题目

阅读理解          Is there something unforgivably confusing about the unlimited use of adjectives and adverbs?          Many famous stylists think so．Crime writer Elmore Leonard，who died last week，commented in his 10 rules of writing that using an adverb was almost always a “mortal sin(大罪)”．William Zinsser，author of On Writing Well，considers most adverbs and adjectives as “clutter(混乱)”，and Mark Twain advised readers to “kill” any adjective they could catch．          Zinsser and Twain are quoted by Adam Okulicz-Kozaryn，assistant professor of public policy at Rutgers University Camden，in support of his view that the greater the number of adjectives and adverbs in academic writing，the harder it is to read．He has published a paper in the journal Scientometrics analyzing adjectival and adverbial quantity in about 1,000 papers published between 2000 and 2010 from across the disciplines．          Perhaps unsurprisingly，the paper，“Cluttered writing：Adjectives and adverbs in academia”，finds that social science papers contain the highest number of them，followed by humanities and history．Natural science and mathematics contain the lowest frequency，followed by medicine and business and economics．The difference between the social and the natural science is about 15 percent．          “Is there a reason that a social scientist cannot write as clearly as a natural scientist？” the paper asks．          Dr．Okulicz-Kozaryn told Times Higher Education that the analysis had been inspired by his own reading of academic papers，which suggested that political science in particular was “full of meaningless words that only add ornament(修饰)and weaken the meaning．”He said the use of adjectives and adverbs also inflated article lengths，making it even harder for academics to keep up with the literature—a serious problem when the content of new papers published doubles every 15 years．          He dismissed the suggestion that the complexity of issues addressed by social scientists demand more adjectives and adverbs．But he said he had no good explanation for overusing “fancy，meaningless language” in the discipline and aimed to investigate further．However，he admitted that he had not analysed the frequency of adjectives and adverbs in his own writing．          “Maybe I am no better after all．．．But I’d bet I am better than average social scientists，” he said casually． （1） Which papers contain the second lowest quantity of adjectives and adverbs? A . Natural science papers． B . Social science papers． C . Business and economics papers． D . Humanities and history papers． （2） The underlined word “inflated” in Paragraph 8 can be best replaced by “_____”． A . increased B . controlled C . decided D . ignored （3） Which of the statements about adjectives and adverbs is TRUE? A . They can be properly used except in political science． B . Some thought social science papers need more of them． C . The complexity of social science leads to more of them． D . Dr．Okulicz-Kozaryn rarely uses them in his own writing． （4） Which is the best title for this passage? A . To write better，cut the clutter B . The number of adjectives and adverbs C . Literature in social science papers D . Functions of adjectives and adverbs 答案： C A B A

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