阅读理解两则

周莲芳　姜红伟

Passage 1

广告是人们司空见惯的，特别是电视中，一会儿是药品广告，一会儿是食品广告，让人们有时足不出户便可了解外面世界。阅读下面短文，它会带给你全新的感受。

Money spent on advertising is money spent as well as on any I know of. It serves directly to bring about a rapid sale of goods at reasonable prices, setting up a firm home market and making it possible to provide for export at good prices. By drawing attention to new ideas it helps greatly to raise standards of living. By helping to increase demand it causes an increased need for labor, and is therefore a nice way to fight unemployment. It lowers the costs of many services: without advertisements your daily newspaper would cost four times as much, the price of your television program would need to be doubled, and travel by bus or subway would cost more.

And perhaps most important of all, advertising provides a promise of reasonable value in the products and services you buy. Besides the fact that twenty-seven Acts of Parliament（议会；国会） govern the terms of advertising, no regular advertiser dare produce anything that fails to live up to the promise of his advertisements. He might fool some people for a little while through misleading（欺骗的） advertising. He will not do so for long, for the public has the good sense not to buy the poor goods more than once. If you see a product frequently advertised, it is the proof I know that the product does what is promised for it, and that it has good value.

Advertising does more for the good of the public than any other force I can think of.

There is one more point I feel I ought to touch on（触摸；涉及；提到）. Recently I heard a well-known television person declare that he was against advertising because it persuades rather than informs. He was telling us the real difference. Of course advertising tries to persuade.

If its message were nothing but information, that would be difficult to get more people to buy, for even the choice of the color of a shirt is a bit persuasive-advertising would be so boring that no one would pay any attention. But perhaps that is what the well-known television person wants.

根据短文内容，选择最佳答案：

1. By the first sentence of the passage the writer means that ____

A. he is fairly familiar with the cost of advertising

B. everybody knows well that advertising is a waste of money

C. advertising costs more money than anything else

D. money on advertising is worth spending

2. According to the passage, which of the following is NOT included in the advantages of advertising? ____.

A. Achieving greater fame

B. Providing more jobs

C. Raising living standards

D. Reducing the cost of daily newspaper

3. The writer thinks that the well-known TV person ____.

A. is quite right in passing judgment on advertising

B. takes an interest in nothing but buyers attention

C. is correct in telling the difference between persuasion and informa-

tion

D. obviously holds unfair views on advertising

4. In the writers opinion, ____.

A. advertising can bring economic interest to producers only by

providing information

B. advertising informs people of new ideas instead of winning them

over

C. there is nothing wrong with advertising in persuading the buyers

D. the buyers are not interested in getting information from an adver-

tisement

Passage 2

这是写给即将选择专业的学生的，也许它会对你有所帮助的！

International Studies (BA)

Key features

Recognizes the “global（全球的） community”

Has close connections with practical research

Much of the teaching is done in small discussion groups

About the course

The course gives you chances to know great power politics between nation states. It will provide more space to study particular issues such as relationship among countries in the European Union, third world debt, local and international disagreement, and the work of such international bodies as the United Nations, the European Union,NATO, and the World Bank.

The course puts theories into the working of the international system with losing attention to particular countries. You will also have a better knowledge of methods of solving the international problems.

Related courses

BA(Hons) Community Management

BA(Hons) Public Policy and Management

Employment possibilities

International organizations

International business

Earth Science(BSc)

Key features

Based on key courses and the latest research findings

Pays much attention to practical skills

Offers chances for fieldwork

About the course

The demand for natural resources is becoming an increasingly serious problem for the future of mankind. Graduates in Earth Science will play an important role in meeting this demand, and in knowing the meaning of using the natural resources.

The course covers geography and geology(地质学). You will carry out fieldwork（实地考察） in the UK and possibly overseas, and a research in an area of interest to you in the final year.

Related courses

BSc(Hons) Geography

BSc(Hons) Geology

Employment possibilities

Mineral, oil, water or other related engineering industries

1. International Studies is a course in ____.

A. international politics B. international business

C. international systems D. international bodies

2. After taking the course of International Studies, the students will____.

A. become practical and open-minded

B. have a greater ability to discuss theories

C. know how to settle international problems

D. have good jobs in any international organizations

3. Earth Science, as described in the text, ____.

A. is attractive because of the chances for fieldwork

B. pays more attention to practical skills than theories

C. is built on important courses and the results of recent studies

D. encourages students to play a role in using natural resources

4. It can be inferred that the above text is written for the students who____.

A. enjoy research work

B. plan to choose courses

C. study in the UK

D. are interested in oversea fieldwork

Key(3)