Question

【题目】The Queen’s English is now sounding less upper-class, a scientific study of the Queen’s Christmas broadcasts has found. Researchers have studied each of her messages to the Commonwealth countries since 1952 to find out the change in her pronunciation from the noble Upper Received to the Standard Received.

Jonathan Harrington, a professor at Germany’s University of Munich, wanted to discover whether accent changes recorded over the past half century would take place within one person. “As far as I know, there just is nobody else for whom there is this sort of broadcast records,” he said.

He said the noble way of pronouncing vowels (元音) had gradually lost ground as the noble upper-class accent over the past years. “Her accent sounds slightly less noble than it did 50 years ago. But these are very, very small and slow changes that we don’t notice from year to year.”

“We may be able to relate it to changes in the social classes,” he told The Daily Telegraph, a British newspaper. “In 1952 she would have been heard saying ‘thet men in the bleck het’. Now it would be ‘that man in the black hat’. Similarly, she would have spoken of ‘the citay’ and ‘dutay’, rather than ‘citee’ and ‘dutee’, and ‘hame’ rather than ‘home’. In the 1950s she would have been ‘lorst’, but by the 1970s ‘lost’.”

The Queen’s broadcast is a personal message to the Commonwealth countries. Each Christmas, the 10-minute broadcast is put on TV at 3 p.m. in Britain as many families are recovering from their traditional turkey lunch.

The results were published in the Journal of Phonetics.

【1】What is the text mainly about?

A. The relationship between accents and social classes.

B. The Queen’s Christmas speeches on TV.

C. The changes in a person’s accent.

D. The recent development of the English language.

【2】The Queen’s broadcasts were chosen for the study mainly because ___.

A. she has been Queen for many years

B. she has a less upper-class accent now

C. her speeches are familiar to many people

D. her speeches have been recorded for 50 years

【3】We may infer from the text that the Journal of Phonetics is a magazine on ___.

A. speech sounds B. Christmas customs

C. TV broadcasting D. personal messages

【4】Which of the following is an example of a less noble accent in English?

A. “dutay” B. “citee” C. “hame” D. “lorst”

Answer 1

【答案】

【1】C

【2】D

【3】A

【4】B

【解析】

试题分析：本文主要介绍了一项研究结果。研究人员通过比较英女王50年来的圣诞致辞发现，女王那著名的女王式发音和以前相比较，已经减少了些贵族的味道。由此看出一个人的口音在50年内是否会发生变化。

【1】主旨大意题。根据对文章主题段第一段的理解可知，女王的口音发生了变化。而通过第二段的Jonathan Harrington, a professor at Germany’s University of Munich, wanted to discover whether accent changes recorded over the past half century would take place within one person.。可知本文主要讲述的是一个人口音的变化，故选择C，

【2】推理判断题。根据第二段的wanted to discover whether accent changes recorded over the past half century would take place within one person. “As far as I know, there just is nobody else for whom there is this sort of broadcast records,” he said.可知Jonathan Harrington想发现，一个人的口音在50年内是否会发生变化，而女王这50年来每年都有圣诞致辞并录制下来，这是其他人所没有的。故选择女王的录音是因为她的录音已经有50年了，故选择D。

【3】推理判断题。根据对文章的理解可知，这篇文章主要讲述的是语言语音的变化，而这篇文章会在这本杂志上刊登，故这本杂志就是和语言相关的。所以选择A。

【4】细节理解题。根据倒数第三段的Similarly, she would have spoken of ‘the citay’ and ‘dutay’, rather than ‘citee’ and ‘dutee’, and ‘hame’ rather than ‘home’. In the 1950s she would have been ‘lorst’, but by the 1970s ‘lost’.”可知citay、dutay、hame、lorst都是具有贵族口音的词。故选项A、C、D都是错误的，选择B。