4主旨題的特點(diǎn)
無(wú)論是在段落中還是在文章中，是明顯還是隱蔽，主旨的提出主要有四種情況。
(1)首段或首句開(kāi)門(mén)見(jiàn)山指出中心或討論的問(wèn)題。
Example
The full import may take a while to sink in. The NT Rights of the Terminally Ill law has left physicians and citizens alike trying to deal with its moral and practical implications. Some have breathed sighs of relief, others, including churches, right-to-life groups and the Australian Medical Association, bitterly attacked the bill and the haste of its passage. But the tide is unlikely to turn back. In Australia—where an aging population, life-extending technology and changing community attitudes have all played their part—other states are going to consider making a similar law to deal with euthanasia. In the US and Canada, where the right-to-die movement is gathering strength, observers are waiting for the dominoes to start falling.(1997年 Passage 1)
From the second paragraph we learn that .
[A] the objection to euthanasia is slow to come in other countries
[B] physicians and citizens share the same view on euthanasia
[C] changing technology is chiefly responsible for the hasty passage of the law
[D] it takes time to realize the significance of the law’s passage
該段是典型的首句主旨題。以首句為段落主題句，其他各句都圍繞此句展開(kāi)論述。正確答案為[D]選項(xiàng)�？忌魧�(duì)sink in理解有困難，還可以從段落總結(jié)歸納出主旨大意。
(2)文章中間或段落中間給出中心。
Example
Could the bad old days of economic decline be about to return? Since OPEC agreed to supply-cuts in March, the price of crude oil has jumped to almost $26 a barrel, up from less than $10 last December. This near-tripling of oil prices calls up scary memories of the 1973 oil shock, when prices quadrupled, and 1979～1980, when they also almost tripled. Both previous shocks resulted in double-digit inflation and global economic decline. So where are the headlines warning of gloom and doom this time?
The oil price was given another push up this week when Iraq suspended oil exports. Strengthening economic growth, at the same time as winter grips the northern hemisphere, could push the price higher still in the short term.
Yet there are good reasons to expect the economic consequences now to be less severe than in the 1970s. In most countries the cost of crude oil now accounts for a smaller share of the price of petrol than it did in the 1970s. In Europe, taxes account for up to four-fifths of the retail price, so even quite big changes in the price of crude have a more muted effect on pump prices than in the past.
Rich economies are also less dependent on oil than they were, and so less sensitive to swings in the oil price. Energy conservation, a shift to other fuels and a decline in the importance of heavy, energy-intensive industries have reduced oil consumption. Software, consultancy and mobile telephones use far less oil than steel or car production. For each dollar of GDP (in constant prices) rich economies now use nearly 50% less oil than in 1973. The OECD estimates in its latest Economic Outlook that, if oil prices averaged $22 a barrel for a full year, compared with $13 in 1998, this would increase the oil import bill in rich economies by only 025%～05% of GDP. That is less than one-quarter of the income loss in 1974 or 1980. On the other hand, oil-importing emerging economies—to which heavy industry has shifted—have become more energy-intensive, and so could be more seriously squeezed.
One more reason not to lose sleep over the rise in oil prices is that, unlike the rises in the 1970s, it has not occurred against the background of general commodity-price inflation and global excess demand. A sizable portion of the world is only just emerging from economic decline. The Economist’s commodity price index is broadly unchanging from a year ago. In 1973 commodity prices jumped by 70%, and in 1979 by almost 30%. (2002年 Text 3)
We can draw a conclusion from the text that .
[A] oil-price shocks are less shocking now
[B] inflation seems irrelevant to oil-price shocks
[C] energy conservation can keep down the oil prices
[D] the price rise of crude leads to the shrinking of heavy industry
文章前面兩段描述出一種現(xiàn)象，指出最近石油價(jià)格大幅上漲;接著在文章中間部分提出文章主旨“這次油價(jià)上漲不會(huì)造成經(jīng)濟(jì)衰退的原因”，并在以后各段分別論述這些原因。正確答案為[A]選項(xiàng)。這里涉及的閱讀技巧是當(dāng)有but,however,yet,while之類(lèi)的轉(zhuǎn)折連詞出現(xiàn)時(shí)，該篇/段/意群/句的中心往往是這些詞后面的部分。
(3)文章末段或段落末句對(duì)全文或全段進(jìn)行總結(jié)歸納，得出中心思想。
Example
Scattered around the globe are more than 100 small regions of isolated volcanic activity known to geologists as hot spots. Unlike most of the world’s volcanoes, they are not always found at the boundaries of the great drifting plates that make up the earth’s surface; on the contrary, many of them lie deep in the interior of a plate. Most of the hot spots move only slowly, and in some cases the movement of the plates past them has left trails of dead volcanoes. The hot spots and their volcanic trails are milestones that mark the passage of the plates.
That the plates are moving is now beyond dispute. Africa and South America, for example, are moving away from each other as new material is injected into the sea floor between them. The complementary coastlines and certain geological features that seem to span the ocean are reminders of where the two continents were once joined. The relative motion of the plates carrying these continents has been constructed in detail, but the motion of one plate with respect to another cannot readily be translated into motion with respect to the earth’s interior. It is not possible to determine whether both continents are moving in opposite directions or whether one continent is stationary and the other is drifting away from it. Hot spots, anchored in the deeper layers of the earth, provide the measuring instruments needed to resolve the question. From an analysis of the hot-spot population it appears that the African plate is stationary and that it has not moved during the past 30 million years.
The significance of hot spots is not confined to their role as a frame of reference. It now appears that they also have an important influence on the geophysical processes that propel the plates across the globe. When a continental plate comes to rest over a hot spot, the material rising from deeper layers creates a broad dome. As the dome grows, it develops deep fissures (cracks); in at least a few cases the continent may break entirely along some of these fissures, so that the hot spot initiates the formation of a new ocean. Thus just as earlier theories have explained the mobility of the continents, so hot spots may explain their mutability (inconstancy).(1998年 Passage 5)
The passage is mainly about .
[A] the features of volcanic activities
[B] the importance of the theory about drifting plates
[C] the significance of hot spots in geophysical studies
[D] the process of the formation of volcanoes
文章總共三段，第一段對(duì)熱點(diǎn)下定義：熱點(diǎn)及其火山痕跡是板塊移動(dòng)的標(biāo)志。第二段和第三段主要論述熱點(diǎn)理論的作用。全文主旨句是第三段的前兩句，它們承上啟下，指出熱點(diǎn)不僅有參照作用，還對(duì)推動(dòng)板塊移動(dòng)的地質(zhì)物理學(xué)過(guò)程提供了解釋。正確答案為[C]選項(xiàng)。
(4)文章或段落中不明確給出中心，考生要根據(jù)各段中心或各句的內(nèi)容進(jìn)行總結(jié)，自己推出主旨。
Example
A history of long and effortless success can be a dreadful handicap, but, if properly handled, it may become a driving force. When the United States entered just such a glowing period after the end of the Second World War, it had a market eight times larger than any competitor, giving its industries unparalleled economies of scale. Its scientists were the world’s best, its workers the most skilled. America and Americans were prosperous beyond the dreams of the Europeans and Asians whose economies the war had destroyed.
It was inevitable that this primacy should have narrowed as other countries grew richer. Just as inevitably, the retreat from predominance proved painful. By the mid-1980s Americans had found themselves at a loss over their fading industrial competitiveness. Some huge American industries, such as consumer electronics, had shrunk or vanished in the face of foreign competition. By 1987 there was only one American television maker left, Zenith. (Now there is none: Zenith was bought by South Korea’s LG Electronics in July.) Foreign-made cars and textiles were sweeping into the domestic market. America’s machine-tool industry was on the ropes. For a while it looked as though the making of semiconductors, which America had invented and which sat at the heart of the new computer age, was going to be the next casualty.
All of this caused a crisis of confidence. Americans stopped taking prosperity for granted. They began to believe that their way of doing business was failing, and that their incomes would therefore shortly begin to fall as well. The mid-1980s brought one inquiry after another into the causes of America’s industrial decline. Their sometimes sensational findings were filled with warnings about the growing competition from overseas.
How things have changed! In 1995 the United States can look back on five years of solid growth while Japan has been struggling. Few Americans attribute this solely to such obvious causes as a devalued dollar or the turning of the business cycle. Self-doubt has yielded to blind pride. “American industry has changed its structure, has gone on a diet, has learnt to be more quick-witted,” according to Richard Cavanaugh, executive dean of Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government. “It makes me proud to be an American just to see how our businesses are improving their productivity,” says Stephen Moore of the Cato Institute, a think-tank in Washington, D.C. And William Sahlman of the Harvard Business School believes that people will look back on this period as “a golden age of business management in the United States.”(2000年 Passage 1)
What can be inferred from the passage?
[A] It is human nature to shift between self-doubt and blind pride.
[B] Intense competition may contribute to economic progress.
[C] The revival of the economy depends on international cooperation.
[D] A long history of success may pave the way for further development.
答案：B
解析：文章的主題既不在首段，也不在末段，需要考生綜合各段內(nèi)容得出。從全文看，文章敘述了美國(guó)經(jīng)濟(jì)從繁榮到衰敗再到繁榮的過(guò)程，且特別強(qiáng)調(diào)競(jìng)爭(zhēng)給美國(guó)帶來(lái)90年代的經(jīng)濟(jì)復(fù)蘇。[B]選項(xiàng)“激烈的競(jìng)爭(zhēng)可能促進(jìn)經(jīng)濟(jì)的發(fā)展”正合全文大意。
5主旨題的解題技巧
根據(jù)上述這四種情況，制定如下解題對(duì)策：
第一，因?yàn)榭忌枰x完全文才能把握文章主題，所以在解答此類(lèi)題時(shí)，考生不要急于去找答案，不論它出現(xiàn)在什么位置都把它作為最后一道題來(lái)做。在做完另外幾道題后，無(wú)疑會(huì)有助于考生加深對(duì)整個(gè)文章的理解。
第二，看到文章主旨型題目，考生要著重理解首段或末段，同樣，段落主旨題也要重視首末句。這是英語(yǔ)文章中出現(xiàn)中心思想最頻繁的位置。
第三，文章主旨出現(xiàn)在中間的比較少見(jiàn)。這樣的主旨句一般兼起承上啟下的作用。遇到文章中前后段意思轉(zhuǎn)折時(shí)，考生應(yīng)該提高警惕，它往往是主旨所在。段落中情況也類(lèi)似。
第四，如果文章中沒(méi)有明確的主題句，主題思想要通過(guò)各段的主要內(nèi)容進(jìn)行歸納。這時(shí)考生就要著重看各段的首末句。試題中的Title 題也屬于該種情況。考生必須通讀全文，才能得出答案。
解題中還有一些具體實(shí)用的解題技巧：
首先，關(guān)于主題句的判斷方法。第一，段落主題句的判斷要看該段的第二句或第三句。如果它們是對(duì)第一句進(jìn)行闡述，那么第一句就是主題句;如果是對(duì)第二句進(jìn)行闡述，那第二句就是主題句;主題句也可能出現(xiàn)在末句。當(dāng)最后一句是對(duì)全段進(jìn)行總結(jié)時(shí)，該句就是主題句。對(duì)于主題句在句中的情況，當(dāng)段落中出現(xiàn)轉(zhuǎn)折時(shí)，該句很可能是主題句。文章主旨所在段落的判斷與此相同。第二，作者有意識(shí)地反復(fù)重復(fù)的觀點(diǎn)通常是主旨。第三，首段出現(xiàn)疑問(wèn)句時(shí)，該問(wèn)題就是全文探討的內(nèi)容，對(duì)該問(wèn)題的解答就是文章主旨。第四，作者提出文章主旨時(shí)，常常伴有文字提示，如therefore，thus，but，however，in short 等等。
其次，選項(xiàng)特點(diǎn)。正確選項(xiàng)特點(diǎn)：(1)不出現(xiàn)細(xì)節(jié)信息;(2)不含過(guò)分肯定或絕對(duì)意義的詞。干擾項(xiàng)特點(diǎn)：(1)一般以偏概全，只是文章的細(xì)枝末節(jié)，不能涵蓋全文內(nèi)容;(2)出現(xiàn)細(xì)節(jié)性的名詞信息;(3)過(guò)于籠統(tǒng)。
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