历年考研英语阅读理解mp3(04-4)

[00:00.00]在线英语听力室(www.tingroom.com)友情制作
[00:05.97]2004 Text4
[00:08.49]Americans today don't place a very high value on intellect.
[00:13.23]Our heroes are athletes, entertainers,
[00:16.56]and entrepreneurs, not scholars.
[00:20.38]Even our schools are where we send our children
[00:23.00]to get a practical education
[00:25.12]--not to pursue knowledge for the sake of knowledge.
[00:28.45]Symptoms of pervasive¹ anti-intellectualism
[00:31.67]in our schools aren't difficult to find.
[00:35.51]"Schools have always been in a society
[00:37.84]where practical is more important than intellectual,"
[00:40.75]says education writer Diane Ravitch.
[00:43.77]"Schools could be a counterbalance."
[00:46.31]Ravitch's la-test book, Left Back:
[00:48.93]A Century of Failed School Reforms,
[00:51.58]traces the roots of anti-intellectualism in our schools,
[00:55.48]concluding they are anything
[00:57.02]but a counterbalance to the American distaste
[00:59.72]for intellectual pursuits.
[01:02.55]But they could and should be.
[01:04.67]Encouraging kids to reject the life
[01:06.90]of the mind leaves them vulnerable
[01:08.60]to exploitation and control.
[01:11.42]Without the ability to think critically,
[01:13.42]to defend their ideas and understand the ideas of others,
[01:17.15]they cannot fully² participate in our democracy.
[01:20.99]Continuing along this path, says writer Earl Shorris,
[01:24.93]"We will become a second-rate country.
[01:27.08]We will have a less civil society."
[01:30.38]"Intellect is resented as a form of power or privilege,"
[01:34.41]writes historian and professor Richard Hofstadter
[01:37.93]in Anti-Intellectualism in American Life,
[01:42.27]a Pulitzer-Prize winning book on the roots
[01:44.57]of anti-intellectualism in US politics,
[01:47.59]religion, and education.
[01:49.85]From the beginning of our history, says Hofstadter,
[01:52.47]our democratic and populist urges have driven us
[01:55.79]to reject anything that smells of elitism³.
[01:59.73]Practicality, common sense, and native intelligence
[02:03.28]have been considered more noble qualities
[02:05.39]than anything you could learn from a book.
[02:08.70]Ralph Waldo Emerson and other Transcendentalist
[02:11.94]philosophers thought schooling⁴ and rigorous book learning
[02:14.88]put unnatural⁵ restraints on children:
[02:18.01]"We are shut up in schools and college recitation rooms
[02:21.13]for 10 or 15 years and come out at last
[02:24.66]with a bellyful of words and do not know a thing."
[02:28.90]Mark Twain's Huckleberry Finn exemplified American
[02:32.23]anti-intellectualism. Its hero avoids being civilized
[02:37.17]--going to school and learning to read
[02:39.79]--so he can preserve his innate⁶ goodness.
[02:43.44]Intellect, according to Hofstadter,
[02:45.85]is different from native intelligence,
[02:48.68]a quality we reluctantly admire.
[02:52.23]Intellect is the critical, creative,
[02:54.67]and contemplative side of the mind.
[02:57.29]Intelligence seeks to grasp, manipulate, re-order,
[03:01.21]and adjust, while intellect examines, ponders, wonders,
[03:06.15]theorizes, criticizes and imagines.
[03:09.28]在线英语听力室(www.tingroom.com)友情制作
[03:10.39]School remains⁷ a place where intellect is mistrusted.
[03:14.43]Hofstadter says our country's educational system
[03:17.35]is in the grips of people who
[03:19.16]"joyfully and militantly⁸ proclaim their hostility
[03:22.28]to intellect and their eagerness to identify with
[03:25.71]children who show the least intellectual promise."

1 pervasive   

adj.普遍的；遍布的，(到处)弥漫的；渗透性的

参考例句：

• It is the most pervasive compound on earth.它是地球上最普遍的化合物。
• The adverse health effects of car exhaust are pervasive and difficult to measure.汽车尾气对人类健康所构成的有害影响是普遍的，并且难以估算。

2 fully   

adv.完全地，全部地，彻底地；充分地

参考例句：

• The doctor asked me to breathe in,then to breathe out fully.医生让我先吸气，然后全部呼出。
• They soon became fully integrated into the local community.他们很快就完全融入了当地人的圈子。

3 elitism   

n.精英论，优秀人士统治

参考例句：

• Many people believe that private education encourages elitism.许多人认为私立教育助长精英主义。
• We must avoid cultural elitism.我们必须避免文化精英主义。

4 schooling   

n.教育；正规学校教育

参考例句：

• A child's access to schooling varies greatly from area to area.孩子获得学校教育的机会因地区不同而大相径庭。
• Backward children need a special kind of schooling.天赋差的孩子需要特殊的教育。

5 unnatural   

adj.不自然的；反常的

参考例句：

• Did her behaviour seem unnatural in any way?她有任何反常表现吗？
• She has an unnatural smile on her face.她脸上挂着做作的微笑。

6 innate   

adj.天生的，固有的，天赋的

参考例句：

• You obviously have an innate talent for music.你显然有天生的音乐才能。
• Correct ideas are not innate in the mind.人的正确思想不是自己头脑中固有的。

7 remains   

n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹

参考例句：

• He ate the remains of food hungrily.他狼吞虎咽地吃剩余的食物。
• The remains of the meal were fed to the dog.残羹剩饭喂狗了。

8 militantly   

激进地，好斗地

参考例句：

• Militantly resentful of slavery, he joined the Union Army. 由于对奴隶制度极为不满，他加入了联邦军队。
• They have fought militantly through the two periods of underground work and of open activity. 从秘密时期到公开时期，贫农都在那里积极奋斗。