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  3. Alphabetism: An Insidious Form of Discrimination Over the past century, all kinds of unfairness and discrimination have been

Alphabetism: An Insidious Form of Discrimination Over the past century, all kinds of unfairness and discrimination have been

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问题                 Alphabetism: An Insidious Form of Discrimination
    Over the past century, all kinds of unfairness and discrimination have been condemned or made illegal. But one insidious form continues to thrive, alphabetism. This, for those as yet unaware of such a disadvantage, refers to discrimination against those whose surnames begin with a letter in the lower half of the alphabet.
    It has long been known that a taxi firm called AAAA cars has a big advantage over Zodiac cars when customers thumb through their phone directories. Less well known is the advantage that Adam Abbott has in life over Zoe Zysman. English names are fairly evenly spread between the halves of the alphabet. Yet a suspiciously large number of top people have surnames beginning with letters between A and K.
    Thus the American president and vice-president have surnames starting with B and C respectively; and 26 of George Bush’s predecessors (including his father) had surnames in the first half of the alphabet against just 16 in the second half. Even more striking, six of the seven heads of government of the G7 rich countries are alphabetically advantaged (Berlusconi, Blair, Bush, Chirac, Chretien and Koizumi). The world’s three top central bankers (Greenspan, Duisenberg and Hayami) are all close to the top of the alphabet, even if one of them really uses Japanese characters. As are the world’s five richest men (Gates, Buffett, Allen, Ellison and Albrecht).
    Can this merely be coincidence? One theory, dreamt up in all the spare time enjoyed by the alphabetically disadvantaged, is that the rot sets in early. At the start of the first year in infant school, teachers seat pupils alphabetically from the front, to make it easier to remember their names. So shortsighted Zysman junior gets stuck in the back row, and is rarely asked the improving questions posed by those insensitive teachers. At the time the alphabetically disadvantaged may think they have had a lucky escape. Yet the result may be worse qualifications, because they get less individual attention, as well as less confidence in speaking publicly.
    The humiliation continues. At university graduation ceremonies, the ABCs proudly get their awards first; by the time they reach the Zysmans most people are literally having a ZZZ. Shortlists for job interviews, election ballot papers, lists of conference speakers and attendees,all tend to be drawn up alphabetically, and their recipients lose interest as they plough through them.
What does the author mean by "most people are literally having a 777" (Line 4~5,Para. 5)?
选项 A、They are getting impatient.
B、They are noisily dozing off.
C、They are feeling humiliated.
D、They are busy with word puzzles.
答案B
解析 语义理解题。这是一道句意分析题，考生应将对该句关键词的理解和该句在上下文中的含义结合起来进行解答。在英文中，ZZZ常被用来描述人们打呼噜时发出的声音，即“呼呼大睡”之意。再结合此前作者一直谈论的姓氏排序靠后的人经常被忽视，就可以知道在毕业典礼上当轮到姓氏字母靠后的学生上台领奖时，大多数人早已鼾声大作了，故B“他们大声地打起鼾来”正确。本段在第四段关于幼儿园时期教育的不公平基础上，继续论述姓氏排序中处于劣势的人得不到足够的关注这一现象。文章的末段开头指出这种不幸还在继续，然后进行阐述。第一句承上启下，第二句通过“大学毕业典礼上姓氏靠前的学生先得到奖励”这一具体实例继续论证本文主旨。第三句论述了在求职面试、投票选举等社会场合中姓氏排名靠后的人所受到的不公平待遇。A“他们变得不耐烦了”是干扰项，意思符合上下文，按一般的句意题设计规律，其实也可选。但这里选B而不选A的原因在于本题着重考查考生对ZZZ本身的理解，实际上考生如果在平时注意观察，应该知道它代表的含义，如在漫画和网络用语中，一个人卧床大睡的时候会在旁边加上ZZZ，表示打鼾的声音。C“他们感到屈辱”是针对humiliation设计的干扰项，是对原句内容的歪曲。D“他们忙着玩填字游戏”是无中生有，与句子内容无关。
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