中国矿业大学2017年博士研究生入学考试英语试题
Section I Reading Comprehension (40 points, 50 minutes)
Directions: There are 5 passages in this section. Each passage is followed by some questions or unfinished statements. For each of them there are four choices marked A, B, C and D. You should decide on the best choice and mark the corresponding letter on the ANSWER SHEET.
Passage One
As the twentieth century began, the importance of formal education in the United States increased. The frontier had mostly disappeared and by 1910 most Americans lived in towns and cities. Industrialization and the bureaucratization of economic life combined with a new emphasis upon credentials and expertise to make schooling increasingly important for economic and social mobility. Increasingly, too, schools were viewed as the most important means of integrating immigrants into American society.
The arrival of a great wave of southern and eastern European immigrants at the turn of the century coincided with and contributed to an enormous expansion of formal schooling. By 1920 schooling to age fourteen or beyond was compulsory in most states, and the school year was greatly lengthened. Kindergartens, vacation schools, extracurricular activities, and vocational education and counseling extended the influence of public schools over the lives of students, many of whom in the larger industrial cities were the children of immigrants. Classes for adult immigrants were sponsored by public schools, corporations, unions, churches, settlement houses and other agencies.
Reformers early in the twentieth century suggested that education programs should suit the needs of specific populations. Immigrant women were one such population. Schools tried to educate young women so they could occupy productive places in the urban industrial economy, and one place many educators considered appropriate for women was the home.
Although looking after the house and family was familiar to immigrant women, American education gave homemaking a new definition. In preindustrial economies, homemaking had meant the production as well as the consumption of goods, and it commonly included income-producing activities both inside and outside the home. In the highly industrialized early-twentieth-century United States, however, overproduction rather than scarcity was becoming a problem. Thus, the ideal American homemaker was viewed as a consumer rather than a producer. Schools trained women to be consumer homemaker — cooking, shopping, decorating, and caring for children“efficiently”in their own homes, or if economic necessity demanded, as employees in the homes of others. Subsequent reforms have made these notions seem quite out-of-date.
1. It can be inferred from the first paragraph that one important factor in the increasing importance of education in the United States was______.
A. the growing number of schools in frontier communities
B. an increase in the number of trained teachers
C. the expanding economic problems of schools
D. the increased urbanization of the entire country
2. According to the passage, one important change in the United States education by 1920s was that______.
A. most places required children to attend schools
B. the amount of time spent on formal education was limited
C. new regulations were imposed on nontraditional education
D. adults and children studied in the same classes
3. Vacation schools and extracurricular activities are mentioned in Paragraph 2 to illustrate______.
A. alternatives to formal education provided by public schools
B. the importance of educational changes
C. activities that competed to attract new immigrants to their programs
D. the increased impact of public schools on students
4. According to the passage, early-20th-century education reformers believed that______.
A. different groups needed different kinds of education
B. special programs should be set up in frontier communities to modernize them
C. corporations and other organizations damaged educational progress
D. more women should be involved in education and industry
Passage Two
One of the most successful commercial products ever launched is said to have come about as the result of a mistake. In 1986, Jacob's Pharmacy in Atlanta, Georgia, was selling a nerve tonic known as“French Wine Cola—Ideal Nerve Tonic”. By accidentally adding fizzy water instead of still water to the recipe, a pharmacist called John S. Pemberton invented what has today become the most popular soft drink in the world:Coca-Cola. Along with its closest rival—Pepsi—which appeared on the market three years later. Coke has enjoyed great success worldwide, particularly in the past fifty years. Indeed, old bottles and “limited edition” cans can often fetch considerable sums from collectors, and there are even stores which deal exclusively in Coke products and memorabilia.
What could possibly account for the amazing success of Coca-Cola? How has this combination of carbonated water, sugar, acid and flavorings come to symbolize the American way of life for most of the world? After all, even the manufacturers could hardly describe Coke as a healthy product since it contains relatively high amounts of sugar (admittedly not the case with Diet Coke which contains artificial sweeteners instead of sugar) and phosphoric acid, both of which are known to damage teeth.
One explanation may be found in the name. The original recipe included a flavoring from the coca plant and probably included small amounts of cocaine (an addictive substance), but since the early part of this century all traces of cocaine have been removed. However, Coke (like all cola drinks) also includes a flavoring from the cola tree; cola extract contains caffeine, which is a stimulant, and the Coca-Cola Company adds extra caffeine for good measure. While caffeine is not thought to be an addictive substance in itself, there is considerable evidence that over a period of time the consumption of caffeine has to be increased in order for its stimulating effect to be maintained, and so sales of Coke perhaps benefit as a result.
A more likely reason for the enduring popularity of Coke may, however, be found in the company's enviable marketing strategies. Over the years it has come up with some of the most memorable commercials, tunes, slogans and sponsorship in the world of advertising, variously emphasizing international harmony, youthfulness and a carefree lifestyle. Few other companies (arguably including Pepsi) have been able to match such marketing strategies so consistently or effectively. As suggested earlier, the influences of American culture are evident just about everywhere, and Coca-Cola has somehow come to represent a vision of the United States that much of the rest of the world dreams about and aspires to. Perhaps drinking Coke brings people that little bit closer to the dream.
5. In the first paragraph, the author points out that______.
A. Coke is so popular that some shops sell nothing else
B. only certain people are allowed to enter the most popular Coke stores
C. some stores can successfully sell Coke at higher prices
D. Coke is so popular that some shops only sell goods with the Coca-Cola
6. In the last sentence of the second paragraph, the author implies that______.
A. it is easy for the company to argue that Coke is a healthy drink
B. Coke is generally considered to be unhealthy as a drink
C. the company believes Coke is not an unhealthy product
D. Coke is, in fact, quite a healthy drink
7. The underlined sentence in Paragraph 4 means that______.
A. Pepsi and a few other companies have had better marketing than Coca-Cola
B. the Coke company has been more successful in marketing than most others
C. some companies have copied Coca-Cola's marketing strategies very effectively
D. no other company has been as successful as Coca-Cola in marketing its products
8. Which of the following statements about the passage is true?
A. Cocaine and caffeine are addictive substances.
B. At least one of the ingredients of Coke is addictive.
C. The stimulating effect of caffeine is reduced over time unless consumption of it is increased.
D. The Coca-Cola company has gradually increased the amount of caffeine it puts in Coke.
Passage Three
I've been writing for most of my life. The book Writing Without Teachers introduced me to one distinction and one practice that has helped my writing processes tremendously. The distinction is between the creative mind and the critical mind. While you need to employ both to get to a finished result, they cannot work in parallel no matter how much we might like to think so.
Trying to criticize writing on the fly is possibly the single greatest barrier to writing that most of us encounter. If you are listening to that 5th grade English teacher correct your grammar while you are trying to capture a fleeting thought, the thought will die. If you capture the fleeting thought and simply share it with the world in raw form, no one is likely to understand. You must learn to create first and then criticize if you want to make writing the tool for thinking that it is.
The practice that can help you past your learned bad habits of trying to edit as you write is what Elbow calls “free writing.” In free writing, the objective is to get words down on paper non-stop, usually for 15-20 minutes. No stopping, no going back, no criticizing. The goal is to get the words flowing. As the words begin to flow, the ideas will come from the shadows and let themselves be captured on your notepad or your screen.
Now you have raw materials that you can begin to work with using the critical mind that you've persuaded to sit on the side and watch quietly. Most likely, you will believe that this will take more time than you actually have and you will end up staring blankly at the pages as the deadline draws near.
Instead of staring at a blank, start filling it with words no matter how bad. Halfway through your available time, stop and rework your raw writing into something closer to finished product. Move back and forth until you run out of time and the final result will most likely be far better than your current practices.
9. When the author says the creative mind and the critical mind“cannot work in parallel”(Line 4, Para.1) in the writing process, he means______.
A. the creative mind dislikes the critical mind
B. they cannot be regarded as equally important
C. they are in constant conflict with each other
D. one cannot use them at the same time
10. What prevents people from writing on is______.
A. putting their ideas in raw form
B. attempting to edit as they write
C. ignoring grammatical soundness
D. trying to capture fleeting thoughts
11. What is the chief objective of the first stage of writing?
A. To organize one's thoughts logically.
B. To choose an appropriate topic.
C. To get one's ideas down.
D. To collect raw materials.
12. In what way does the critical mind help the writer in the writing process?
A. It refines his writing into better shape.
B. It helps him to come up with new ideas.
C. It saves the writing time available to him.
D. It allows him to sit on the side and observe.
Passage Four
Leadership is hardly a new area of research, of course. For years, academics have debated whether leaders are born or made, whether a person who lacks charisma can become a leader, and what makes leaders fail. Warren G. Bennis, possibly the world's foremost expert on leading, has, together with his co-author, written two best-sellers on the topic. Generally, researchers have found that you can't explain leadership by way of intelligence, birth order, family wealth or stability, level of education, race, or sex. From one leader to the next there's enormous variance in every one of those factors.
The authors' research led to a new and telling discovery: that every leader, regardless of age, had undergone at least one intense, transformational experience—what the authors call“crucible”. These events can either make you or break you. For emerging leaders, they do more making than breaking, providing key lessons to help a person move ahead confidently.
If a crucible helps a person to become a leader, there are four essential qualities that allow someone to remain one, according to the authors. They are:“an adaptive capacity”that lets people not only survive inevitable setbacks, heartbreaks, and difficulties but also learn from them, an ability to engage others through shared meaning or a common vision;a distinctive and compelling voice that communicates one's conviction and desire to do the right thing;and a sense of integrity that allows a leader to distinguish between good and evil.
That sounds obvious enough to be commonplace, until you look at some recent failures that show how valid these dictums (formal statements of opinion) are. The authors believe that former Coca-Cola Co. Chairman, M. Douglas Ivester lasted just 28 months because“his grasp of context was sorrowful”. Among other things, Ivester degraded Coke's highest-ranking African-American even as the company was losing a $200 million class action brought by black employees. Procter&Gamble Co. ex-CEO Durk Jager lost his job because he failed to communicate the urgent need for the sweeping changes he was making.
It's striking, too, that the authors found their geezers (whose formative period, as the authors define them, was 1945 to 1954, and who were shaped by World War II) sharing what they believed to be a critical trait—the sense of possibility and wonder more often associated with childhood.“Unlike those defeated by time and age, our geezers have remained much like our geeks (who came of age between 1991 and 2000, and grew up“virtual, visual and digital”)—open, willing to take risks, hungry for knowledge and experience, courageous, and eager to see what the new day brings,”the authors write.
13. The passage indicates that leadership research______.
A. has been a controversial study for years
B. predicts how a leader comes to be
C. defines the likelihood to be a leader
D. probes the mysteries of leadership
14. According to Bennis, the trait shared by leaders consists of______.
A. top levels of intelligence and education and devotion
B. remarkable ability to encourage people with loyalty and hope
C. striking qualities of going through serious trials and suffering
D. strong personalities that arouse admiration and confidence
15. The favorable effect of a crucible depends on whether a leader______.
A. proves himself/herself to be a newly emergent one
B. accepts it as a useful experience for progress
C. shrinks back from tiring and trying experiences
D. draws important lessons for his/her followers
16. A leader can hardly maintain his/her position unless he/she______.
A. fulfills all necessary quality requirements
B. helps people to prevent defeats and sorrows
C. fails to attract people with common concerns
D. lacks appeal and strength of character
Passage Five
As we have seen, the focus on medical care in our society has been shifting from curing disease to preventing disease—especially in terms of changing our many unhealthy behaviors, such as poor eating habits, smoking, and failure to exercise. The line of thought involved in this shift can be pursued further. Imagine a person who is about the right weight, but does not eat very nutritious foods, who feels OK but exercises only occasionally, who goes to work every day, but is not an outstanding worker, who drinks a few beers at home most nights but does not drive while drunk, and who has no chest pains or abnormal blood counts, but sleeps a lot and often feels tired. This person is not ill. He may not even be at risk for any particular disease. But we can imagine that this person could be a lot healthier.
The field of medicine has not traditionally distinguished between someone who is merely“not ill” and someone who is in excellent health and pays attention to the body's special needs. Both types have simply been called“well”. In recent years, however, some health specialists have begun to apply the term “well” and “wellness” only to those who are actively striving to maintain and improve their health. People who are well are concerned with nutrition and exercise, and they make a point of monitoring their body's condition. Most important, perhaps, people who are well take active responsibility for all matters related to their health. Even people who have a physical disease or handicap may be“well”in this new sense, if they make an effort to maintain the best possible health they can in the face of their physical limitations.“Wellness”may perhaps best be viewed not as a state that people can achieve, but as an ideal that people can strive for. People who are well are likely to be better able to resist disease and to fight disease when it strikes. And by focusing attention on healthy ways of living, the concept of wellness can have a beneficial impact on the ways in which people face the challenges of daily life.
17. Today medical care is placing more stress on______.
A. keeping people in a healthy physical condition
B. monitoring patients' body functions
C. removing people's bad living habits
D. ensuring people's psychological well-being
18. In the first paragraph, people are reminded that______.
A. good health is more than not being ill
B. drinking, even if not to excess, could be harmful
C. regular health checks are essential to keeping fit
D. prevention is more difficult than cure
19. Traditionally, a person is considered“well”if he______.
A. does not have any unhealthy living habits
B. does not have any physical handicaps
C. is able to handle his daily routines
D. is free from any kind of disease
20. According to what the author advocates, which of the following groups of people would be considered healthy?
A. People who have strong muscles as well as slim figures.
B. People who are not presently experiencing any symptoms of disease.
C. People who try to be as healthy as possible, regardless of their limitations.
D. People who can recover from illness even without seeking medical care.
Section II Use of English (10 points, 20 minutes)
Directions: Read the following text. Choose the best word(s) for each numbered blank and mark A, B, C or D on the ANSWER SHEET.
The translator must have an excellent, up-to-date knowledge of his source languages, full facility in the handling of his target language, which will be his mother tongue or language of habitual 21 and a knowledge and understanding of the latest subject-matter in his field of 22 .
This is, 23 , his professional equipment. 24 this, it is desirable that he 25 have an inquiring mind, wide interests, a good memory and the ability to grasp quickly the basic principles of new developments. He should be willing to work 26 his own, often 27 high speeds, but should be humble enough to consult others 28 his own knowledge not always prove adequate to the task in hand. He should be able to type fairly quickly and accurately and, if he is working mainly for publication, should have more than a nodding 29 with printing techniques and proof-reading. If he is working basically as an information translator, let us say, for an industrial firm, he should have the flexibility of mind to enable him to 30 rapidly from one source language to another, as well as from one subject-matter to another, since this ability is frequently 31 of him in such work. Bearing in mind the nature of the translator's work, i.e. the processing of the written word, it is, strictly speaking, 32 that he should be able to speak the languages he is dealing with. If he does speak them, it is an advantage 33 a hindrance, but this skill is in many ways a luxury that he can 34 with. It is, 35 , desirable that he should have an approximate idea about the 36 of his source languages even if this is restricted to 37 how proper names and place names are pronounced. The same 38 to an ability to write his source languages. If he can, well and good;if he cannot, it does not 39 . There are many other skills and 40 that are desirable in a translator.
21. A. application
B. use
C. utility
D. usage
22. A. specialization
B. majors
C. specials
D. profession
23. A. as it was
B. as it were
C. as it is
D. as this is
24. A. More than
B. Except for
C. Because of
D. In addition to
25. A. must
B. need
C. should
D. ought to
26. A. of
B. by
C. for
D. on
27. A. in
B. to
C. at
D. for
28. A. should
B. when
C. because
D. if
29. A. familiarity
B. acquaintance
C. knowledge
D. skill
30. A. change
B. transform
C. turn
D. switch
31. A.lacked
B. required
C. faced
D. confronted
32. A.essential
B. unnecessary
C. advantageous
D. useless
33. A.over
B. despite
C. rather than
D. instead
34. A.deal
B. concern
C. work
D. do away
35. A.however
B. accordingly
C. consequently
D. thus
36. A.idioms
B. spelling
C. grammar
D. pronunciation
37. A.knowing
B. having known
C. know
D. have known
38. A.refers
B. comes
C. applies
D. amounts
39. A.matter
B. mind
C. harm
D. work
40. A.characteristics
B. qualities
C. distinctions
D. features
Section III Translation (30 points, 60 minutes)
Part A
Directions: There are two passages in this part. Read them carefully and then translate them into Chinese. Your translation should be written neatly on the ANSWER SHEET.
1. This lofty ambition for a university was never fully realized, and what we today call“disciplinarity”did not take full form until universities were incorporated into state bureaucracies in Germany, and enrollments and budgets grew. Over the course of the 19th century, German universities developed other academic practices that we now take for granted: the idea of research, the seminar, the faculty imperative to publish, the division of intellectual labor according to specialization, and a focus on the fine-grained details of scholarly argument. Within the university, specialization and disciplines have organized intellectual labor, traditions, and ambitions for over 200 years, not as abstract taxonomies but as cultural practices. To dismiss them as merely static, formal categories is to overlook the ways in which their continuity and stability have depended on transforming actual people who developed and embodied practices and habits of work, criteria for excellence, and systems and forms of communication, all of which were tied to a disciplinary self, the persona of specialized knowledge.
2. All mammals benefit from sleep in fundamental aspects for brain and body. For sleep to be beneficial, it must be of sufficient duration and physiological continuity. Conversely, sleep needs to retain a certain degree of fragility, because all sleeping organisms remain capable of a behavioral arousal response to salient stimuli and potential threats. To date, it is unclear how sleep generates advantageous effects while maintaining sensory responsiveness and how the two opposite needs for continuity and fragility are balanced. Recently, given the enormous differences in sleep fragmentation between mammalian species, the idea of universal beneficial functions of sleep for all mammals has even been challenged.
Part B
Directions: There is a passage in Chinese in this part. Read it carefully and then translate it into Chinese. Your translation should be written neatly on the ANSWER SHEET.
科学研究的美妙之处在于你永远无法用放之四海而皆准的标准来衡量她的精彩和意义。那么对于你——一个博士研究生来说，什么样的研究才“有趣”，才“有意义”，才更适合你自己呢？你是更喜欢动手还是喜欢分析？喜欢观察偶然现象还是喜欢定量研究？是喜欢为理论补上最后一块缺环，还是干脆开辟一个新战场？
当然，这个阶段的博士生大概还没有能力完全掌控自己的研究课题，仍然需要导师大量的指导和帮助。但是我相信你的研究必定会开始带有你的“个人印记”。从某个具体实验的安排，到实验逻辑链条的设计，到对发现的总结和提炼，你应该试着开始有自己的思路。等你真正经历过完整的科学研究程序，就会开始慢慢体会科学发现的美好和激动。
Section IV Writing (20 points, 50 minutes)
Directions: In some universities, all PhD students must publish articles in top academic journals to obtain their degree, while in other institutions, publication is optional and PhD students should focus on acquiring theoretical knowledge and research skills. What is your view on this issue? Write an essay of at least 200 words based on the topic “Publication: Compulsory or Optional?”