certain aspects.

C. No, admitting weaknesses may put you at a disadvantage.

D. No, it will only prompt the interviewees to reject you.

23. The best way to deal with odd questions from the interviewers is to ___.

A. remain smiling and kindly point out the inaccuracies

B. keep calm and try to be tactful in your answers

C. say frankly what you think about the issues raised

D. suggest something else to get over your nervousness

24. The suggestions offered by the headteacher are ___.

A. original B. ambiguous C. practical D. controversial

TEXT D

Family Matters

This month Singapore passed a bill that would give legal teeth to the moral obligation to support one’s parents. Called the Maintenance of Parents Bill, i t received the backing of the Singapore Government.

That does not mean it hasn’t generated discussion. Several members of the Parliament opposed the measure as un-Asian. Others who acknowledged the problem o f the elderly poor believed it a disproportionate response. Still others believe it will subvert relations within the family: cynics dubbed it the “Sue Your So n” law.

Those who say that the bill does not promote filial responsibility, of course, are right. It has nothing to do with filial responsibility. It kicks in where filial responsibility fails. The law cannot legislate filial responsibility any more than it can legislate love. All the law can do is to provide a safety net where this morality proves insufficient. Singapore needs this bill not to replace morality, but to provide incentives to shore it up.

Like many other developed nations, Singapore faces the problems of an increasing proportion of people over 60 years of age. Demography is inexorable. In 19 80, 7.2% of the population was in this bracket. By the end of the century that figure will grow to 11%. By 2030, the proportion is projected to be 26%. The problem is not old age per se. It is that the ratio of economically active people to economically inactive people will decline.

But no amount of government exhortation or paternalism will completely eliminate the problem of old people who have insufficient means to make ends meet. Some people will fall through the holes in any safety net.

Traditionally, a person’s insurance against poverty in his old age was his family, lifts is not a revolutionary concept. Nor is it uniquely Asian. Care an d support for one’s parents is a universal value shared by all civilized societies.

The problem in Singapore is that the moral obligation to look after one’s parents is unenforceable. A father can be compelled by law to maintain his children. A husband can be forced to support his wife. But, until now, a son or daughter had no legal obligation to support his or her parents.

In 1989, an Advisory Council was set up to look into the problems of the aged. Its report stated with a tinge of complacency that 95% of those who did not have their own income were receiving cash contributions from relations. But what about the 5% who aren’t getting relatives’ support? They have several options: (a) get a job and work until they die; (b) apply for public assistance (you have to be destitute to apply); or (c) starve quietly. None of these options is socially acceptable. And what if this 5% figure grows, as it is likely to do, as society ages?

The Maintenance of Parents Bill was put forth to encourage the traditional virtues that have so far kept Asian nations from some of the breakdowns encountered in other affluent societies. This legislation will allow a person to apply t o the court for maintenance from any or all of his children. The court would have the discretion to refuse to make an order if it is unjust.

Those who deride the proposal for opening up the courts to family lawsuits miss the point. Only in extreme cases would any parent take his child to court. If it does indeed become law, the bill’s effect would be far more subtle.

First, it will reaffirm the notion that it is each individual’s—not society’s—responsibility to look after his parents. Singapore is still conservative enough that most people will not object to this idea. It reinforces the traditional values and it doesn’t hurt a society now and then to remind itself of its core values.

Second, and more important, it will make those who are inclined to shirk their responsibilities think twice. Until now, if a person asked family elders, clergymen or the Ministry of Community Development to help get financial support from his children, the most they could do was to mediate. But mediators have no teeth, and a child could simply ignore their pleas.

But to be sued by one’s parents would be a massive loss of face. It would be a public disgrace. Few people would be so thick-skinned as to say, “Sue and be damned”. The hand of the conciliator would be immeasurably strengthened. It is far more likely that some sort of amicable settlement would be reached if the recalcitrant son or daughter knows that the alternative is a public trial.

It would be nice to think Singapore doesn’t need this kind of law. But that belief ignores the clear demographic trends and the effect of affluence itself on traditional bends. Those of us who pushed for the bill will consider ourselves most successful if it acts as an incentive not to have it invoked in the firs t place.

25. The Maintenance of Parents Bill ___.

A. received unanimous support in the Singapore Parliament

B. was believed to solve all the problems of the elderly poor

C. was intended to substitute for traditional values in Singapore

D. was passed to make the young more responsible to the old

26. By quoting the growing percentage points of the aged in the population, the author seems to imply that ___.

A. the country will face mounting problems of the old in future

B. the social welfare system would be under great pressure

C. young people should be given more moral education

D. the old should be provided with means of livelihood

27. Which of the following statements is CORRECT?

A. Filial responsibility in Singapore is enforced by law.

B. Fathers have legal obligations to look after their children.

C. It is an acceptable practice for the old to continue working.

D. The Advisory Council was dissatisfied with the problems of the old.

28. The author seems to suggest that traditional values ___.

A. play an insignificant role in solving social problems

B. are helpful to the elderly when they sue their children

C. are very important in preserving Asian uniqueness

D. are significant in helping the Bill get approved

29. The author thinks that if the Bill becomes law, its effect would be ___.

A. indirect

B. unnoticed

C. apparent

D. straightforward

30. At the end of the passage, the author seems to imply that success of the Bill depends upon ___.

A. strict enforcement

B. public support

C. government assurance

D. filial awareness

SECTION B SKIMMING AND SCANNING (10 min)

In this section there are seven passages with ten multiple-choice questions. Ski m or scan them as required and then mark your answers on your Coloured Answer Sheet.

TEXT E

First read the question.

31. The primary purpose of the letter is to ___.

A. illustrate the World Bank’s efforts in poverty-relief programmes

B. call for further efforts by nations in sustainable development

C. provide evidence for the World Bank’s aid to the private sectors

D. clear up some misunderstanding about the World Bank

Now go through TEXT E quickly to answer question 31.

August 18th 199

Dear Sir,

In your July 28th article you noted that the Bank’s own internal analysis rated one third of the projects completed in 1991 as unsatisfactory. But that statement fails to take account of the Bank’s criteria for ‘success’, which are exceptionally strict. For instance, before a project can be considered successful, it must have at least a 10% rate of return. This rate is far higher than the minimum demanded by many bilateral aid donors, many of which require a return of only 5% or 6%. Thus, projects rated unsatisfactory under the Bank’s standards still yield many benefits.

You imply that, because it deals mainly with governments, the Bank does not sufficiently support private sector development. Here are the facts. The World

Bank has:

supported reforms in mere than 80 countries aimed at opening up trade, making prices realistic and dismantling state monopolies which stifle individual enterprise invested in infrastructure to facilitate business activity; assisted and advised over 200 privatization-related operations involving nearly US $ 25 billion in loans; provided mere than US $ 12 billion through an affiliate, the International Finance Corp. over the last 30 years to mere than 1,000 private companies in the dev eloping world; and through another affiliate, the Multi lateral Investment Guarantee Agency, offered insurance against non-commercial risk to encourage foreign investment in poor countries.

The record shows that, over the past generation, more progress has been mad e in reducing poverty and raising living standards than during any other comparable period in history. In the developing countries: life expectancy has been increased from 40 to 63 years; infant mortality has been reduced by 50% ;and per capita income has doubled.

The World Bank consistently stresses that most of the credit for these advances should go to the countries themselves. Nevertheless, the Bank and organizations with which it collaborates-bilateral and international agencies and non-governmental organizations-have played a valuable role in this progress. In the future the Bank will continue to do its utmost to support its member countries in t heir efforts to achieve sustainable development.

(LEANDRO V. CORONEL

Public Affairs

The Worm Bank

Washington)

TEXT F

First read the question.

32. The author’s main argument is that ___.

A. most farmers in developing countries face unemployment

B. developing countries need agricultural aid to boost economy

C. agricultural aid hints the economy in developing countries

D. a well-developed agricultural sector provides a domestic market

Now go through TEXT F quickly to answer question 32.

Ours is an agrarian economy. We must become serf-sufficient in food to feed a rapidly growing population at an annual growth rate of more than 3 million people. A well-developed agricultural sector would offset the need for food import and play an important role in the development process by providing a home market for the products of the industrial sector. This implies that the rate of industrialization itself depends upon how fast agricultural incomes are rising. Development in the agricultural sector in our country means a rise in the income level of 70 percent of the population who are related to this sector. Their increase d income in turn will give us mere voluntary savings and investment and thus a source of revenue through taxation and potential capital formation by the government plus reduction in income inequalities between the urban population and rural masses. In this sense, aid received in the form of agricultural commodities hurts the developing countries and benefits developed countries mere than proportionately. Because most of the farmers in developing countries are already at a mere subsistence level with a high rate of unemployment, disguised-unemployment and underemployment.

The Chinese experience with rural development has demonstrated that agricultural modernization via labour-intensive techniques is a highly promising way t o create extra jobs without extensive geographic displacement of the farmers. Regarding the impact of transfer of agricultural commodities on the long-term grow threaten in the recipient country, it can be said that transfer of agricultural commodities under confessional terms may result in an ultimate lowering of the recipient countries long-term growth rate.

TEXT G

First read the question.

33. The passage is most probably from ___.

A. a review of a book on cowboys

B. a study of cowboy work culture

C. a novel about cowboy life and culture

D. a school textbook on the cowboy history

Now go through TEXT G quickly to answer question 33.

A cowboy is defined by the work that he does. Any man can lay claim to that name if he lives on a ranch and works—— drives, brands, castrates, or murmurs ——a cattleman’s herd. In addition, working accounts for ways in which cowboy s portray themselves in their art: in 19th-century poems that they orally compose d and sang on the ranch, in 20th-century poems that they write, in books that they publish, and in art objects that they fashion, cowboys always represent themselves as engaging in some form of labour. This book’s three fold purpose is, first, to look at art that cowboys produce——art, that has never been studied before——and, second, to demonstrate that cowboy art values historically document labour routines that cowboys have traditionally acted out in their work culture.

I use the term work culture not only to suggest that cowboys are defined b y the work that they do, but also to argue that they are serf-represented in culture by poems, prose, and art that ail reveal cowboys to be men who are culturally unified by engaging in labour routines that they think of as cowboy work. Art deals with cowboy work, as well as with concerns about economics, gender, religion, and literature, even though these thoughts sometimes express themselves as concerns about cattle branding, livestock castration, and other tasks. The book ’ s third and most important function is, therefore, to show that artistic self-re presentations of labour also formulate systems of thought which cowboys use as a metaphor for discussing economies, gender, religion, and literature, sometimes equating branding with religious salvation, at other times defining spur making as freedom, and so on.

TEXT H

First read the question.

34. The writer of this letter attempts to ___ the views in the editorial.

A. refute

B. illustrate

C. support

D. substantiate

Now go through TEXT H quickly to answer question 34.

October 3rd 199

Dear Sir,

In your editorial on August 31st, there seems to be some confused thinking in attempting to establish a direct relationship between the desire of the OAA airlines to negotiate more equitable agreements with the United States for air-traffic rights and the cost of air travel for the public.

It is simply untrue that the Asian carriers are not looking for increased access to the U.S. market, including its domestic market; they are, as part of balanced agreements that provide equality of opportunity. So long as the U. S. takes the inequitable arrangements enshrined in current agreements as a starting point for negotiation, however, there is no chance that U.S. carriers will be granted more regional rights which further unbalance the economic opportunities available to each side. Most importantly from the consumer viewpoint, it has yet to be demonstrated that in those regional sectors where U.S. carriers currently operate-such as Hong Kong/Tokyo-they have added anything in terms of price, quality of service, innovation or seat availability in peak seasons.

Turning to cost, I am not sure to which Merrill Larrych study you are referring, but it would be simplistic to compare seat-mile costs of narrow-body operation over U. S. domestic sectors with wide-body operation over international sectors; comparative studies of seat-mile costs are valid only if they compare similar aircraft operating over identical sectors. On this basis, International Civil Aviation Organization figures show that Asian carriers are highly competitive. O f course, given its operating environment Japan Air Lines will have high seat-mi le costs, while a carrier based in Southeast Asia, such as Singapore Airlines, w ill have relatively low costs. But it is a fallacy to assume this means ‘higher ticket prices or higher taxes’ for the ‘hapless Asian air traveller’ if he travels on JAL.

The Japanese carriers have to compete in the Asian marketplace with others, and costs cannot simply be passed on to the consumer or taxpayer. The people who really pay the price or reap the reward of differing cost levels are the share holders.

(RICHARD. T. STIRLAND

Director General

Orient Airlines Association

TEXT I

First read the questions.

35. Today’s computers can process data ___ times faster than the 1952 model, ILLIAC.

A. 4

B. 100

C. 200

D. 4, 000

36. NCSA aims to develop ___.

A. a new Internet browser

B. a more powerful national system

C. human-computer intelligence interaction

D. a new global network

Now go through TEXT I quickly to answer questions 35 and 36.

URBANA, Illinois. Welcome to Cyber City, USA, where scientists are developing the next-generation Internet and leading ground-breaking research in artificial intelligence. The University of Illinois at Urbana, which has a student body of 36,100, has a proud computing tradition. In 1952, it became the first educational institution to build and own its own computer.

That computer, ILLIAC, was four metres tall, four metres long and sixty centimetres deep. Its processing speed was about 50 kilohertz compared with 200 megahertz-that’s 200,000 kilohertz for today’s computers.

At the state-of-the-art Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology, researchers from disciplines as far-ranging as psychology, computer science and biochemistry are focusing on biological intelligence and human-computer intelligence interaction.

Beckman also houses the National Centre for Supercomputing Application (NCS A), which played a key role in the development of the Internet global network. I t was NCSA that developed Mosaic, the graphically driven programme that first ma de surfing on the Internet possible.

Mosaic, introduced in 1992, has been replaced by much more powerful Interne t browsers such as its successor Netscape or Microsoft’s Internet Explorer.

NCSA officials say they are now trying to bring more advanced computing and communication to research scientists, engineers and ultimately the public.

“What we’re looking for is a national system in which the networks are 10 0 times greater than the Internet today, and the supercomputers are 100 times more powerful,” said NCSA Director Larry Smart.

A proposed joint project would develop a prototype or demonstration model f or the “21st century national information infrastructure” in line with an initiative announced by President Bill Clinton last October.

If funded by the National Science Foundation, the new structure would take effect on October 1st.

NCSA, one of the four operational federal supercomputer centres in the country, is awaiting a decision from the Foundation’s board late this month on a competition for US $ 16 million in continued annual federal funding.

NCSA, which employs 200 people and has a yearly budget of US $ 31 million, is expected to be one of two winners along with its counterpart in San Diego.

“The University has put a great deal of effort into this competition. We remain hopeful about the outcome, but we will have no comment until the National Science Foundation Board’s decision,” Smart said.

TEXT J

First read the questions.

37. In Japanese the work depato refers to ___.

A. traditional Japanese stores

B. modern stores in cities

C. special clothing stores

D. railway stores

38. During the Meiji era depato was regarded by Japanese customers as a (n ) ___ shopping place.

A. cheap

B. traditional

C. fashionable

D. attractive

Now go through TEXT J quickly to answer questions 37 and 38.

The Japanese have two words for the modern department stores that abound in large urban areas. The older word, hyakkaten, which is seldom used in daily speech, can usually be found engraved in ideographs in a building cornerstone, and i t is part of a store’s official rifle. Literally “a store with one hundred items,” this word was coined during the late Meiji era ( 1868 - 1912), when clothing stores began to expand their product lines and railroads began to build shops at major train crossings. The more recent and more commonly used word is depato (from the English ‘department store’).

These words reflect the dual nature of Japanese department stores. Words written in ideographs can impart an aura of antiquity and tradition. Frequently, a s in the case of the word hyakkaten, they suggest indigenous origin. In contrast, foreign borrowed words often give a feeling of modernity and foreignness. Many Japanese department stores actually originated in Japan several hundred years a go as dry goods stores that later patterned themselves after foreign department stores. Even the trendiest and most avant-garde of these stores practise pattern s of merchandising and retain forms of prepaid credit, customer service, and special relationships with suppliers characteristic of merchandising during the Tokygawa era (1600 — 1868). To many Japanese these large urban stores may seem like a direct import from the West, but like the word depato, they have undergone a transformation in the process of becoming Japanese.

Throughout the Tokygawa era, Japan was closed by decree to foreign influences. During the Meiji era, however, Japan reopened to the western world; concurrently, depato emerged as large-scale merchandisers in Japan. The Meiji depato we re soon perceived by Japanese customers as glamorous places to shop because of t heir Western imports, which the Japanese were eager to see and buy. Depato also sold Japanese goods but often followed practices that people of the time considered foreign, such as letting customers wear their shoes while shopping in the store.

A representative of the Japan Department Store Association told me that throughout their history depato have played on the Japanese interest in foreign pl aces, cultures and objects, and that to a great extent these were introduced to Japan through department stores. I suggest that in addition to this role of cultural importer depato have also been involved in the creation of domestic cultural meanings. They have made foreign customs, ideas and merchandise familiar by giving them meanings consistent with Japanese cultural practice.

TEXT K

First read the questions.

39. The Agency for International Development is a ___ organization.

A. new 、

B. regional

C. UN

D. US

40. According to NDS’s statistics, the number of babies the average Pilipino woman bears dropped by ___ between 1960 and 1993.

A.4.1

B.6.4

C.2.3

D.2.9

Now go through TEXT K quickly to answer questions 39 and 40.

When representatives from 170 nations gather in Cairo next month for the third International Conference on Population and Development, they will vote on the largest population-control plan in history. It is ambitious. Not only does it call for a host of “reproductive fights” and aim to freeze world population at 7 2 billion people by 2050; it also calls for billions of dollars in new government spending on the issue-US $ 13.2 billion by the end of the century.

Some of the plan’s provisions have already aroused opposition, most notably from Pope John Paul II. All this has been gleefully covered by the newspapers. Yet scant attention has been paid to many of the dubious social and economic assumptions that underlie the plan. In particular, it is interesting to see how the se programmes are being sold in places like the Philippines, on the front lines of the population debate. For the way the proponents of population control have gone about pushing their programmes raises serious doubts about the integrity of their studies, their ultimate value to development, and the role of foreign-aid groups.

Although population-control measures in the Philippines never reached the coercive levels they did in India, they were not popular. This time, proponents have learned their lesson. For the past few years, they have been quietly laying the groundwork for Cairo. Rather than attack the issue head-on, it has been redefined in terms of a host of new “reproductive rights” to which the solution is invariably a government-funded initiative.

We have just had a good taste of this in the Philippines. The National Statistics Office recently published the results of the 1993 National Demographic Survey (NDS),which happens to have been funded by the U.S. Agency for International Development. It is probably mere coincidence, but the NDS report, published on the eve of the Cairo meeting, nicely supports the thrust of the Cairo Declaration. That is, it has found a connection between mothers’ and children’s health and fertility behaviour. The implication is that large-scale government family-planning programmes are essential if health issues are to be addressed.

But the demographic survey seems to have been selective about what facts it would report and connections it would make. Take the health issue. The document concludes that the high risk of infant, child and maternal mortality is associated with pregnancies where mothers are too young, too old, or have already had several children. But a discussion of poverty is missing from the list of factor s related to health. It would be difficult to deny that poverty, lack of access to safe water, poor housing, poor hygiene and unsanitary conditions all have a strong bearing on the health of the mother and child. Although the NDS collected data on housing characteristics, it did not include any data on income.

A closer look at the fertility behaviour of the poor is important because of the extensive literature on the “replacement effect” of high infant mortality. Statistical studies in various countries show high fertility among the poor as a rational desire to have children who will survive into adulthood to help take care of them. This helps to explain why many poor women have babies at such short intervals. The 1993 NDS would have been a good opportunity to verify the validity of this behaviour in the Philippines.

The NDS avoided collecting data on socio-economic variables that would have a serious effect on these health issues. But, in one area, it made painstaking efforts to quantify fertility preference to derive figures for planned and unplanned pregnancies. It concluded that “if all unwanted births were avoided, the total fertility rate would be 2.9 children, which is almost 30% less than the observed rate.” This, too, was used to establish an “unmet” need requiring a government programme.

Yet the NDS’s own numbers suggest that Filipinos are aware of their option s. The total fertility rote——the number of babies the average woman bears over her lifetime——has dropped to 4.1 in 1993 from 6.4 in 1960. Some 61% used contraceptives, just a few percentage points short of the 65-80% rate prevailing in Europe, North America and most of East Asia. The delay of marriage by Filipinos t o the age of 23 years represents a reduction of the risk of pregnancy by 19% given the 35 years of their reproductive life.

In short, the Philippines has its problems but its people are not as ignorant as the population-control lobby would suppose. Unfortunately, this lobby has development dollars, organizational muscle and support of the media. “We’ve built a consensus about population as a global issue and family planning as a health issue,” says the UN’s Naris Sadik, host of the conference. Yes, they have. And now we know how.

Section A原文

加拿大的溫哥華1986年剛剛度過百歲生日，但城市的發(fā)展令世界矚目。以港立市，以港興市，是許多港口城市生存發(fā)展的道路。經(jīng)過百年開發(fā)建設(shè)，有著天然不凍良港的溫哥華，成為舉世聞名的港口城市，同亞洲、大洋洲、歐洲、拉丁美洲均有定期班輪，年貨物吞吐量達到8，000萬噸，全市就業(yè)人口中有三分之一從事貿(mào)易與運輸行業(yè)。

溫哥華（Vancouver）的輝煌是溫哥華人智慧和勤奮的結(jié)晶，其中包括多民族的貢獻。加拿大地廣人稀，國土面積比中國還大，人口卻不足3000萬。吸收外來移民，是加拿大長期奉行的國策?？梢哉f，加拿大除了印第安人外，無一不是外來移民，不同的只是時間長短而已。溫哥華則更是世界上屈指可數(shù)的多民族城市?，F(xiàn)今180萬溫哥華居民中，有一半不是在本地出生的，每4個居民中就有一個是亞洲人。而25萬華人對溫哥華的經(jīng)濟轉(zhuǎn)型起著決定性的作用。他們其中有一半是近5年才來到溫哥華地區(qū)的，使溫哥華成為亞洲以外最大的中國人聚居地。

Section B原文

In some societies people want children for what might be called familial reasons: to extend the family line or the family name, to propitiate the ancestors; to enable the proper functioning of religious rituals involving the family. Such reasons may seem thin in the modern, secularized society but they have been and are powerful indeed in other places.

In addition, one class of family reasons shares a border with the following category, namely, having children in order to maintain or improve a marriage: to hold the husband or occupy the wife; to repair or rejuvenate the marriage; to increase the number of children on the assumption that family happiness lies that way. The point is underlined by its converse: in some societies the failure to bear children (or males) is a threat to the marriage and a ready cause for divorce.

Beyond all that is the profound significance of children to the very institution of the family itself. To many people, husband and wife alone do not seem a proper family —they need children to enrich the circle, to validate its family character, to gather the redemptive influence of offspring. Children need the family, but the family seems also to need children, as the social institution uniquely available, at least in principle, for security, comfort, assurance, and direction in a changing, often hostile, world. To most people, such a home base, in the literal sense, needs more than one person for sustenance and in generational extension.

參考答案

PART ⅠLISTENING COMPREHENSION

SECTION A TALK

As we all know, when machines work they give off a lot of noise, and the no ise can sometimes be very unpleasant, or annoying. As a result, people have been trying to find ways to reduce noise. Although it may sound a bit strange to you all, one of the best ways to make machines quieter, in cars for example, may be to make them noisier. The source of this paradox is electronic anti-noise which creates sound waves to cancel out unwanted noise, such as rattles, blare, etc.

Now although the idea dates back to the 1930s, it’s only recently that advances in computer technology have made anti-noise a commercial possibility. Take Franc e for example. Here industry spends a fortune to get rid of noise. We all know how unpleasant it is. Both people working in factories and ordinary people at home enjoying their leisure can be affected by noise. Delicate machines are affected by noise as well. The government has passed a lot of regulations concerning acceptable levels of noise.

Noise is costly to industry. In the first place, just following a single regulation can cost 1 to 2 billion US dollars in the textile industry, they say.

Then secondly, of course, vibration can cause damage to machinery. Even very small vibrations can cause parts to wear out and equipment to fail. And naturally enough, this gets added on to the price of the products. About $ to 15% of the price of a product comes from noise and vibration costs, it’s estimated.

At present, methods used to dampen down noise and vibrations rely on techniques that are 30 or 40 years old. These usually involve wrapping the noisy or vibrating component in anything from cotton to concrete. But this is often expensive and inefficient.

The modern electronic anti-noise devices don’t reduce sound. Instead, sound is used to attack sound. The trick is to hit these sound waves with other waves in a carefully controlled way. It may not be possible to eliminate noise completely, but engineers can build systems to eliminate specific kinds of noise and vibration. The new systems can deal with repetitive noise. This unfortunately means that there is not much that can be done about one-off noise, like someone trying to learn to play a trumpet. But they can handle fairly regular things like engine noise.

A French company has developed a technique which uses a microphone and a microprocessor. The processor measures the sound and directs a speaker to broadcast sound waves that are out of phase with the engine noise. The company claimed t hat it will make a car engine quieter, if not completely 100% silent. There are a number of other areas of application in the noisy, industrial environment of today. One system which the company is developing, aims to minimize the noise of aircraft engines and helicopter vibrations. Now anti-noise systems would be able to reduce noise in the cabin of an airplane to mere acceptable levels.

Another area which affects ordinary households nowadays concerns the noise which electricity and gas suppliers create. The electricity companies spend a lo t of money each year, cutting the harm of transformers, trying to quiet the noise and maintaining equipment that is constantly affected by vibration. If they can get rid of or even stop the vibrations, manufacturers can increase production speeds. But, of course, people working in noisy workplaces are perhaps mere affected than anything by the effects of noise. Anti-noise can also create “zones of quiet” in noisy workplaces. To create such a zone, you do two things.

First, microphones are suspended around the workplace. Then speakers that produce out-of-phase sound waves can then be put close to the worker under the desk o r the machine. A company working in this area has tested this system and says that it cuts noise levels enough for somebody inside the zone to hear a conversation from another part of the work place. Yet, this is only one-way; shouts from t he quiet zone could not be heard over the factory noise by those outside it, because the rest of the workplace remains noisy. This is one of the anti-noise measures experimented with today. If this proves to be feasible in many workplaces, I’m sure it can contribute to the reduction of noise in factory workshops in the future.

SECTION B INTERVIEW

W: First of all, when do people start work in American offices?

M: Right, well, the official work day starts at 9:00 am. This really means 9 o’clock-not ten past or half past nine.

W: Would you say that people work very hard in offices in America?

M: Well, I don’t know about employees in your country. But some nations have a philosophy that you work when the “boss” is around. And any time he’s not there, one can relax by reading the newspaper or whatever one likes doing in a personel way.

W: And things are different in the States, you’re saying?

M: Well, in America one is being paid for one’s time. So employees are expected to find other work if their own desks are clear, or to help someone else with his or her work. But you never sit idle doing nothing.

W: Yes, as the saying goes: “Time is money.”

M: Exactly. Your employer “owns” your time while he is paying you for it. That is precisely what “Time is money” means. And anyway the boss doesn’t ask mo re of you than he is doing himself: he...he will probably work through the lunch hour himself and even take work home at night.

W: Talking about lunch hours. What about them? Do you have to take them seriously?

M: Oh, yes, sure, of course. An employee’s lunch hour should he taken within t h e period allowed, unless you are officially discussing company business-say... en... on a business lunch. It’s the same too with the end of the day. I mean, e n, work until the day officially ends at five o’clock, unless you are in an off ice where “flextime” is the accepted practice.

W: Oh, so you have the flextime system, do you? I wasn’t sure about that.

M: Oh yes, sure. Flexible working hours, that is, en... starting or ending work earlier or later I... I know it’s still relatively new. However, there are mo r e and more Americans on the system today. Well, for the same reasons as in Europe-to keep traffic and commuting problems down. And as more women now work it gives more family time.

W: Er... could you say something about contracts or hiring in America, please?

M: Well, it’s different in America from, say, European countries like Germany o r France, perhaps Japan, too. I’m not sure. I know that in some countries people relax once they have got a job, because they know that they will almost never be fired-unless they do something wrong.

W: You mean that your employer can just fire you in America?

M: No, no, no. There are, of course, legal protections in the US. So employees cannot be unjustly fired without good reasons. Workers must do a good job, produce well, and get along with their colleagues-or they can be “l(fā)et go”, as it is called.

W: From one day to the next, you mean?

M: Well, it’s rarely done without warning, but it is important to remember that in the US you are a member of a business firm and not a family. It makes a difference.

W: I wonder, are the physical or external appearances of office life different from European offices?

M: Well, I have heard people comment on the informality found in American offices. And this is certainly a little difficult for people who are more used to a hierarchical system, of course. But there are some very formal offices, too, say, in... in big banks, law firms and major corporations. But in many establishment s with fewer employees the atmosphere is loose and easy with a lot of joking, and teasing, and wandering in and out of offices among all levels of employees.

W: Well, that sounds quite interesting. I think that’s all I want to know really. Thank you very much.

M: My pleasure.

SECTION C NEWS BROADCAST

News Item 1(For Question 11)

President Clinton begins a 3-day campaign-styled trip to the western US later today to highlight his domestic agenda.

White House spokesman says crime, the most important issue for Americans t his election year according to public opinion polls, will be a key theme of President Clinton’s trips to California, Nevada and New Mexico. Mr. Clinton’s presumptive Republican challenger, retiring Senator Bob Dole, has repeatedly disapproved of Mr. Clinton’s record on fighting crime. The president is expected to argue that his policies have helped make American communities safer places. Mr. Clint on will also attend a number of political fund-raising events during his visits to California and Nevada.

News Item 2(For Questions 12-13)

Reports say Japan and the US have reached an agreement on their dispute over air-cargo transport rights in Asia.

The agreement will mean that Washington and Tokyo will renegotiate a 1952 Aviation Treaty which allowed American airlines to fly on from Tokyo to other pl aces in Asia but didn’t allow Japanese airlines the same rights to fly on from America to other destinations. Tokyo has always said that the treaty was unfair and Japan has always wanted it changed.

According to the agreement, Japan will allow the American airline carrier Federal Express to fly on through Tokyo to 7 other destinations in Asia. Now Japan has always said it was happy to allow that, if the treaty was renegotiated. It does seem very clear that Japan has come out of this one on top.

This is certainly not the first dispute and it certainly won’t be the last dispute, either. There are several outstanding areas of friction between Japan and the US. At the moment, they are negotiating about photographic film and photographic paper. It could take a year to resolve. But even where the two countries do reach agreement there is still room for argument. They reached this famous car agreement about a month ago. They are already bickering about it.

News Item 3(For Questions 14-15)

Scientists say they can tell what air and sea conditions were like hundreds of thousands of years ago. They say pieces of ice taken from Greenland provide such information.

Scientists took the ice from more than one-and-a-half mile deep in huge masses of ice that float on the sea. That is the deepest scientists ever have drilled for ice. The ice represents 25,000 years of history. It provides one of the clearest records of ancient weather. European and American scientific teams have been studying ice from the same area to confirm each other s findings. The scientists examine the ice that was formed each year. They measure the oxygen and carbon dioxide in the ice. These measurements tell about the year’s temperature.

From these measurements, the scientific teams say that the past 10,000 years is the only period during which the weather has not changed very much. Before that time, they believe very large, sudden changes in the weather were common. The ice appears to show that at some periods, earth’s weather changed from very hot to very cold in only ten years.

SECTION D NOTE-TAKING AND GAP-FILLING

It is common nowadays for companies and industries to sponsor big sports events. For example, many companies sponsored the 8th National Games held in Shanghai in 1997. Then, what exactly do companies and industries get out of sponsoring big sports events, such as international games? And why need they do so?

There is an obvious answer and a not so obvious one. The obvious answer is that they get known worldwide, particularly if they are the principal sponsor of an event. This is especially important when you consider the number of countries around the world that might show the event on TV. The not so obvious answer is that sponsorship can help firms to save money.

Then how can they save money in this way? Companies can claim expenditures on sponsorship or “support to sport and the arts” against the amount of tax that they owe. So, if they are going to have to pay tax anyway, why not spend the money on promoting their name or product?

However, sponsorship is surely a very expensive business. So, how does one decide which events or activities to support? Companies spend a lot of time making sure that they have a perfect match between the products to be represented and the activity that needs sponsorship. Basically, companies have to make sure that the image is right and that the product gets maximum coverage through the event. I mean, you wouldn’t expect a company whose product has a young international image to sponsor a sport that has a following among older people. There are all sorts of reasons behind sponsorship. That’s what the game’s about for those who are trying to sell it.

There are some important points to consider before agreeing to sponsor an event. First and foremost, I suppose, is the popularity of the event in go-between, I mean. Events like the World Cup and the Olympics have businesses queuing up to offer sponsorship. There are the big media events: hours and hours of TV and satellite coverage guaranteed all over the world, as well as press coverage and the possibility of photographs that in some way advertise your product. Most events aren’t quite like that though. I suppose you’ve got the national games every four years in China. But most events appeal to only a limited proportion of the potential audience-tennis, for example. Most of the audience there is young, so products for the young are the ones that you would associate with the event recently. Then how do you match up the product with the event? The most important thing with the smaller event is to identify the audience it’s going to appeal to in this instance, tennis and young people. That should attract drinks manufactures, sports fashion designers, cosmetics producers, and so on. Then you look at the potential coverage in the media. It’s the sort of event that might attract Coca-Cola or Pepsi maybe even McDonalds.

In sponsoring sports events, it is not just the media coverage that matters. The important question is whether the people who’ve either been to the event or read about it in the press will be more likely to buy your product as a result. A lot of the advantages of investment in sponsorship are longer-term. People who have possibly read about or watched an event on TV may not even be able to tell you who was sponsoring the event, yet will react favorably if asked to comment on products marketed by the sponsoring company. They have been conditioned in some way. Conditioning the mind is what advertising is about. Believe it or not, straight advertising is a far more expensive way of promoting your image than sponsorship, and what’s more, sponsorship is mostly tax-free.

To sum up, today we have talked about sponsorship of sports events by companies: the reasons behind and a few related points. I hope this will help you gain some insight into the issue.

PAPER ONE

PART ⅠLISTENING COMPREHENSION

SECTION A TALK

1.答案：C

【問句譯文】使機器噪音小一些的技術(shù)如何？

【試題分析】本題為細節(jié)區(qū)分題。

【詳細解答】談話的第五句說“Now although the idea dates back to the 1930s, it’s only recently that advances in computer technology have made anti-noise a commercial possibility.”由此可知，這種方法可追溯到二十世紀30年代，但只是近來才被應(yīng)用于

商業(yè)。因此答案選C。

2.答案：D

【問句譯文】現(xiàn)代電子抗噪音設(shè)備如何？

【試題分析】本題為推理概括題。

【詳細解答】由關(guān)鍵句“The modern electronic anti-noise devices don’t reduce sound.

Instead, sound is used to attack sound.”可知，現(xiàn)代電子抗噪音設(shè)備是以噪音抗噪音

的全新原理而設(shè)計的，故答案選D。

3.答案：A

【問句譯文】下列哪一項不是法國公司的抗噪音技術(shù)的應(yīng)用？

【試題分析】本題為細節(jié)題，可用排除法解答。

【詳細解答】談話中專門介紹說，法國公司把這一技術(shù)應(yīng)用于工廠、汽車、飛機，而未提到“街道”，故選項A為正確答案。

4.答案：B

【問句譯文】根據(jù)該談話錄音，在安靜區(qū)的工人們能怎樣？

【試題分析】本題為細節(jié)題。

【詳細解答】在談到安靜區(qū)（zones of quiet）時，錄音中說“…it cuts noise levels enough for somebody inside the zone to hear a conversation from another part of the work place. Yet, this is only one-way; shouts from the quiet zone could not be heard over the factory noise by those outside it, because the rest of the workplace remains noisy.”由此可知，“安靜區(qū)”的工人可以聽到外邊區(qū)域的談話，而外面卻聽不到里面的談話，故選項B為正確答案。

5.答案：A

【問句譯文】這段談話的主題是什么？

【試題分析】本題為主旨題。

【詳細解答】聽完全文可知，選項B、C、D都只是錄音的某一部分內(nèi)容，只有選項A能全面地概括全文大意，故為正確答案。

SECTION B INTERVIEW

6.答案：C

【問句譯文】美國雇員是按時間付薪金的，那么這就意味著他們該怎樣呢？

【試題分析】本題為細節(jié)題。

【詳細解答】在談到美國雇員是按時間付薪金時，被采訪者說道“So employees are expected to find other work if their own desks are clear, or to help someone else withhis or her work.”由此可知，雇員如果干完了自己的活，就應(yīng)該去幫助別的人，積極主動

地去找活干。故答案選C。

7.答案：B

【問句譯文】靈活的工作時間的一個益處是什么？

【試題分析】本題為細節(jié)理解題。

【詳細解答】由關(guān)鍵句“And as more women now work it gives more family time.”可知，靈活的工作時間使得婦女有更多時間呆在家里，故答案選B。

8.答案：D

【問句譯文】關(guān)于美國的工作合同問題，下列哪一項是不正確的？

【試題分析】本題為細節(jié)題。

【詳細解答】當采訪者問到顧主是否可以無故解雇他時，被采訪者說“There are, of course, legal protections in the US. So employees cannot be unjustly fired without good reasons.”由此可否定美國的勞動合同多數(shù)是短期的說法，故答案選D。

9.答案：A

【問句譯文】從該采訪中可推斷出不拘禮節(jié)的工作氣氛可能會出現(xiàn)在哪類公司？

【試題分析】本題為推理題。

【詳細解答】在采訪臨近尾聲時，男士說“But in many establishments with fewer employees the atmosphere is loose and easy with a lot of joking, and teasing, and wandering in and out of offices among all levels of employees.”由此可知，在那些雇員少的公司，也就是小公司會有不拘禮節(jié)的工作氣氛，故答案選A。

10.答案：D

【問句譯文】這次采訪主要是關(guān)于美國在哪一方面的情況？

【試題分析】本題為主旨題。

【詳細解答】從這四個選項來分析，office hierarchies，office conditions和office roles 只是office life的各個方面。只有用office life才能較全面 地概括這次采訪的內(nèi)容。故答案選D。

SECTION C NEWS BROADCAST

News Item 1

11.答案：A

【問句譯文】參議員多爾對克林頓的反犯罪政策持什么態(tài)度？

【試題分析】本題為推理題。

【詳細解答】由關(guān)鍵句“…retiring Senator Bob Dole, has repeatedly disapproved of Mr. Clinton’s record on fighting crime.”由此可知，多爾是不贊成克林頓的反犯罪政策的，故選項A為正確答案。

News Item 2

12.答案：A

【問句譯文】日本和美國正在做什么？

【試題分析】本題為細節(jié)理解題。

【詳細解答】新聞中講到“At the moment, they are negotiating about photographic film and photographic paper.”由此可知，他們正在就照相用的膠卷和紙進行談判，故答案選A。

13.答案：B

【問句譯文】新聞似乎在暗示兩國間的協(xié)議怎樣？

【試題分析】本題為推理題。

【詳細解答】新聞臨近結(jié)尾時說“This is certainly not the first dispute and it certainly won’t be the last dispute, either.”這里是說這不是美、日兩國之間的第一次矛 盾沖突，這次的協(xié)議不能作為一個永久性的協(xié)議。由此可知，該協(xié)議不可能永久性地解決爭端，故答案選B。

News Item 3

14.答案：B

【問句譯文】根據(jù)該新聞，這塊來自格陵蘭冰塊可以提供哪一方面的信息？

【試題分析】本題為主旨題。

【詳細解答】在談到該冰塊時，科學(xué)家們說“It provides one of the clearest records ofancient weather.”由此可知，從該冰塊可以了解古時候的天氣狀況。

15.答案：D

【問句譯文】下列哪一項陳述是正確的？

【試題分析】本題為細節(jié)理解題。

【詳細解答】新聞臨近結(jié)尾時說“…the scientific teams say that the past 10,000 years is the only period during which the weather has not changed very much.”由此可知，那段時期的氣候變化不是很大，故選項D為正確答案。

SECTION D NOTE-TAKING AND GAP-FILLING

1.答案：known

【詳細解答】在談到公司贊助體育時，第一個理由是“The obvious answer is that they get known worldwide,…”故此空應(yīng)填“known”。

2.答案：save

【詳細解答】公司贊助體育的第二個理由是“The not so obvious answer is that sponsorship can help firms to save money.”即幫助公司省錢（save money）。

3.答案：expensive／costly

【詳細解答】由錄音中的句子“However, sponsorship is surely a very expensive business.”可知，贊助體育活動的代價是非常昂貴的，故此處應(yīng)填寫expensive或costly。

4.答案：match

【詳細解答】由錄音“Companies spend a lot of time making sure that they have a perfect match between the products to be represented and the activity that needs sponsorship.”可知，公司的產(chǎn)品必須與運動項目相吻合（match）。

5.答案：image

【詳細解答】只要聽清了關(guān)鍵句“Basically, companies have to make sure that the image is right and that the product gets maximum coverage through the event.”就可知道，此處應(yīng)填寫image。

6.答案：media

【詳細解答】有錄音“There are the big media events: hours and hours of TV and…”可知，這里指的是大的媒體活動。

7.答案：cosmetics / drinks

【詳細解答】在談到觀眾的潛在購買力時，錄音中舉例說“That should attract drinks manufactures, sports fashion designers, cosmetics producers, and so on.”由于受products一詞的限制，此處可填寫cosmetics或drinks。

8.答案：favorably

【詳細解答】由錄音“…yet will react favorably if asked to comment on products marketed by the sponsoring company.”可知，此處應(yīng)填寫favorably。

9.答案：conditioning

【詳細解答】由錄音“Conditioning the mind is what advertising is about.”可直接填

寫conditioning。

10.答案：expensive

【詳細解答】錄音臨近結(jié)尾時說“…straight advertising is a far more expensive way of promoting your image than sponsorship,…”由此可知，公司贊助體育比直接做廣告要省錢（less expensive）。

Part ⅡProofreading and Error Correction

1.答案：as→like

【詳細解答】as our prehistoric human ancestors意為“作為人類史前的祖先那樣”，但是 根據(jù)上下文，此處應(yīng)表達的意思是“像人類史前的祖先那樣”，故應(yīng)該將as改為介詞like。

2.答案：supplementing→supplemented

【詳細解答】本句中的分詞短語supplementing with animal foods 是定語，修飾vegetable diet，根據(jù)上下文，此處是指“素食被肉食補充”，故應(yīng)該用過去分詞表被動。

3.答案：and→or

【詳細解答】根據(jù)上下文，這里的意思只能是三分之二或多于三分之二，所以不能用表示并列 關(guān)系的and，而應(yīng)該用表示選擇關(guān)系的or。

4.答案：in→on

【詳細解答】on average為固定搭配，意為“平均”。

5.答案：as→whereas/while

【詳細解答】根據(jù)上下文意思，這兩句話表示的是一種對比關(guān)系。故應(yīng)該改用連whereas或w hile，引出相反或不同的事實。

6.答案：for

【詳細解答】provide是及物動詞，可以直接連賓語，不需要任何介詞。

7.答案：of

【詳細解答】despite是一介詞，其后可直接接名詞。

8.答案：half∧→that

【詳細解答】在這里加上that，用來指代前面的blood cholesterol levels，句子結(jié)構(gòu)才完整。

9.答案：if→though

【詳細解答】根據(jù)上下文，這里的主從句關(guān)系不是條件，而是讓步關(guān)系，即“盡管沒有人建議 我們回到土著人的生活方式，…”。

10.答案：for ∧→a

【詳細解答】本句中的a healthier diet表示一種更加健康的飲食。冠詞a泛指“一種或一類”。

SECTION A

TEXT A

短文大意：本文介紹的是藝術(shù)月刊FMR打算在美國出版的原因以及該雜志的特點。

16.答案：A

【參考譯文】Ricci為何計劃在美國版的FMR上登載更多美國藝術(shù)品？

【試題分析】本題為細節(jié)題。

【詳細解答】短文第二段倒數(shù)第二句說“The English-language edition will include more American works, Ricci says, to help Americans get over ‘a(chǎn)n inferiority complex about their art’.”由此可知，登載更多美國藝術(shù)品是為了幫助美國人樹立自信心，因為他們對其沒有太長歷史的文化藝術(shù)而感到自卑。故選項A為正確答案。

17.答案：B

【參考譯文】本文將Ricci和哥倫布相比的主要原因是什么？

【試題分析】本題為推理題。

【詳細解答】眾所周知，哥倫布是一位探險家，他發(fā)現(xiàn)了美洲大陸，而Ricci是想要開拓美國 的藝術(shù)雜志市場，是一位商業(yè)探索者。因此他們同是探索者，故答案選B。

18.答案：D

【參考譯文】我們對美國雜志FMR的印象如何？

【試題分析】本題為推理題。

【詳細解答】短文倒數(shù)第二段說“In addition, he seems to be pursuing his won eclectic vision without giving a moment’s thought to such established competitors as Connoisseur and Horizon.”即該雜志的編輯方式不同于其他藝術(shù)雜志，故選項D“追求自己獨特的藝術(shù)風(fēng)格”為正確答案。

TEXT B

短文大意：本文主要介紹了Geoff舅舅對于英國發(fā)展史的看法。

19.答案：B

【參考譯文】根據(jù)Geoff舅舅的觀點，只有怎樣做才能恢復(fù)國力？

【試題分析】本題為細節(jié)題。

【詳細解答】Geoff舅舅在寫給報社的信中提到“The only way to regain our punch, our character, our lost virtues, and with them the freedom natural to islanders, is to compost our land so as to allow moulds, bacteria and earthworms to remake liv ing soil to nourish Englishmen’s bodies and spirits.”由此可知，Geoff舅舅認為英 國的興衰與使用天然肥料是成正比的，故選項B“使用天然肥料”為正確答案。

20.答案：A

【參考譯文】本文作者很可能是什么語氣？

【試題分析】本題為推理題。

【詳細解答】通讀全文可知，作者在描述Geoff舅舅時用的語言幽默風(fēng)趣，充滿了詼諧、嘲弄的語氣。故選項A“滑稽可笑的”為正確答案。

TEXT C

短文大意：本文主要介紹的是面試者如何做好面試的準備工作。

21.答案：C

【參考譯文】Brenda Stevens女士建議求職者在求職前應(yīng)該怎樣？

【試題分析】本題為細節(jié)題。

【詳細解答】短文第三段第二句說“Brenda Stevens speaks of the value of getting students to deconstruct the advertisement, see what they can offer to that school, and that situation, and then write the letter, do their CVs and criticize each o other’s.’”由此可知，面試訓(xùn)練班的目的是讓學(xué)生對所處場面的了解，故Brenda Stevens 女士建議求職者在求職前應(yīng)該是C“徹底了解所處的場面”。

22.答案：A

【參考譯文】承認自己工作中的一些弱點是否明智？

【試題分析】本題為推理題。

【詳細解答】短文第十段第三句說“The experts agree you should recognize your weaknesses and offer a strategy for overcoming them.”這里以專家的觀點說明應(yīng)聘者應(yīng)該正 視自己的弱點，并且要有克服它們的策略。故答案選A。

23.答案：B

【參考譯文】對于面試者提出的古怪問題，應(yīng)聘者最好的應(yīng)對方法是什么？

【試題分析】本題為推理題。

【詳細解答】短文第十一段談到如果面試者提出愚蠢問題時，應(yīng)聘者應(yīng)該“Do not be thrown, have ways of circumnavigating it, and never, ever let them see that you think they have said something foolish.” 即應(yīng)試者應(yīng)從側(cè)面巧妙地避開問題，并且千萬不要讓面試者看出你認為他們問了愚蠢的問題。故選項B為正確答案。

24.答案：C

【參考譯文】校長所提的建議如何？

【試題分析】本題為歸納總結(jié)題。

【詳細解答】短文中共列出了校長提出的九點建議，均是關(guān)于具體處理問題的辦法，故選項C “實用的”為最佳答案。

TEXT D

短文大意：本文主要對新加坡的“贍養(yǎng)父母議案”的討論。

25.答案：D

【參考譯文】“贍養(yǎng)父母議案”如何？

【試題分析】本題為細節(jié)理解題。

【詳細解答】短文首句說“This month Singapore passed a bill that would give legal teeth to the moral obligation to support one’s parents.”由此可知，選項D“該議案的通過是為了讓年輕人對老年人更盡義務(wù)”為正確答案。

26.答案：A

【參考譯文】作者引用老年人比例不斷上升，似乎是在暗示什么？

【試題分析】本題為推理題。

【詳細解答】短文通過具體數(shù)字告訴我們，在新加坡確實存在老齡人口比例增大的問題，這所 帶來的影響是：“It is that the ratio of economically active people to economically inactive people will decline.”即國家將面臨嚴重的經(jīng)濟問題。故選項A為正確答案。

27.答案：B

【參考譯文】下列哪一種說法是正確的？

【試題分析】本題為細節(jié)題。

【詳細解答】短文第七段第二句說“A father can be compelled by law to maintain his children.”這與B的說法一致，故選項B為正確答案。

28.答案：C

【參考譯文】作者似乎在暗示傳統(tǒng)價值觀怎樣？

【試題分析】本題為細節(jié)題。

【詳細解答】短文第九段首句說“The Maintenance of Parents Bill was put forth to encourage the traditional virtues that have so far kept Asian nations from some of the breakdowns encountered in other affluent societies.”這里是說亞洲國家的傳統(tǒng) 美德使得他們有別于那些富有的國家，這表明傳統(tǒng)美德在保持亞洲國家的特色方面起著重要作用，故答案選C。

29.答案：A

【參考譯文】作者認為如果這項議案成為法律的話，它將會產(chǎn)生怎樣的效果？

【試題分析】本題為推理題。

【詳細解答】短文第十段最后一句說“If it does indeed become law, the bill’s effect would be far more subtle.” 在接下來的幾段里，作者講到贍養(yǎng)父母是個人的責(zé)任，并非 社會的責(zé)任。而有些人礙于情面，不得不重新考慮贍養(yǎng)父母的問題。因此該議案起到了間接的作用。故選項A為正確答案。

30.答案：D

【參考譯文】在文章的結(jié)尾部分，作者似乎在暗示該議案的成功有賴于什么？

【試題分析】本題為總結(jié)題。

【詳細解答】文章的最后一句說“Those of us who pushed for the bill will consider ourselves most successful if it acts as an incentive not to have it invoked in the first place.” 這句話表明該議案是否成功要看它能否激勵人們維護傳統(tǒng)道德觀念，而不是首先考慮對簿公堂，故選項D“孝順意識”為正確答案。

Section B

TEXT E

短文大意：這是一封回信，主要是對世界銀行工作中存在的問題進行辯解。

31.答案：D

【參考譯文】寫這封信的目的是什么？

【試題分析】本題為主旨題。

【詳細解答】信的第二句說“But that statement fails to take account of the Bank’s criteria for ‘success’, which are exceptionally strict.”指出了寫信人沒有考慮到銀 行的成功標準，接著列舉一些具體數(shù)字來闡述這一觀點。在第二段展開了更加深入的論述。因此，該信的目的是為了澄清對世界銀行的誤解。故答案選D。

TEXT F

短文大意：本文主要論述的是發(fā)達國家對發(fā)展中國家的農(nóng)業(yè)援助的危害性。

32.答案：C

【參考譯文】作者的主要論點是什么？

【試題分析】本題為主旨題。

【詳細解答】短文第一段倒數(shù)第二句說“In this sense, aid received in the form of agricultural commodities hurts the developing countries and benefits developed countries mere than proportionately.”由此可知，接受發(fā)達國家以農(nóng)產(chǎn)品形式的援助，危害 的是發(fā)展中國家的利益，受益的是發(fā)達國家。接著在第二段以中國為例，證明了該論點，故選項C“農(nóng)產(chǎn)品形式的援助不利于發(fā)展中國家的經(jīng)濟”為正確答案。

TEXT G

短文大意：本文旨在說明寫作“牛仔工作文化”一書的目的。

33.答案：B

【參考譯文】這篇文章最有可能源自何處？

【試題分析】本題為推理題。

【詳細解答】本文分別闡述了寫作該書的三個目的，用的是第一人稱。由此可知這是對自己所 寫的“牛仔工作文化”一書的評論。故選項B為正確答案。

TEXT H

短文大意：這是一封回信，東方航空公司總裁在信中駁斥了某報社對該公司的評論。

34.答案：A

【參考譯文】寫信者對報社的評論持什么態(tài)度？

【試題分析】本題為推理題。

【詳細解答】信的開頭便說“In your editorial on August 31st, there seems to be some confused thinking in …”表明作者不同意報社的評論，接著作者對報社的觀點一一進行了反駁。故選項A“反駁”為正確答案。

TEXT I

短文大意：本文主要介紹的是美國科學(xué)家計算機領(lǐng)域的最新進展情況。

35.答案：D

【參考譯文】目前的計算機比1952年的ILLIAC型計算機的運算速度快多少？

【試題分析】本題為推理題。

【詳細解答】短文第三段第二句說“Its processing speed was about 50 kilohertz compared with 200 megahertz-that’s 200,000 kilohertz for today’s computers.”由此句可知，當時的速度為50千赫茲，現(xiàn)在的是200，000千赫茲，那么現(xiàn)在的速度是當時的4，000倍。故答案選D。

36.答案：B

【參考譯文】NCSA（全國超級計算機應(yīng)用中心）的發(fā)展目標是什么？

【試題分析】本題為細節(jié)題。

【詳細解答】在短文的第八段，NCSA公司的董事長Larry Smart說“What we’re looking for is a national system in which the networks are 100 times greater than the Intern et today, and the supercomputers are 100 times more powerful”即我們所期望的是一 種全國性的網(wǎng)絡(luò)系統(tǒng)，其運作速度比目前的因特網(wǎng)要快100倍，故選項B“一個更加強大的全 國系統(tǒng)”為正確答案。

TEXT J

短文大意：本文通過介紹日語中兩個詞的起源，說明了日本百貨商店受到本國文化和外國文 化的雙重影響。

37.答案：B

【參考譯文】depato在日本指的是什么？

【試題分析】本題為細節(jié)題。

【詳細解答】短文第一段說“The Japanese have two words for the modern department stores that abound in large urban areas. The older word, hyakkaten, which is seldom used in daily speech, …The more recent and more commonly used word is depato ( from the English ‘department store’).”由此可知，在日本有兩個詞用來表示大城市中的百貨商店，hyakkaten是過去用的，最近常用的是depato，因此選項B為正確答案。

38.答案：D

【參考譯文】在梅奇時代，日本顧客認為depato是怎樣的購物場所？

【試題分析】本題為細節(jié)題。

【詳細解答】短文第三段第三句說“The Meiji depato were soon perceived by Japanese customers as glamorous places to shop because of their Western imports, which the Japanese were eager to see and buy.”由此可知，當時的日本顧客把depato看成是富有 魅力的場所，故選項D“有吸引力的”為正確答案。

TEXT K

短文大意：本文主要介紹的是在開羅召開的第三屆國際人口與發(fā)展會議的一些情況。

39.答案：D

【參考譯文】國際發(fā)展署是一個什么樣的組織？

【試題分析】本題為細節(jié)題。

【詳細解答】短文第四段第二句說“The National Statistics Office recently published the results of the 1993 National Demographic Survey (NDS), which happens to have been funded by the U.S. Agency for International Development.” 這句話告訴我們說 “NDS的基金是由美國的國際發(fā)展署提供的”，由此可知，國際發(fā)展署是一個美國的一個組織，故答案選D。

40.答案：C

【參考譯文】根據(jù)全國人口普查的統(tǒng)計數(shù)據(jù)，從1960年到1993年，菲律賓婦女生育小孩的平均 數(shù)量下降了多少？

【試題分析】本題為細節(jié)題？

【詳細解答】短文倒數(shù)第二段第二句說“The total fertility rote——the number of babies the average woman bears over her lifetime——has dropped to 4.1 in 1993 from 6.4 in 1960.”由此可知，從1960年到1993年，菲律賓婦女生育小孩的減少率由6.4減少到4 1，其差為2.3，故選項C為正確答案。

Translation

part A

參考譯文：

The glory of Vancouver has been achieved through the wisdom and the industry of the Vancouver people, including the contributions of many ethnic groups. Canada, sparsely populated, has a territory larger than that of China, but its population is only less than 30 million. Consequently, to attracting immigrants from other countries has become a national policy long practiced/followed/cherished by Canada. All Canadians except the American Indians, so to speak, are foreign immigrants, differing only in the length of time they have settled in Canada. Vancouver, in particular, is one of the few most celebrated multi-ethnic cities in the world. Among the 1.8 million Vancouver residents, half of them are non-natives and one out of every four residents is from Asia. The 250,000 Chinese there have played a decisive role in the transformation of Vancouver’s economy. Half of them have come to settle in Vancouver over the past five years only, rendering Vancouver the largest area outside Asia where the Chinese inhabit

Part B

參考譯文：

在某些社會中，人們希望擁有孩子是出于所謂的家庭原因：傳宗接代，光宗耀祖，討好祖輩，使那些涉及到家庭的宗教儀式得以正常進行。此類原因在現(xiàn)代世俗化的社會中似顯蒼白，但它們在其他地方曾一度構(gòu)成并確實仍在構(gòu)成強有力的理由。

此外，有一類家庭原因與下列類別不無共通之處，這便是：生兒育女是為了維系或改善婚姻：能拴住丈夫或者使妻子不致于無所事事；修復(fù)或重振婚姻；多子多孫，以為家庭幸福惟有此法。這一點更可以由其反面得到昭示：在某些社會中，無法生兒育女（或無法生育男孩）對婚姻而言是一種威脅，還可作為離婚的現(xiàn)成借口。

后代對于家庭這一體制本身所具有的深遠意義遠非如此。對許多人來說，夫妻兩人尚不足以構(gòu)成一個真正意義上的家庭——夫妻需要孩子來豐富其兩人小天地，賦予該小天地以真正意義上的家庭性質(zhì)，并從子孫后代身上獲取某種回報。

孩子需要家庭，但家庭似乎也需要孩子。家庭作為一種社會機構(gòu)，以其特有的方式，至少從原則上說，可在一個變幻莫測、常常是充滿敵意的世界中讓人從中獲取某種安全、慰藉、保障，以及價值取向。

（責(zé)任編輯：liushengbao）