GRE阅读考试模拟题及答案解析(4)

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　　GRE阅读考试模拟题及答案解析(4)

　　P1

　　Jean Wagner‘s most enduring contribution to the study of Afro-American poetry is his insistence that it be analyzed in a religious, as well as secular, frame of reference.

　　The appropriateness of such an approach may seem self-evident for a tradition commencing with spirituals and owing its early forms, rhythms, vocabulary, and evangelical fervor to Wesleyan hymnals.

　　But before Wagner a secular outlook that analyzed Black poetry solely within the context of political and social protest was dominant in the field.

　　It is Wagner who first demonstrated the essential fusion of racial and religious feeling in Afro-American poetry.

　　The two, he argued, form a symbiotic union in which religious feelings are often applied to racial issues and racial problems are often projected onto a metaphysical plane.

　　Wagner found this most eloquently illustrated in the Black spiritual, where the desire for freedom in this world and the hope for salvation in the next are inextricably intertwined. (159 words)

　　1. The primary purpose of the passage is to

　　(A) contrast the theories of Jean Wagner with those of other contemporary critics

　　(B) document the influence of Jean Wagner on the development of Afro-American poetry

　　(C) explain the relevance of Jean Wagner‘s work to the study of Afro-American religion

　　(D) indicate the importance of Jean Wagner‘s analysis of Afro-American poetry

　　(E) present the contributions of Jean Wagner to the study of Black spirituals

　　2. All of the following aspects of Afro-American poetry are referred to in the passage as having been influenced by Wesleyan hymnals EXCEPT

　　(A) subject matter

　　(B) word choice

　　(C) rhythm

　　(D) structure

　　(E) tone

　　3. It can be inferred from the passage that, before Wagner, most students of Afro-American poetry did which of the following?

　　(A) Contributed appreciably to the transfer of political protest from Afro-American poetry to direct political action.

　　(B) Ignored at least some of the historical roots of Afro-American poetry.

　　(C) Analyzed fully the aspects of social protest to be found in such traditional forms of Afro-American poetry as the Black spiritual.

　　(D) Regarded as unimportant the development of fervent emotionalism in a portion of Afro-American poetry.

　　(E) Concentrated on the complex relations between the technical elements in Afro-American poetry and its political content.

　　P2

　　In the early 1950‘s, historians who studied preindustrial Europe (which we may define here as Europe in the period from roughly 1300 to 1800) began , for the first time in large numbers , to investigate more of the preindustrial European population than the 2 or 3 percent who comprised the political and social elite: the kings, generals, judges, nobles, bishops, and local magnates who had hitherto usually filled history books.

　　One difficulty, however, was that few of the remaining 97 percent recorded their thoughts or had them chronicled by contemporaries.

　　Faced with this situation, many historians based their investigations on the only records that seemed to exist: birth, marriage, and death records.

　　As a result, much of the early work on the nonelite was aridly statistical in nature; reducing the vast majority of the population to a set of numbers was hardly more enlightening than ignoring them altogether.

　　Historians still did not know what these people thought or felt.

　　One way out of this dilemma was to turn to the records of legal courts, for here the voices of the nonelite can most often be heard, as witnesses, plaintiffs, and defendants.

　　These documents have acted as "a point of entry into the mental world of the poor."

　　Historians such as Le Roy Ladurie have used the documents to extract case histories, which have illuminated the attitudes of different social groups (these attitudes include, but are not confined to, attitudes toward crime and the law) and have revealed how the authorities administered justice.

　　It has been societies that have had a developed police system and practiced Roman law, with its written depositions, whose court records have yielded the most data to historians.

　　In Anglo-Saxon countries hardly any of these benefits obtain, but it has still been possible to glean information from the study of legal documents.

　　The extraction of case histories is not, however, the only use to which court records may be put.

　　Historians who study preindustrial Europe have used the records to establish a series of categories of crime and to quantify indictments that were issued over a given number of years.

　　This use of the records does yield some information about the nonelite, but this information gives us little insight into the mental lives of the nonelite.

　　We also know that the number of indictments in preindustrial Europe bears little relation to the number of actual criminal acts, and we strongly suspect that the relationship has varied widely over time.

　　In addition, aggregate population estimates are very shaky, which makes it difficult for historians to compare rates of crime per thousand in one decade of the preindustrial period with rates in another decade.

　　Given these inadequacies, it is clear why the case history use of court records is to be preferred. (473 words)

　　4. The author suggests that, before the early 1950‘s, most historians who studied preindustrial Europe did which of the following?

　　(A) Failed to make distinctions among members of the preindustrial European political and social elite.

　　(B) Used investigatory methods that were almost exclusively statistical in nature.

　　(C) Inaccurately estimated the influence of the preindustrial European political and social elite.

　　(D) Confined their work to a narrow range of the preindustrial European population.

　　(E) Tended to rely heavily on birth, marriage, and death records.

　　5. According to the passage, the case histories extracted by historians have

　　(A) scarcely illuminated the attitudes of the political and social elite

　　(B) indicated the manner in which those in power apportioned justice

　　(C) focused almost entirely on the thoughts and feelings of different social groups toward crime and the law

　　(D) been considered the first kind of historical writing that utilized the records of legal courts

　　(E) been based for the most part on the trial testimony of police and other legal authorities

　　6. It can be inferred from the passage that much of the early work by historians on the European nonelite of the preindustrial period might have been more illuminating if these historians had

　　(A) used different methods of statistical analysis to investigate the nonelite

　　(B) been more successful in identifying the attitudes of civil authorities, especially those who administered justice, toward the nonelite

　　(C) been able to draw on more accounts, written by contemporaries of the nonelite, that described what this nonelite thought

　　(D) relied more heavily on the personal records left by members of the European political and social elite who lived during the period in question

　　(E) been more willing to base their research on the birth, marriage, and death records of the nonelite

　　7. It can be inferred from the passage that a historian who wished to compare crime rates per thousand in a European city in one decade of the fifteenth century with crime rates in another decade of that century would probably be most aided by better information about which of the following?

　　(A) The causes of unrest in the city during the two decades

　　(B) The aggregate number of indictments in the city nearest to the city under investigation during the two decades

　　(C) The number of people who lived in the city during each of the decades under investigation

　　(D) The mental attitudes of criminals in the city, including their feelings about authority, during each of the decades under investigation

　　(E) The possibilities for a member of the city‘s nonelite to become a member of the political and social elite during the two decades

　　P3

　　Mycorrhizal fungi infect more plants than do any other fungi and are necessary for many plants to thrive, but they have escaped widespread investigation until recently for two reasons.

　　First, the symbiotic association is so well-balanced that the roots of host plants show no damage even when densely infected.

　　Second, the fungi cannot as yet be cultivated in the absence of a living root.

　　Despite these difficulties, there has been important new work that suggests that this symbiotic association can be harnessed to achieve more economical use of costly superphosphate fertilizer and to permit better exploitation of cheaper, less soluble rock phosphate.

　　Mycorrhizal benefits are not limited to improved phosphate uptake in host plants.

　　In legumes, Mycorrhizal inoculation has increased nitrogen fixation beyond levels achieved by adding phosphate fertilizer alone.

　　Certain symbiotic associations also increase the host plant‘s resistance to harmful root fungi.

　　8. Which of the following most accurately describes the passage?

　　(A) A description of a replicable experiment

　　(B) A summary report of new findings

　　(C) A recommendation for abandoning a difficult area of research

　　(D) A refutation of an earlier hypothesis

　　(E) A confirmation of earlier research

　　For the following question, consider each of the choices separately and select all that apply

　　9. It can be inferred from the passage that which of the following has NOT been a factor influencing the extent to which research on mycorrhizal fungi has progressed?

　　□A Lack of a method for identifying mycorrhizal fungi

　　□B Difficulties surrounding laboratory production of specimens for study

　　□C Difficulties ensuing from the high cost and scarcity of superphosphate fertilizers

　　P4

　　It is one of nature‘s great ironies that the availability of nitrogen in the soil frequently sets an upper limit on plant growth even though the plants‘ leaves are bathed in a sea of nitrogen gas.

　　The leguminous plants—among them crop plants such as soybeans, peas, alfalfa, and clover—have solved the nitrogen supply problem by entering into a symbiotic relationship with the bacterial genus Rhizobium.

　　10. Which of the following situations is most closely analogous to the situation described by the author as one of nature‘s great ironies?

　　(A) That of a farmer whose crops have failed because the normal midseason rains did not materialize and no preparations for irrigation had been made

　　(B) That of a long-distance runner who loses a marathon race because of a wrong turn that cost him twenty seconds

　　(C) That of shipwrecked sailors at sea in a lifeboat, with one flask of drinking water to share among them

　　(D) That of a motorist who runs out of gas a mere five miles from the nearest gas station

　　(E) That of travelers who want to reach their destination as fast and as cheaply as possible, but find that cost increases as travel speed increases

　　P5

　　Throughout human history there have been many stringent taboos concerning watching other people eat or eating in the presence of others.

　　There have been attempts to explain these taboos in terms of inappropriate social relationships either between those who are involved and those who are not simultaneously involved in the satisfaction of a bodily need, or between those already satiated and those who appear to be shamelessly gorging.

　　Undoubtedly such elements exist in the taboos, but there is an additional element with a much more fundamental importance.

　　In prehistoric times, when food was so precious and the on-lookers so hungry, not to offer half of the little food one had was unthinkable, since every glance was a plea for life. (124 words)

　　11. If the argument in the passage is valid, taboos against eating in the presence of others who are not also eating would be LEAST likely in a society that

　　(A) had always had a plentiful supply of food

　　(B) emphasized the need to share worldly goods

　　(C) had a nomadic rather than an agricultural way of life

　　(D) emphasized the value of privacy

　　(E) discouraged overindulgence

　　12. The author‘s hypothesis concerning the origin of taboos against watching other people eat emphasizes the

　　(A) general palatability of food

　　(B) religious significance of food

　　(C) limited availability of food

　　(D) various sources of food

　　(E) nutritional value of food

　　13. Select the sentence in the passage in which the author suggests that past attempts to explain some taboos concerning eating are incomplete.