48.What is the text mainly about?

A.The relationship between accents and social classes.

B.The Queen’s Christmas speeches on TV.

C.The changes in a person’s accent.

D.The recent development of the English language.

答案　 45.D　 46.B　 47.A　 48.C

Passage 24

(08·湖南D篇)

Celebrity(名人) has become one of the most important representatives of popular culture.Fans used to be crazy about a specific film,but now the public tends to base its consumption(消费) on the interest of celebrity attached to any given product.Besides,fashion magazines have almost abandoned the practice of putting models on the cover because they don’t sell nearly as well as famous faces.As a result,celebrities have realized their unbelievably powerful market potential,

moving from advertising for others’ products to developing their own.

Celebrity clothing lines aren’t a completely new phenomenon,but in the past they were typically aimed at the ordinary consumers,and limited to a few TV actresses.Today　 they’re started by first-class stars whose products enjoy equal fame with some world top brands.The most successful start-ups have been those by celebrities with specific personal style.As celebrities become more and more experienced at the market,they expand their production scale rapidly,covering almost all the poducts of daily life.

However,for every success story,there’s a related warning tale of a celebrity who overvalued his consumer appeal.No matter how famous the product’s origin is,if it fails to impress consumers with its own qualities it begins to resemble an exercise in self-promotional marketing.And once the initial(最初的) attention dies down,consumer interest might fade,loyalty(忠诚) returning to tried-and-true labels.

Today,celebrities face even more severe embarrassment.The pop-cultural circle might be bigger than ever,but its rate of turnover has speeded up as well.Each misstep threatens to reduce a celebrity’s shelf life,and the same newspaper or magazine that once brought him fame has no problem picking him to pieces when the opportunity appears.Still,the ego’s(自我的) potential for expansion is limitless.Having already achieved great wealth and public recognition,many celebrities see fashion as the next frontier to be conquered.As the saying goes,success and failure always go hand in hand.Their success as designers might last only a short time,but fashion-like celebrity-has always been temporary.

47.We may infer from the text that the Journal of Phonetics is a magazine on　　　　 .

A.speech sounds　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　 B.Christmas customs

C.TV broadcasting　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　 D.personal messages

46.Which of the following is an example of a less noble accent in English?

A.“Dutay”.　　　　　　 B.“Citee”.　　　　　　　 C.“Hame”.　　　　　　 D.“Lorst”.

45.The Queen’s broadcasts were chosen for the study mainly because　　　　 .

A.she has been Queen for many years

B.she has a less upper-class accent now

C.her speeches are familiar to many people

D.her speeches have been recorded for 50 years

75.We can infer that the text is　　　　 .

A.a description of natural resources

B.a research report

C.a book review

D.an introduction to a scientist

答案　 72.B　 73.A　 74.D　 75.C

Passage 23

(08·全国ⅡB篇)

The Queen’s English is now sounding less upper-class,a scientific study of the Queen’s Christmas broadcasts has found.Researchers have studied each of her messages to the Commonwealth countries since 1952 to find out the change in her pronunciation from the noble Upper Received to the Standard Received.

Jonathan Harrington,a professor at Germany’s University of Munich,wanted to discover whether accent(口音) changes recorded over the past half century would take place within one person.“As far as I know,there just is nobody else for whom there is this sort of broadcast records,”he said.

He said the noble way of pronouncing vowels(元音) had gradually lost ground as the noble upper-class accent over the past years.“Her accent sounds slightly less noble than it did 50 years ago.But these are very,very small and slow changes that we don’t notice from year to year.”

“We may be able to relate it to changes in the social classes,”he told The Daily Telegraph,a British　 newspaper.“In 1952 she would have been heard saying ‘thet men in the bleck het’.Now it would be ‘that man in the black hat’.Similarly,she would have spoken of ‘the citay’ and’dutay’,rather than ‘citee’and‘dutee’,and‘hame’rather than‘home’.In the 1950s she would have been ‘lorst’,but by the 1970s ‘lost’.”

The Queen’s broadcast is a personal message to the Commonwealth countries.Each Christmas,the 10-minute broadcast is put on TV at 3 pm in Britain as many families are recovering from their traditional turkey lunch(传统火鸡午餐).

The results were published(发表) in the Journal of Phonetics.

74.Wilson suggests that one way to keep biodiversity is to　　　　 .

A.learn how to farm scientifically B.build homes for some dying species

C.make it clear what to eat　　　　　　　　　 D.use more species for food

73.How many species are most important to our present food supply?

A.Twenty.　　　　　　　　　　 B.Eighty.　　　　 C.One hundred.　　　　　　 D.Ten thousand.

72.We learn from the text that Wilson cares most about　　　　 .

A.the environment for plants　　　　　　　 B.the biodiversity of our earth

C.the waste of natural resources　　　　　 D.the importance of human values

51. What can we infer from the passage?

　 A. Active learning is less important.　　　　　　　　　　 B. Passive learning may not be reliable.

　 C. Active learning occurs more frequently.　　 D. Passive learning is not found among scholars.

答案　 48.C　 49.D　 50.A　 51.B

Passage 22

(08·全国ⅠE篇)

Edward Wilson is America’s，if not the world’s，leading naturalist.In The Future of Life，he takes us on a tour of the world’s natural resources(资源).How are they used? What has been lost? What remains and is it able to continue with the present speed of use?Wilson also points out the need to understand fully the biodiversity(生物多样性) of our earth.

Wilson begins with an open letter to the pioneer in environment(环境) protection，Henry David Thorean.He compares today’s Walden Pond with that of

Thorean’s day.Wilson will use such comparisons for the rest of the book.The problem is clear: the earth，with human help，be made to return to biodiversity levels that will be able to support us in the future?

Biodiversity，Wilson argues，is the key to settling many problems the earth faces today.Even our agricultural crops can gain advantages from it.A mere hundred species(物种) are the basis of our food supply，of which but twenty carry the load.Wilson suggests changing this situation by looking into ten thousand species that could be made use of，which will be a way to reduce the clearing of the natural homes of plants and animals to enlarge farming areas.

At the end of the book，Wilson discusses the importance of human values in considering the environment.If you are to continue to live on the earth，you may well read and act on the ideas in this book.

50. The author mentions the game Rumor to show that _____.

　 A. a message may be changed when being passed on

　 B. a message should be delivered in different ways

　 C. people may have problems with their sense of hearing

　 D. people tend not to believe in what they know as rumor