Text 1
①In the 2006 film version of The Devil Wears Prada, Miranda Priestly, played by Meryl Streep, scolds her unattractive assistant for imagining that high fashion doesn't affect her. ②Priestly explains how the deep blue color of the assistant's sweater descended over the years from fashion shows to department stores and to the bargain bin in which the poor girl doubtless found her garment.
①This top-down conception of the fashion business couldn't be more out of date or at odds with the feverish world described in Overdressed, Elizabeth Cline's three-year indictment of “fast fashion”. ②In the last decade or so, advances in technology have allowed mass-market labels such as Zara, H&M, and Uniqlo to react to trends more quickly and anticipate demand more precisely. ③Quicker turnarounds mean less wasted inventory, more frequent releases, and more profit. ④These labels encourage style-conscious consumers to see clothes as disposable—meant to last only a wash or two, although they don't advertise that—and to renew their wardrobe every few weeks. ⑤By offering on-trend items at dirt-cheap prices, Cline argues, these brands have hijacked fashion cycles, shaking an industry long accustomed to a seasonal pace.
①The victims of this revolution, of course, are not limited to designers. ②For H&M to offer a $5.95 knit miniskirt in all its 2,300-plus stores around the world, it must rely on low-wage overseas labor, order in volumes that strain natural resources, and use massive amounts of harmful chemicals.
①Overdressed is the fashion world's answer to consumer-activist bestsellers like Michael Pollan's The Omnivore's Dilemma. ②“Mass-produced clothing, like fast food, fills a hunger and need, yet is non-durable and wasteful,” Cline argues. ③Americans, she finds, buy roughly 20 billion garments a year—about 64 items per person—and no matter how much they give away, this excess leads to waste.
2013
①Towards the end of Overdressed, Cline introduced her ideal, a Brooklyn woman named Sarah Kate Beaumont, who since 2008 has made all of her own clothes—and beautifully. ②But as Cline is the first to note, it took Beaumont decades to perfect her craft; her example can't be knocked off.
①Though several fast-fashion companies have made efforts to curb their impact on labor and the environment—including H&M, with its green Conscious Collection line—Cline believes lasting change can only be effected by the customer. ②She exhibits the idealism common to many advocates of sustainability, be it in food or in energy. ③Vanity is a constant; people will only start shopping more sustainably when they can't afford not to.
2013
21.Priestly criticizes her assistant for her __________.
[A] poor bargaining skill
[B] insensitivity to fashion
[C] obsession with high fashion
[D] lack of imagination
22.According to Cline, mass-market labels urge consumers to __________.
[A] combat unnecessary waste
[B] shut out the feverish fashion world
[C] resist the influence of advertisements
[D] shop for their garments more frequently
23.The word “indictment” (Line 2，Para. 2) is closest in meaning to __________.
[A] accusation
[B] enthusiasm
[C] indifference
[D] tolerance
2013
24.Which of the following can be inferred from the last paragraph?
[A] Vanity has more often been found in idealists.
[B] The fast-fashion industry ignores sustainability.
[C] People are more interested in unaffordable garments.
[D] Pricing is vital to environment-friendly purchasing.
25.What is the subject of the text?
[A] Satire on an extravagant lifestyle.
[B] Challenge to a high-fashion myth.
[C] Criticism of the fast-fashion industry.
[D] Exposure of a mass-market secret.
2013
Text 2
①An old saying has it that half of all advertising budgets are wasted—the trouble is, no one knows which half. ②In the internet age, at least in theory, this fraction can be much reduced. ③ By watching what people search for, click on and say online, companies can aim “behavioral” ads at those most likely to buy.
①In the past couple of weeks a quarrel has illustrated the value to advertisers of such fine-grained information：Should advertisers assume that people are happy to be tracked and sent behavioral ads? ②Or should they have explicit permission?
①In December 2010 America's Federal Trade Commission (FTC) proposed adding a “do not track”(DNT) option to internet browsers, so that users could tell advertisers that they did not want to be followed. ②Microsoft's Internet Explorer and Apple's Safari both offer DNT; Google's Chrome is due to do so this year. ③In February the FTC and the Digital Advertising Alliance (DAA) agreed that the industry would get cracking on responding to DNT requests.
①On May 31st Microsoft set off the row. ②It said that Internet Explorer 10，the version due to appear with Windows 8，would have DNT as a default.
①Advertisers are horrified. ②Human nature being what it is, most people stick with default settings. ③Few switch DNT on now, but if tracking is off it will stay off. ④Bob Liodice, the chief executive of the Association of National Advertisers, says consumers will be worse off if the industry cannot collect information about their preferences. ⑤People will not get fewer ads, he says. ⑥“They'll get less meaningful, less targeted ads.”
①It is not yet clear how advertisers will respond. ②Getting a DNT signal does not oblige anyone to stop tracking, although some companies have promised to do so. ③Unable to tell
2013
whether someone really objects to behavioral ads or whether they are sticking with Microsoft's default, some may ignore a DNT signal and press on anyway.
①Also unclear is why Microsoft has gone it alone. ②After all, it has an ad business too, which it says will comply with DNT requests, though it is still working out how. ③If it is trying to upset Google, which relies almost wholly on advertising, it has chosen an indirect method：There is no guarantee that DNT by default will become the norm. ④DNT does not seem an obviously huge selling point for Windows 8—though the firm has compared some of its other products favorably with Google's on that count before. ⑤Brendon Lynch, Microsoft's chief privacy officer, blogged：“We believe consumers should have more control.” ⑥Could it really be that simple?
2013
26.It is suggested in Paragraph 1 that “behavioral” ads help advertisers to __________.
[A] ease competition among themselves
[B] lower their operational costs
[C] avoid complaints from consumers
[D] provide better online services
27.“the industry” (Line 4，Para. 3) refers to __________.
[A] online advertisers
[B] e-commerce conductors
[C] digital information analysts
[D] internet browser developers
28.Bob Liodice holds that setting DNT as a default __________.
[A] may cut the number of junk ads
[B] fails to affect the ad industry
[C] will not benefit consumers
[D] goes against human nature
2013
29.Which of the following is true according to Paragraph 6?
[A] DNT may not serve its intended purpose.
[B] Advertisers are willing to implement DNT.
[C] DNT is losing its popularity among consumers.
[D] Advertisers are obliged to offer behavioral ads.
30.The author's attitude towards what Brendon Lynch said in his blog is one of __________.
[A] indulgence
[B] understanding
[C] appreciation
[D] skepticism
2013
Text 3
①Up until a few decades ago, our visions of the future were largely—though by no means uniformly—glowingly positive. ②Science and technology would cure all the ills of humanity, leading to lives of fulfillment and opportunity for all.
①Now utopia has grown unfashionable, as we have gained a deeper appreciation of the range of threats facing us, from asteroid strike to epidemic flu and to climate change. ②You might even be tempted to assume that humanity has little future to look forward to.
①But such gloominess is misplaced. ②The fossil record shows that many species have endured for millions of years—so why shouldn't we? ③Take a broader look at our species' place in the universe, and it becomes clear that we have an excellent chance of surviving for tens, if not hundreds, of thousands of years. ④Look up Homo sapiens in the “Red List” of threatened species of the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN)，and you will read:“Listed as Least Concern as the species is very widely distributed, adaptable, currently increasing, and there are no major threats resulting in an overall population decline.”
①So what does our deep future hold? ②A growing number of researchers and organisations are now thinking seriously about that question. ③For example, the Long Now Foundation has its flagship project a mechanical clock that is designed to still be marking time thousands of years hence.
①Perhaps willfully, it may be easier to think about such lengthy timescales than about the more immediate future. ②The potential evolution of today's technology, and its social consequences, is dazzlingly complicated, and it's perhaps best left to science fiction writers and futurologists to explore the many possibilities we can envisage. ③That's one reason why we have launched Arc, a new publication dedicated to the near future.
2013
①But take a longer view and there is a surprising amount that we can say with considerable assurance. ②As so often, the past holds the key to the future：we have now identified enough of the long-term patterns shaping the history of the planet, and our species, to make evidence-based forecasts about the situations in which our descendants will find themselves.
①This long perspective makes the pessimistic view of our prospects seem more likely to be a passing fad. ②To be sure, the future is not all rosy. ③But we are now knowledgeable enough to reduce many of the risks that threatened the existence of earlier humans, and to improve the lot of those to come.
2013
31.Our vision of the future used to be inspired by __________.
[A] our desire for lives of fulfillment
[B] our faith in science and technology
[C] our awareness of potential risks
[D] our belief in equal opportunity
32.The IUCN's “Red List” suggests that human being are __________.
[A] a sustained species
[B] a threat to the environment
[C] the world's dominant power
[D] a misplaced race
33.Which of the following is true according to Paragraph 5?
[A] Arc helps limit the scope of futurological studies.
[B] Technology offers solutions to social problem.
[C] The interest in science fiction is on the rise.
[D] Our immediate future is hard to conceive.
2013
34.To ensure the future of mankind, it is crucial to __________.
[A] explore our planet's abundant resources
[B] adopt an optimistic view of the world
[C] draw on our experience from the past
[D] curb our ambition to reshape history
35.Which of the following would be the best title for the text?
[A] Uncertainty about Our Future
[B] Evolution of the Human Species
[C] The Ever-bright Prospects of Mankind
[D] Science, Technology and Humanity
2013
Text 4
①On a five to three vote, the Supreme Court knocked out much of Arizona's immigration law Monday—a modest policy victory for the Obama Administration. ②But on the more important matter of the Constitution, the decision was an 8-0 defeat for the Administration's effort to upset the balance of power between the federal government and the states.
①In Arizona v. United States, the majority overturned three of the four contested provisions of Arizona's controversial plan to have state and local police enforce federal immigration law. ②The Constitutional principles that Washington alone has the power to “establish a uniform Rule of Naturalization” and that federal laws precede state laws are noncontroversial. ③Arizona had attempted to fashion state policies that ran parallel to the existing federal ones.
①Justice Anthony Kennedy, joined by Chief Justice John Roberts and the Court's liberals, ruled that the state flew too close to the federal sun. ②On the overturned provisions the majority held the Congress had deliberately “occupied the field”，and Arizona had thus intruded on the federal's privileged powers.
①However, the Justices said that Arizona police would be allowed to verify the legal status of people who come in contact with law enforcement. ②That's because Congress has always envisioned joint federal-state immigration enforcement and explicitly encourages state officers to share information and cooperate with federal colleagues.
①Two of the three objecting Justice—Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas—agreed with this Constitutional logic but disagreed about which Arizona rules conflicted with the federal statute. ②The only major objection came from Justice Antonin Scalia, who offered an even more robust defense of state privileges going back to the Alien and Sedition Acts.
2013
①The 8-0 objection to President Obama turns on what Justice Samuel Alito describes in his objection as “a shocking assertion of federal executive power”. ②The White House argued that Arizona's laws conflicted with its enforcement priorities, even if state laws complied with federal statutes to the letter. ③In effect, the White House claimed that it could invalidate any otherwise legitimate state law that it disagrees with.
①Some powers do belong exclusively to the federal government, and control of citizenship and the borders is among them. ②But if Congress wanted to prevent states from using their own resources to check immigration status, it could. ③It never did so. ④The administration was in essence asserting that because it didn't want to carry out Congress's immigration wishes, no state should be allowed to do so either. ⑤Every Justice rightly rejected this remarkable claim.
2013
36.Three provisions of Arizona's plan were overturned because they __________.
[A] deprived the federal police of Constitutional powers
[B] disturbed the power balance between different states
[C] overstepped the authority of federal immigration law
[D] contradicted both the federal and state policies
37.On which of the following did the Justices agree, according to Paragraph 4?
[A] Federal officers' duty to withhold immigrants' information.
[B] States' independence from federal immigration law.
[C] States' legitimate role in immigration enforcement.
[D] Congress's intervention in immigration enforcement.
38.It can be inferred from Paragraph 5 that the Alien and Sedition Acts __________.
[A] violated the Constitution
[B] undermined the states' interests
[C] supported the federal statute
[D] stood in favor of the states
2013
39.The White House claims that its power of enforcement __________.
[A] outweighs that held by the states
[B] is dependent on the states' support
[C] is established by federal statutes
[D] rarely goes against state laws
40.What can be learned from the last paragraph?
[A] Immigration issues are usually decided by Congress.
[B] Justices intended to check the power of the Administration.
[C] Justices wanted to strengthen its coordination with Congress.
[D] The Administration is dominant over immigration issues.
因篇幅问题不能全部显示，请点此查看更多更全内容