Question

【题目】Did you know the meaning of a word may change over time? Many English words we know now had different meanings a long time ago. One example is the word nice.

Around the year 1300, nice was first used in English to mean “stupid”. Two hundred years later, nice began to carry a “better” meaning. If people said a book was written nicely, they meant the book was written “clearly” or “carefully”, not “stupidly”. After 1800, nice began to take its meaning like kind or “friendly”. Since then, people have thought of nice as a word with good meanings.

A good change of a word’s meaning like this example of nice is called AMELIORATION. Though we don’t use nice to mean “stupid” any more, it is fun to know how much a word’s meaning can change from its start!

For more examples of AMELIORATION，see next page.

【1】1300 years ago, a “nice person” was believed to be .

A. careful B. friendly

C. stupid D. clever

【2】What is the second paragraph mainly about?

A. What nice used to mean.

B. Why the meaning of nice changed.

C. How long nice has been used.

D. How the meaning of nice changed over time.

【3】AMELIORATION means a word’s meaning .

A. can change from its start

B. changes from bad to good

C. changes from good to bad

D. remains the same over a long time

【4】Which of the following is most likely to appear on the next page?

A. The word terrific used to mean ‘"terrible”, but now it means “excellent”.

B. The word silly used to mean “happy”, but now it means “stupid”.

C. You may wonder why a word’s meaning changes over time.

D. Besides AMELIORATION, a word’s meaning may change in other ways.

Answer 1

【答案】

【1】C

【2】D

【3】B

【4】A

【解析】本文告诉人们，在很久以前很多英语单词有不同的意思。

【1】C考查细节理解。由第二段第一句 Around the year 1300, nice was first used in English to mean “stupid”可知，此题应选C

【2】D考查推理判断。第二段中提到1300年, nice 的意思是stupid，两百年以后nice的意思是better，1800年后, nice的意思是 kind or friendly，自此以后, nice就用这个意思。由此可知，本段主要讲述的是nice意思是怎样随着时间变化的。故选D。

【3】B考查细节理解。由最后一段第二句话Though we don’t use nice to mean “stupid” any more, it is fun to know how much a word’s meaning can change from its start可知，应选B。

【4】A考查推理判断。由最后一段第一句话A good change of a word’s meaning like this example of nice is called AMELIORATION和最后一句For more examples of AMELIORATION，see next page可知，下一页讲的例子应该和nice的例子相似，故应选A。