them on the wall. When a natural history museum wants an [ZZ(Z]exhibition[ZZ)], it must often build it. [JY](3)[ZZ(Z]exhibit[ZZ)]〖FK)〗〖CSD〗〖CSX〗
Demographic indicators show that Americans in the postwar period
were more eager than over to establish families. They quickly brought down the age at marriage for both men and women and
brought the birth rate to a twentieth century height after more than [JY](1)____ a hundred years of a steady decline, producing the “baby boom”.
[JY](2)____
There young adults established a trend of early marriage and relatively
large families that went for more than two decades and caused a major but [JY](3)____ temporary reversal of long-term demographic patterns. From the 1940s 235
through the early 1960s, Americans married at a high rate and at a [JY](4)____
younger age than their Europe counterparts. [JY](5)____
Less noted but equally more significant, the man and women
[JY](6)____ who formed families between 1940 and 1960 nevertheless reduced
[JY](7)____ the divorce rate after a postwar peak; their marriages remained intact to a greater extent than did that of couples who married in earlier [JY](8)____
as well as later decades. Since the United States maintained its [JY](9)____ dubious distinction of having the highest divorce rate
in the world,
the temporary decline in divorce did not occur in the same extent in [JY](10)____
Europe. Contrary to fears of the experts, the role of breadwinner
and homemaker was not abandoned. Part Ⅲ Reading 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 and then mark 236
your answers on your COLORED ANSWER SHEET. TEXT A
Hostility to Gypsies has existed almost from the time they first
appeared in Europe in the 14th century. The origins of the Gypsies, with little written history, were shrouded in mystery. What is known now from clues in the various dialects of their language, Romany, is
that they came from northern India to the Middle East a thousand years ago, working as minstrels and mercenaries, metalsmiths and servants.
Europeans misnamed them Egyptians, soon shortened to Gypsies. A clan
system, based mostly on their traditional crafts and geography, has
made them a deeply fragmented and fractious people, only really
unifying in the face of enmity from non-Gypsies, whom they call gadje.
Today many Gypsy activists prefer to be called Roma, which comes from the Romany word for “man”. But on my travels among them most still
referred to themselves as Gypsies. In Europe their persecution by the gadje began quickly, with the church
seeing heresy in their fortune-telling and the state
seeing anti-social behaviour in their nomadism. At various times they have been forbidden
to wear their distinctive bright clothes, to speak their own language,
to travel, to marry one another, or to ply their traditional crafts.
In some countries they were reduced to slavery—it wasn?t until the
mid-1800s that Gypsy slaves were freed in Romania. In more recent times the Gypsies were caught up in Nazi ethnic hysteria, and perhaps half a million perished in the Holocaust. Their horses have been shot and the wheels removed from their wagons, their names have been changed,
their women have been sterilized, and their children have been forcibly
given for adoption to non-Gypsy families.
But the Gypsies have confounded predictions of their disappearance as
a distinct ethnic group, and their numbers have burgeoned. Today there
are an estimated 8 to 12 million Gypsies scattered across Europe, making them the continent?s largest minority. The exact number is hard to
pin down. Gypsies have regularly been undercounted, both by regimes
anxious to downplay their profile and by Gypsies themselves, seeking
to avoid bureaucracies. Attempting to remedy past inequities, activist
groups may overcount. Hundreds of thousands more have emigrated to the 237
Americans and elsewhere. With very few exceptions Gypsies have
expressed no great desire for a country to call their own—unlike the
Jews, to whom the Gypsy experience is often compared. “Romanestan,”said Ronald Lee, the Canadian Gypsy writer, “is where
my two feet stand.”
16. Gypsies are united only when they ____. A.are engaged in traditional crafts B.call themselves Roma
C.live under a clan system D.face external threats 17. In history hostility to Gypsies in Europe resulted in their
persecution by all the following EXCEPT ____. A.the Egyptians B.the state C.the church D.the Nazis
18. According to the passage, the main difference between the Gypsies
and the Jews lies in their concepts of ____. A.language B.culture C.identity D.custom Text B
I was just a boy when my father brought me to Harlem for the first time,
almost 50 years ago. We stayed at the Hotel Theresa, a grand brick structure at 125th Street and Seventh Avenus. Once, in the hotel 238
restaurant, my father pointed out Joe Louis. He even got Mr. Brown, the hotel manager, to introduce me to him, a bit paunchy but still the
champ as far as I was concerned.
Much has changed since then. Business and real estate are booming. Some
say a new renaissance is under way. Others decry what they see as outside
forces running roughshod over the old Harlem. New York meant Harlem to me, and as a young man I visited it whenever I could. But many of my old haunts are gone. The Theresa shut down in
1966. National chains that once ignored Harlem now anticipate yuppie
money and want pieces of this prime Manhattan real estate. So here I
am on a hot August afternoon, sitting in a Starbucks that two years
ago opened a block away from the Theresa, snatching at
memories between sips of high-priced coffee. I am about to open up a piece of the old
Harlem—the New York Amsterdam News—when a tourist asking directions to Sylvia?s, a prominent Harlem restaurant, penetrates my daydreaming.
He?s carrying a book: Touring Historic Harlem.
History. I miss Mr. Michaux?s bookstore, his House of Common Sense, which was across from the Theresa. He had a big billboard out front
with brown and black faces painted on it that said in large
letters:“World History Book Outlet on 2 000 000 000 Africans and
Nonwhite Peoples.”An ugly state office building has swallowed that space. I miss speaker like Carlos Cooks, who was always on the southwest corner
of 125th and Seventh, urging listeners to support Africa. Harlem?s
powerful political electricity seems unplugged—although the streets
are still energized, especially by West African immigrants.
Hardworking southern newcomers formed the bulk of the community back in the 1920s and ?30s, when Harlem renaissance artists, writers, and
intellectuals gave it a glitter and renown that made it the capital of black America. From Harlem, W. E. B. Dubois, Langston Hughes, Paul
Robeson, Zora Hurston, and others helped power America?s cultural
influence around the world. By the 1970s and ?80s drugs and crime had ravaged parts of the community. 239 And the life expectancy for men in Harlem was less than that of men in Bangladesh. Harlem had become a symbol of the dangers