completely unrealistic when it comes to everyday wear, generally the theme is adapted into versions suitable for wearing.
Media. Fashion trends are often sparked by characters on popular television shows and movies as well as adopted from magazine pages. “Sex and the City,” “The Devil Wears Prada,” these shows introduced us to new, cutting-edge designs. While you might not be caught dead wearing a Carrie Bradshaw original, you might take ideas inspired from her look and piece together your own creation. Celebrities. A prime example of a celebrity-driven fashion trend? UGGs. Until Kate Hudson and Jessica Simpson were spotted wearing them around L.A. several years ago, no one had given any thought to UGG boots. Now they are everywhere.
Musicians. Musicians have always been very influential when it comes to dictating fashion. Rock ‘n’ roll is fashion. Elvis is an iconic example. In the 1950s, everyone wanted to dress like Elvis. What about the heavy metal hair bands so popular in the 1980s? Axl Rose reinvented the head bandana while Poison, Motley Crue and Bon Jovi set the pace for big, rocker hair.
Just because you don’t know if a Prada bag is fall 2007 or spring 2008 doesn’t matter. All that matters is that you like it and it’s an expression of you. That is fashion.
Passage B
Fashion is more prevalent in modern society than in primitive tribes or peasant communities. The modern society is an open society where class distinctions are not so rigid as in primitive society. Its urban and mobile class structure enables people to cultivate individual taste and adopt new course. The modern society is more tolerant of differences and therefore places few shackles on the cycle of fashion. Our standards of judgment have also changed. Today the individual is rated more by observable externalities than by his ancestry, his character or his genuine accomplishments. The clothes a man wears, the language he speaks, the manners he shows have more weight in ascribing a status than his simplicity, patriotism and integrity.
If he can keep himself up to date in the matters of his dress, speech and manners, he will assure himself a high social esteem. Not only the mobile and urban character of modern society but its affluence also speaks for greater prevalence of fashion in it. Men today are richer than their ancestors and have more leisure. They have the necessary means and time to play with luxuries and to think of fashion. Maclver writes: We do not think of fashion in overalls; there is more of fashion in the body of an automobile than in its chassis. There is no fashion in steam shovels. Consequently the higher the standard of living the more material there is for fashion to operate upon.
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Passage C
As summer has officially faded into the colder weather of autumn, I assumed the days of Nike shorts, comically large T-shirts and polos would be only a memory of yesterday. This has not been the case.
Fashion, in and of itself, is already a type of conformism. In order to be considered fashion, a look, a garment or a stylistic choice must be deemed fashionable.
Who gets to decide this—what is fashionable? While certain fashion heavyweights play a role in this decision, the ultimate decision is left to the public.
As I was surfing the Web recently for inspiration for this column, I came across the Prada website. What I discovered literally caused me to gasp. Of course, everyone knows Prada is an expensive brand—a luxury—but what I discovered shocked me: a keychain priced at $180. No, this keychain was not solid gold or encased in diamonds. It was simply a keychain: a skull with the word “Prada” on a small charm.
How can a company charge $180 for a keychain? The answer: people are willing to pay for it. People know the brand and conform to the idea of owning a piece of such an Italian “luxury.”
This is nonsensical. Why do we choose to wear miniscule shorts in frigid weather or spend nearly $200 on a charm? Such decisions are influenced by peers, the media and the personal resolution to not make rational, individualistic choices. We cling to the idea of acceptance.
In short, we often choose to abide by the pressures of social conventionality, and this leads us to make ridiculous selections—pairing Ugg boots with shorts or wearing neon with camouflage—which we would otherwise not make. I am certainly shamefaced in my occasional conformity to these ludicrous fashion folkways. I am guilty of donning Crocs in public. Yikes!
Transient, often preposterous trends referred to as fads inspire some rather strange ideas. Who can recall the pet rocks of the ‘70s or Popples of the ‘80s? Such pop trends are not confined to behavior; they bleed into the fashion world, evidenced in overly distressed jeans, the most painful of neon shades, shoes that resemble Swiss cheese and a host of other fads I do not have the space to mention.
I refuse to give up hope for societal common sense.
One day we will comprehend that shorts are for the summer and ridiculously expensive keychains are for “never.” Do not allow others to dictate for you. Be bold. Be an individual. Do not buy the keychain.
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24. The phrase “might not be caught dead” in Passage A most probably means ______.
A. would rather not die anyway B. might not be caught red handed
C. would refuse completely to do something D. might be uneasy though doing something 25. Which of the following best fits the numbered space in Passage A?
A. fashion is an individual statement of expression for each of us B. fashion facilitates social change by providing a transitional stage C. fashion is not an individual choice but a group choice
D. fashion determines our speech, opinion, dress, music, art, etc. 26. It can be inferred from Passage A that fashion designers, media, celebrities and musicians share the following views except ______.
A. that fashion is anything but separated from the daily life of ordinary people.
B. that nothing completely absurd and unrealistic can finally become fashion.
C. that fashion is what society accepts and has an element of social sanction behind it.
D. that if a particular choice remains confined to an individual it can’t be called fashion. 27. The word “affluence” in Passage B is closest in meaning to ______.
A. versatility B. wealthiness C. peculiarity D. charisma
28. According to Passage B, which of the following attributes may probably be more important than others for an individual to be favorably received now? A. A wide range of erudition. B. Loyalty to his or her friends. C. A passion for popular novels. D. Good virtues such as honesty.
29. Which of the following is NOT true about the author’s attitude towards fashion according to Passage C?
A. The author thinks it a waste of time mentioning a list of examples of
irrational fads.
B. People are mad about fashion and therefore lose their own good
judgment.
C. The author never allows himself to be carried away by the fashion trends. D. Behind the behavior of keeping up with fashion is a need to stay in the
crowd. E.
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30-31. Decide whether the statements are True or False according to the three passages.
30. All the three passages agree that fashion plays a role in the interplay of class relations that it satisfies the contrary desires for novelty and for conformity. True ( ) False ( )
31. None of the three passages are denying conventional social values in people’s judgment, for example, what’s considered good about things or people. True ( ) False ( )
Part IV Read and Create
In Part IV, you will read a passage and then write a short essay according to it. You should write with clarity and logic. (Time allowed: 40 minutes)
Question 32 (Suggested completion time: 40 minutes)
Directions: Read a passage from Discourse on the Method of Rightly Conducting the Reason and Seeking the Truth in the Sciences. Write a short essay according to the passage.
… And as a multitude of laws often only hampers justice, so that a state is best governed when, with few laws, these are rigidly administered; in like manner, instead of the great number of precepts of which logic is composed, I believed that the four following would prove perfectly sufficient for me, provided I took the firm and unwavering resolution never in a single instance to fail in observing them.
The first was never to accept anything for true which I did not clearly know to be such; that is to say, carefully to avoid precipitancy and prejudice, and to comprise nothing more in my judgment than what was presented to my mind so clearly and distinctly as to exclude all ground of doubt.
The second, to divide each of the difficulties under examination into as many parts as possible, and as might be necessary for its adequate solution.
The third, to conduct my thoughts in such order that, by commencing with objects the simplest and easiest to know, I might ascend by little and little, and, as it were, step by step, to the knowledge of the more complex; assigning in thought a certain order even to those objects which in their own nature do not stand in a relation of antecedence and sequence.
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And the last, in every case to make enumerations so complete, and reviews so general, that I might be assured that nothing was omitted.
The long chains of simple and easy reasonings by means of which geometers are accustomed to reach the conclusions of their most difficult demonstrations, had led me to imagine that all things, to the knowledge of which man is competent, are mutually connected in the same way, and that there is nothing so far removed from us as to be beyond our reach, or so hidden that we cannot discover it, provided only we abstain from accepting the false for the true, and always preserve in our thoughts the order necessary for the deduction of one truth from another. And I had little difficulty in determining the objects with which it was necessary to commence, for I was already persuaded that it must be with the simplest and easiest to know, and, considering that of all those who have hitherto sought truth in the sciences, the mathematicians alone have been able to find any demonstrations, that is, any certain and evident reasons, I did not doubt but that such must have been the rule of their investigations. 32. Answer the topic questions with no less than 300 words. You should write in YOUR OWN words:
What is the main issue that Descartes explores in this part of the text, and what’s his method? What’s your OWN understanding of the methods proposed by Descartes?
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2016“外研社杯”全国英语阅读大赛样题
