Lesson 1

听力部分

听力练习

一级练习：［难度系数★］

本课的主题在六级听力里出现。先听一段简单的小对话，试一试！

A. She took a history class last year.

B. She doesn't trust the man's opinion.

C. She probably won't take any history classes.

D. She didn't like her sociology professor.

听力原文如下：

M: I'd think twice about taking a history class next year. There's not a single good professor in the whole history department.

W: Look, that's what you said last semester about the sociology department, and I'm very glad I didn't pay any attention to what you said.

Q: What does the woman mean?

二级练习：［难度系数★★］

这次主题在较长的TOEFL听力对话题里出现。依然是你熟悉的主题和词汇，挑战一下吧！

1. A. How to investigate the geological history.

B. How sediment hardens into rock.

C. How floodplains develop.

D. How minerals are extracted from rock.

2. A. How rocks are eroded.

B. How strata are formed in rock.

C. Why flooding makes geological investigations difficult.

D. Which minerals can be found in rock.

3. A. The deposits aren't made of organic material.

B. The deposits aren't found everywhere in the world.

C. The deposits harden under conditions of heat and pressure.

D. The deposits don't form at regular time intervals.

4. A. Where fossils are most commonly found.

B. How a geological discovery was made.

C. Why rivers flood.

D. The differences between two geological periods.

听力原文如下：

M: Let's say you are geologists, and you want to investigate the geological history of a place. That is, how did geologists determine things like...say...how were the rocks formed? Or was an area once under water? If so, when? How should you go about it?

W: I'd start with stratigraphy （地层学）.

M: Could you explain what that is to the class?

W: Well, stratigraphy is the description of strata in sedimentary （沉积的） rock. I guess that's not so clear, huh? OK, let's say one of the investigators thought near a river, for example. Well, over the history of that area, every time the river flooded, it would deposit（沉淀） a layer of sediment all through with floodplain. Sometimes a bigger layer, sometimes a smaller layer, depending on the size of the flood. Well, one layer or stratum gets deposited over another. Obviously these strata built up over millions of years. Stratigraphy is the study of these layers of deposited settlement.

M: So does that mean if I examine each of these strata, I can tell how long ago each one is deposited?

W: Not necessarily. You see, there might've been some years when the river didn't flood and no settlement was deposited. You need other kinds of evidence to tell how much time might've gone by between when one layer got deposited and one on top of it got deposited.

M: And what are those other kinds of evidence you are talking about?

W: Well, fossils for one. You can determine exactly how old a fossil is and that's how you can tell how old the rock surrounding it is.

M: Very good. The discovery of that particular technique is an interesting story. It was a man named William Smith who first used fossils for the purpose of dating strata back in the 1800s. Let's take a look at how he went about making this geological breakthrough.

Q:

1. What is the discussion mainly about?

2. What does the woman explain when she talks about rivers?

3. According to the discussion, why are geologists unable to determine the geological age of an area by studying sediment deposit alone?

4. What will the class probably discuss next?

听说练习

一级练习：听写填空［难度系数★］

Anthropology is the study of ____________________________________. It includes the study of ________________, the archaeological record, ____________________, the relationship between ________________________________, and cultural modes of being as these differ in ___________________. In studying anthropology, students can better understand ___________________________________________, respecting cultural diversity while building upon common human values.

The study of anthropology is comprised of three sub-disciplines:

•　Archaeology is the study of the human past through ________________________________ (artifacts, food remains, features, structures, etc.) and their relationships in space and time.

•　Bicultural anthropology focuses on ____________________ through the study of the ecological, demographic, genetic, developmental, and epidemiological dimensions of modern human adaptation and its evolutionary basis.

•　Sociocultural anthropology is the study of _____________________________ from the perspective of culture as a comparative frame.

二级练习：口语复读与背诵［难度系数★★］

刚才听写练习的答案是“anthropology”主题的关键表达，一定要积累成自己的口语素材。

第一步：看着上面的听力原文跟读一遍。

第二步：自己试着完整地背诵一遍。（计时3分钟，背诵开始…）

词汇部分

一级练习：［难度系数★］

本课新学的词汇出现在六级和考研考试中。这些词汇如果在题干里出现，是否减轻了你的阅读负担呢？如果在选项里出现（可它们不一定是正确选项），你能选对吗？试一试吧！

临考情境模拟：每题控制在1分钟内，本级测试限时4分钟，请把计时器调到4分钟。计时开始！

考查词汇：immigration

1. In addition to the rising birthrate and immigration, the ______ death rate contributed to the population growth.

A. inclining

B. increasing

C. declining

D. descending

［六级真题］

考查词汇：migration

2. Sadly, the Giant Panda is one of the many species now in danger of ______.

A. extinction

B. migration

C. destruction

D. extraction

［六级真题］

考查词汇：decay

3. Connie was told that if she worked too hard, her health would ______.

A. decay

B. hop

C. dart

D. degrade

［六级真题］

考查词汇：remote

4. When any non-human organ is transplanted into a person, the body immediately recognizes it as ______.

A. novel

B. remote

C. distant

D. foreign

［考研真题］

二级练习：［难度系数★★］

这次新学的词汇在较难的GRE考试里出现，挑战一下吧！

临考情境模拟：每题控制在2分钟内，本级测试限时18分钟，请把计时器调到18分钟。计时开始！

考查词汇：preserve

1. Although ancient tools were ______ preserved, enough have survived to allow us to demonstrate an occasionally interrupted but generally _______ progress through prehistory.

A. partially...noticeable

B. superficially...necessary

C. unwittingly...documented

D. rarely...continual

E. needlessly...incessant

［GRE真题］

2. The spellings of many old English words have been _______ in the living language, although their pronunciations have changed.

A. preserved

B. shortened

C. preempted

D. revised

E. improved

［GRE真题］

3. Neither the ideas of philosophers nor the practices of ordinary people can, by themselves, ______ reality; what in fact changes reality and kindles revolution is the ______ of the two.

A. constitute...divergence

B. affect...aim

C. transform...interplay

D. preserve...conjunction

E. alter...intervention

［GRE真题］

4. No computer system is immune to a virus, a particularly malicious program that is designed to ______ and electronically ______ the disks on which data are stored.

A. prepare...improve

B. restore...disable

C. infect...damage

D. preserve...secure

E. invade...repair

［GRE真题］

考查词汇：recount

5. The natures of social history and lyric poetry are ______: social history always recounting the ______ and lyric poetry speaking for unchanging human nature, that timeless essence beyond fashion and economics.

A. predetermined...bygone

B. antithetical...evanescent

C. interdependent...unnoticed

D. irreconcilable...unalterable

E. indistinguishable...transitory

［GRE真题］

考查词汇：remote

6. The astronomer and feminist Maria Mitchell's own prodigious activity and the vigor of the association for the Advancement of Women during the 1870's ______ any assertion that feminism was ______ in that period.

A. exclude...thriving

B. contradict...prospering

C. pervade...remote

D. buttress...dormant

E. belie...quiescent

［GRE真题］

7. Although supernovas are among the most ______ of cosmic events, these stellar explosions are often hard to ______, either because they are enormously far away or because they are dimmed by intervening dust and gas clouds.

A. remote...observe

B. luminous...detect

C. predictable...foresee

D. ancient...determine

E. violent...disregard

［GRE真题］

8. The senator's attempt to convince the public that she is not interested in running for a second term is as ______ as her opponent's attempt to disguise his intention to run against her.

A. biased

B. unsuccessful

C. inadvertent

D. indecisive

E. remote

［GRE真题］

考查词汇：ancestor

9. The skeleton of ______ bird that was recently discovered indicated that this ancient creature ______ today's birds in that, unlike earlier birds and unlike reptilian ancestors, it had not a tooth in its head.

A. a primeval...obscured

B. a unique...preempted

C. a primitive...anticipated

D. a contemporary...foreshadowed

E. an advanced...differed from

［GRE真题］

阅读部分

一级练习：［难度系数★］

本课的主题“anthropology”在考研翻译题里出现。下面的文章和题目中有你熟悉的主题和词汇，试一试！

临考情境模拟：请在5分钟内读完文章，4分钟做完题。请把计时器调到9分钟。计时开始！

Directions: Read the following text carefully and translate the underlined segments into Chinese.

Human beings in all times and places think about their world and wonder at their place in it. Humans are thoughtful and creative, possessed of insatiable curiosity. （1） Furthermore, humans have the ability to modify the environment in which they live, thus subjecting all other life forms to their own peculiar ideas and fancies. Therefore, it is important to study humans in all their richness and diversity in a calm and systematic manner, with the hope that the knowledge resulting from such studies can lead humans to a more harmonious way of living with themselves and with all other life forms on this planet Earth.

“Anthropology” derives from the Greek words anthropos “human” and logos “the study of.” By its very name, anthropology encompasses the study of all humankind.

Anthropology is one of the social sciences. （2） Social science is that branch of intellectual enquiry which seeks to study humans and their endeavors in the same reasoned, orderly, systematic, and dispassionate manner that natural scientists use for the study of natural phenomena.

Social science disciplines include geography, economics, political science, psychology, and sociology. Each of these social sciences has a subfield or specialization which lies particularly close to anthropology.

All the social sciences focus upon the study of humanity. Anthropology is a field-study oriented discipline which makes extensive use of the comparative method in analysis. （3） The emphasis on data gathered first-hand, combined with a cross-cultural perspective brought to the analysis of cultures past and present, makes this study a unique and distinctly important social science.

Anthropological analyses rest heavily upon the concept of culture. Sir Edward Tylor's formulation of the concept of culture was one of the great intellectual achievements of 19th century science. （4） Tylor defined culture as“...that complex whole which includes belief, art, morals, law, custom, and any other capabilities and habits acquired by man as a member of society.” This insight, so profound in its simplicity, opened up an entirely new way of perceiving and understanding human life. Implicit within Tylor's definition is the concept that culture is learned, shared, and patterned behavior.

（5） Thus, the anthropological concept of “culture,” like the concept of “set” in mathematics, is an abstract concept which makes possible immense amounts of concrete research and understanding.

［考研真题］

二级练习：［难度系数★★］

这次主题“anthropology”在较难的英语专业八级阅读题里出现。依然是你熟悉的主题和词汇，挑战一下吧！

临考情境模拟：请在5分钟内读完文章，4分钟做完题。请把计时器调到9分钟。计时开始！

Human migration: the term is vague. What people usually think of is the permanent movement of people from one home to another. More broadly, though, migration means all the ways—from the seasonal drift of agricultural workers within a country to the relocation of refugees from one country to another.

Migration is big, dangerous, compelling. It is 60 million Europeans leaving home from the 16th to the 20th centuries. It is some 15 million Hindus, Sikhs, and Muslims swept up in a tumultuous shuffle of citizens between India and Pakistan after the partition of the subcontinent in 1947.

Migration is the dynamic undertow of population change: everyone's solution, everyone's conflict. As the century turns, migration, with its inevitable economic and political turmoil, has been called “one of the greatest challenges of the coming century”.

But it is much more than that. It is, as it has always been, the great adventure of human life. Migration helped create humans, drove us to conquer the planet, shaped our societies, and promises to reshape them again.

“You have a history book written in your genes”, said Spencer Wells. The book he's trying to read goes back to long before even the first word was written, and it is a story of migration.

Wells, a tall, blond geneticist at Stanford University, spent the summer of 1998 exploring remote parts of Transcaucasia and Central Asia with three colleagues in a Land Rover, looking for drops of blood. In the blood donated by the people he met, he will search for the story that genetic markers can tell of the long paths human life has taken across the Earth.

Genetic studies are the latest technique in a long effort of modern humans to find out where they have come from. But however the paths are traced, the basic story is simple: people have been moving since they were people. If early humans hadn't moved and intermingled as much as they did, they probably would have continued to evolve into different species. From beginnings in Africa, most researchers agree, groups of hunter-gatherers spread out, driven to the ends of the Earth.

To demographer Kingsley Davis, two things made migration happen. First, human beings, with their tools and language, could adapt to different conditions without having to wait for evolution to make them suitable for a new niche. Second, as populations grew, cultures began to differ, and inequalities developed between groups. The first factor gave us the keys to the door of any room on the planets; the other gave us reasons to use them.

Over the centuries, as agriculture spread across the planet, people moved toward places where metal was found and worked and to centres of commerce that then became cities. Those places were, in turn, invaded and overrun by people later generations called barbarians.

In between these storm surges were steadier but similarly profound tides in which people moved out to colonize or were captured and brought in as slaves. For a while the population of Athens, that city of legendary enlightenment was as much as 35 percent slaves.

“What strikes me is how important migration is as a cause and effect in the great world events.” Mark Miller, co-author of The Age of Migration and a professor of political science at the University of Delaware, told me recently.

It is difficult to think of any great events that did not involve migration. Religions spawned pilgrims or settlers; wars drove refugees before them and made new land available for the conquerors; political upheavals displaced thousands or millions; economic innovations drew workers and entrepreneurs like magnets; environmental disasters like famine or disease pushed their bedraggled survivors anywhere they could replant hope.

“It's part of our nature, this movement,” Miller said, “It's just a fact of the human condition.”

1. Which of the following statements is INCORRECT?

A. Migration exerts a great impact on population change.

B. Migration contributes to mankind's progress.

C. Migration brings about desirable and undesirable effects.

D. Migration may not be accompanied by human conflicts.

2. According to Kingsley Davis, migration occurs as a result of the following reasons EXCEPT ______.

A. human adaptability

B. human evolution

C. cultural differences

D. inter-group inequalities

3. Which of the following groups is NOT mentioned as migrants in the passage?

A. Farmers.

B. Workers.

C. Settlers.

D. Colonizers.

4. There seems to be a（n） ______ relationship between great events and migration.

A. loose

B. indefinite

C. causal

D. remote

［专八真题］

写作部分

本课介绍了有关历史研究的主题，这里给大家提供这方面的写作素材，方便大家积累下来，在以后遇到的有关历史研究的话题中结合课文使用。

真题举例：

Learning about the past has no value for those of us living in the present. Do you agree or disagree? Use specific reasons and examples to support your answer.

［TOEFL真题］

写作素材：

Why Study History

There are many different reasons to study history, as it is a fantastic combination of all the other school subjects. There are many arguments over the importance of history, and these still go on today. We often ask the question: why study history? The answer we hear is that we have to. Yet we study history for a variety of reasons—to understand people who thought and acted differently than we do in our own time, to seek self knowledge, to make sense of a time radically different from our own time, to find a sense of distance from the present to aid us in placing our own times in perspective, to help us understand how we got to where we are now, and a whole host of other reasons. One of the many things we learn about the human condition through the study of the past is the very contingency of human society, how little human life is predetermined and how much people actively have shaped times passed. Some would find this frightening to contemplate in the modern world; others find it consoling. The question has intrigued philosophers of history for eons.

Perhaps the best explanation for studying history was given by the blind Czech historian Milan Hubl to the novelist Milan Kundera:

“The first step in liquidating a people is to erase its memory. Destroy its books, its culture, its history. Then have somebody write new books, manufacture a new culture, invent a new history. Before long the nation will begin to forget what it is and what it was. The world around it will forget even faster.”

In brief, the major arguments for studying history are as follows:

•　History helps you discover how your world evolved.

•　History helps you develop the skills to look beyond the headlines, to ask questions properly, and to express your own opinions.

•　History trains your mind and teaches you how to think and process information.

•　History students are rounded individuals who develop an understanding of both past and present.

•　The pursuit of historical events and people is fun—a form of time travel.

•　History helps you make sense of most other subjects.

•　A lack of historical knowledge prevents people from truly understanding the world they live in.

•　History helps you understand the origins of modern political and social problems.

•　History lets you learn how and why people behaved as they did, whether they are Elizabeth I, Hitler or John Lennon...

•　History makes you appreciate that people in the past were not just“good” or“bad”, but motivated in complex and inconsistent ways, just like us.

•　History provides you with the skills employers are looking for.