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  3. For years scholars have contrasted slavery in the United States and in Brazil, stimulated by the fact that racial patterns assum

For years scholars have contrasted slavery in the United States and in Brazil, stimulated by the fact that racial patterns assum

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问题     For years scholars have contrasted slavery in the United States and in Brazil, stimulated by the fact that racial patterns assumed such different aspects in the two countries after emancipation. Brazil never developed a system of rigid segregation of the sort that replaced slavery in the United States, and its racial system was fluid(a situation that is fluid is likely to change)because its definition of race was based as much on characteristics such as economic status as on skin color. Until recently, the most persuasive explanation for these differences was that Portuguese institutions especially the Roman Catholic church and Roman civil law, promoted recognition of the slave’s humanity. The English colonists, on the other hand, constructed their system of slavery out of whole cloth(whole cloth: pure fabrication usually used in the phrase out of whole cloth). There were simply no precedents in English common law, and separation of church and state barred Protestant clergy from the role that priests assumed in Brazil.
    But the assumption that institutions alone could so powerfully affect the history of two raw and malleable frontier a new field for exploitative or developmental activity. Countries seem, on reexamination, untenable. Recent studies focus instead on a particular set of contrasting economic circumstances and demographic profiles at significant periods in the histories of the two countries. Persons of mixed race quickly appeared in both countries. In the United States they were considered to be Black, a social definition that was feasible because they were in the minority. In Brazil, it was not feasible. Though intermarriage was illegal in both countries, the laws were unenforceable in Brazil since Whites formed a small minority in an overwhelmingly Black population. Manumission for persons of mixed race was also easier in Brazil, particularly in the nineteenth century when in the United States it was hedged about with difficulties. Furthermore, a shortage of skilled workers in Brazil provided persons of mixed race with the opportunity to learn crafts and trades, even before general emancipation, whereas in the United States entry into these occupations was blocked by Whites sufficiently numerous to fill the posts. The consequence was the development in Brazil of a large class of persons of mixed race, proficient in skilled trades and crafts, who stood waiting as a community for freed slaves to join.
    There should be no illusion that Brazilian society after emancipation was color-blind. Rather, the large population of persons of mixed race produced a racial system that included a third status, a bridge between the Black caste and the White, which could be traversed by means of economic or intellectual achievement, marriage, or racial heritage. The strict and sharp line between the races so characteristic of the United States in the years immediately after emancipation was simply absent. With the possible exception of New Orleans, no special "place" developed in the United States for persons of mixed race.
    Sad to say, every pressure of society worked to prevent their attaining anything approximating the economic and social position available to their counterparts in Brazil.
The author implies that the explanation proposed by early scholars for the differences between the systems of slavery in the United States and in Brazils______.
选项 A、stimulating to historians and legal scholars
B、more powerful than more recent explanations
C、persuasive in spite of minor deficiencies
D、questionable in light of current scholarly work
答案D
解析 细节推理题。根据题干关键词the explanation proposed by early scholars与原文第二段首句中的the assumption that institutions对应进行定位，原句中的seems(似乎)，reexamination(复核)，untenable(站不住脚的)都表示出作者对这个假设的不支持，其中untenable与questionable对应。故答案为D。
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