The writer could not bear it. He could not ____ it.
A.lift
B.carry
C.suffer
D.stand
A.lift
B.carry
C.suffer
D.stand
“Schools have always been in a society where practical is more important than intellectual,” says education writer Diane Ravitch. “Schools could be a counterbalance.” Razitch’s latest bock, Left Back: A Century of Failed School Reforms, traces the roots of anti-intellectualism in our schools, concluding they are anything but a counterbalance to the American distaste for intellectual pursuits.
But they could and should be. Encouraging kids to reject the life of the mind leaves them vulnerable to exploitation and control. Without the ability to think critically, to defend their ideas and understand the ideas of others, they cannot fully participate in our democracy. Continuing along this path, says writer Earl Shorris, “We will become a second-rate country. We will have a less civil society.”
“Intellect is resented as a form. of power or privilege,” writes historian and professor Richard Hofstadter in Anti-Intellectualism in American life, a Pulitzer Prize winning book on the roots of anti-intellectualism in US politics, religion, and education. From the beginning of our history, says Hofstadter, our democratic and populist urges have driven us to reject anything that smells of elitism. Practicality, common sense, and native intelligence have been considered more noble qualities than anything you could learn from a book.
Ralph Waldo Emerson and other Transcendentalist philosophers thought schooling and rigorous book learning put unnatural restraints on children:“We are shut up in schools and college recitation rooms for 10 or 15 years and come out at last with a bellyful of words and do not know a thing.”Mark Twain’s Huckleberry Finn exemplified American anti-intellectualism. Its hero avoids being civilized —— going to school and learning to read —— so he can preserve his innate goodness.
Intellect, according to Hofstadter, is different from native intelligence, a quality we reluctantly admire. Intellect is the critical, creative, and contemplative side of the mind. Intelligence seeks to grasp, manipulate, re-order, and adjust, while intellect examines, ponders, wonders, theorizes, criticizes and imagines.
School remains a place where intellect is mistrusted. Hofstadter says our country’s educational system is in the grips of people who “joyfully and militantly proclaim their hostility to intellect and their eagerness to identify with children who show the least intellectual promise.”
第56题:What do American parents expect their children to acquire in school?
A The habit of thinking independently.
B Profound knowledge of the world.
C Practical abilities for future career.
D The confidence in intellectual pursuits.
Many observers wrote about the loneliness and monotony of life on the Plains. Men escaped the oppressiveness by working outdoors and taking occasional trips to sell crops or buy supplies. But women were more isolated, confined by domestic chores to the household, where, as one writer remarked, they were "not much better than slaves. It is a weary, monotonous round of cooking and washing and mending and as a result the insane asylum is 1/3 filled with wives of farmers."
The ad has great appeal. It pictures a handsome man sitting at a piano in front of smiling guests. It tells the story of Jack, who has secretly learned to play the piano through a mail-order course. His friends at a party all scoff when he sits at the keyboard. But as he plays the first notes of Beethoven's "Moonlight Sonata, " they all amazed. When he finishes his flawless performance, the listeners shower him with applause and praise.
Jack tells his friends that he learned to play through the V. S. School of Music. He explains that he was taught through a new method, using no laborious scales and no tiresome practicing. He didn't even have a special talent for music! In the ad, others, too, could increase their popularity and gain happiness.
The writer of this ad, John Gaples, called this style. the "Walter Mitty approach." Walter Mitty is a character in a short story by James Thurber, who daydreams of taking part in great adventures. Although this ad seems old-fashioned now, many people still dream of such easy social success.
The opening sentence catches your attention by______.
A.surprising you
B.describing a humorous situation
C.ridiculing someone
D.appealing to people's dreams of personal success
As long as the resources we consumed each year came primarily from within our own boundaries, this was largely an internal matter. But as our resources come more and more from the outside world, "outsiders" are going to have some stay over the rate at which and terms under which we consume. We will no longer be able to think in terms of "our" resources and "their" resources, but only of common resources.
As Americans consuming such a disproportionate share of the world's resources, we have to question whether or not we can continue our pursuit of super affluence in a world of scarcity. We are now reaching the point where we must carefully examine the presumed link between our level of well-being and the level of material goods consumed. If you have only one crust of bread, then an additional crust of bread doesn't make that much different. In the eyes of most of the world today, Americans have their loaf of bread and are asking for still more. People elsewhere are beginning to ask why. This is the question we're going to have to answer, whether we're trying to persuade countries to step up their exports of oil to us or trying to convince them that we ought to be permitted to maintain our share of the world fish catch.
The prospect of a scarcity of, and competition for, the world's resources require that we reexamine the way in which we relate to the rest of the world. It means we find ways of cutting back on resource consumption that is dependent on the resources and cooperation of other countries. We cannot expect people in these countries to concern themselves with our worsening energy and food shortages unless we demonstrate some concern for the hunger, illiteracy and disease that are diminishing life for them.
The writer warns Americans that ______.
A.their excessive consumption has caused world resource exhaustion
B.they are confronted with the problem of how to obtain more material goods
C.their unfair share of the world's resources should give way to proper division among countries
D.they have to discard their cars for lack of fossil fuel in the world
Faces, like fingerprints(指纹) , are unique. Did you ever wonder how it is possible for us to recognize people? Even a skilled writer probably could not describe all the features that make one face different from another. Yet a very young child—or even an animal, such as a pigeon—can learn to recognize faces. We all take this ability for granted.
We also tell people apart by how they behave. When we talk about someone's personality, we mean the ways in which he or she acts, speaks, thinks and feels that make that individual different from others.
Like the human face, human personality is very complex. But describing someone's personality in words is somewhat easier than describing his face. If you were asked to describe what a "nice face" looked like, you probably would have a difficult time doing so. But if you were asked to describe a" nice person" , you might begin to think about someone who was kind, considerate (考虑 周到的) , friendly, warm, and so forth.
There are many words to describe how a person thinks, feels and acts. Gordon an Ports, an American psychologist, found nearly 18, 000 English words characterizing differences in people's behavior. And many of us use this information as a basis for describing, or typing his personality. Bookworms, conservatives, military types—people are described with such terms.
People have always tried to" type" each other. Actors in early Greek drama wore masks to show the audience whether they played the villain's (坏人) or the hero 's role. In fact, the words "person" and" personality" come from the Latin persona, meaning " mask " . Today, most television and movie actors do not wear masks. But we can easily tell the "good guys" from the "bad guys" because the two types differ in appearance as well as in actions.
The main idea of this passage is ______.
A.how to distinguish people's faces
B.how to describe people's personality
C.how to distinguish people both inward (内向的) and outward (外向的)
D.how to differ good persons from bad persons
The writer's attitude towards the use of the telephone is ______.
A.affectionate
B.approving
C.disapproving
D.neutral
A.Best writer of the English novel
B.Father of the English novel
C.the most gifted writer of the English novel
D.conventional writer of English novel
To the writer, the fact that women alter their old-fashioned dresses is seen as ______.
A.a waste of money
B.a waste of time
C.an expression of taste
D.an expression of creativity
In the writer's opinion, laws and manners ______.
A.are always the same
B.are changeable
C.can be important if you dine in a restaurant
D.influence each other