Over the past century, all kinds of unfairness and discrimination have been made illegal. But one popular form continues to exist, that is alphabetism (字母排序法). This, for those as yet unaware of such a disadvantage, refers to discrimination against those whose surnames(姓氏)begin with a letter in the lower half of the alphabet.
It has long been known that the cars of a taxi firm called AAAA have a big advantage over Zodiac cars when customers look through their phone directories. Less well known is the advantage that Adam Abbot has in life over Zoe Zysman. English names are fairly spread between the halves of the alphabet. Yet a quite large number of top people have surnames beginning with letters between A and K.
Thus the American presidents and vice-presidents have surnames starting with B and C separately and 26 of those before George Bush took office (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. The same case are the world's five richest men ( Gates, Buffet and so on) .
Can this merely happen by chance? At the start of the first year in primary school, teachers seat pupils, alphabetically from the front, to make it easier to remember their names. So shortsighted and small-sized Zysman junior gets stuck in the back row, and is seldom asked the improving questions by those teachers. At that time the alphabetically disadvantaged may think they have had a lucky escape. Yet the result may be worse qualifications, because they get less attention, as well as less confidence in speaking publicly.
The unfairness continues. At university graduation parties, the ABCs proudly get their awards first. However, by the time they reach the Zysmans most people are a little tired. Lists of job interviews and conference speakers and attendees all tend to be drawn up alphabetically, and their readers lose interest as they plough through them.
【小题1】What does the author intend to show with AAAA cars and Zodiac cars?A．An example of petition of two kinds of cars.B．Some advantages of AAAA cars in the taxi firm.C．An example of unfairness caused by alphabetism.D．Some disadvantages of Zodiac cars in the taxi firm.【小题2】What can we infer from the first three paragraphs?A．The alphabet is to blame for the failure of Zoe Zysman.B．In both East and West, names are important to success.C．Customers often pay a lot of attention to panies' names.D．The discrimination in alphabetism can be found in many areas.【小题3】The fourth paragraph suggests that .A．alphabetically disadvantaged often escape from classB．teachers should pay equal attention to all their studentsC．questions are often put to the more intelligent studentsD．students should be seated according to their eyesight【小题4】Which of the following is TRUE according to the passage?A．VIPs in the western world gain a great deal from alphabetism.B．People with surnames beginning with N to Z are often misunderstood.C．Putting things alphabetically may lead to unintentional unfairness.D．The movement to get rid of alphabetism still has a long way to go.C
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(答案→)C
解析：本文作者介绍了按字母顺序排列对姓氏首字母在字母表后半部分不利。作者列举了许多例子来说明这种情况。
【小题1】细节题：根据第二段第一句“It has long been known that the cars of a taxi firm called AAAA have a big advantage over Zodiac cars when customers look through their phone directories. ”人们早就知晓一个叫4个A的汽车公司比一个叫Zodiac的汽车公司在做生意时享 有便利，因为顾客在翻看电话簿时，4个A汽车的名字排在前面，所以这是一种看似平等，实 际上并不平等的安排。故选C。
【小题2】推理题：阅读前三段内容可知第一段讲按字母顺序排列对姓氏首字母在字母表后半部分不利。第二段举两个例子， 一个是以A开头的汽车公司，另一个是以A开头的人名，都比以Z开头的汽车公司和人名 享有更多的好处，并指出有许多杰出人士的姓氏首字母都在A到K之间。第三段讲美国的总统、副总统、7个经济强国的政府首脑、世界上3个顶尖的银行家以及世界上最有钱的5个人的名字都在字母表的前一半。故选D。
【小题3】推理题：阅读第四段内容可知老师把学生按字母顺序排座位，结果，名字在字母表后面的学生虽有近视也得坐在后面，这样不利于学生的学习，也会影响他们以后在公众场合讲话的自信心。这反过来说明教师应当关心每个学生，故C项正确。故选B。
【小题4】细节题：文章的前4段都讲到了按字母排列而引起的对一些人的不公平，所以C对。“按字 母顺序排列会导致非故意的不公正”。故选C。