Passage 7
六錯二
In 1896 a Georgia couple suing for damages in the accidental death of their two year old was told that since the child had made no real economic contribution to the family, there was no liability for damages. In contrast, less than a century later, in 1979, the parents of a three year old sued in New York for accidental-death damages and won an award of $750,000.
第一段:陳述二件相互對比的事件,快速讀過即可
The transformation in social values implicit(含蓄的) in juxtaposing(並列) these two incidents is the subject of Viviana Zelizer’s excellent book, Pricing the Priceless Child.(作者引述一位或一本書的看法) During the nineteenth century, she argues, the concept of the “useful”(呼應本段最後一句的童工現象) child who contributed to the family economy gave way gradually to the present-day notion of the “useless” child who, though producing no income for, and indeed extremely costly to, its parents, is yet considered emotionally “priceless.” Well established among segments of the middle and upper classes by the mid-1800’s, this new view of childhood spread throughout society in the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries as(伴隨著) reformers introduced child-labor regulations and compulsory education laws predicated in part on the assumption that a child’s emotional value made child labor taboo(禁忌).
第二段總結:作者引用一本新書的概念,指出本來兒童是有工作的,後來法律限制不能工作,因此是從有用的變成無用的,但事實上,在情感上兒童總被父母視為無價之寶。這觀念到了二十世紀初就己完全在社會中普遍開來
For Zelizer the origins of this transformation were many and complex. The gradual erosion(侵蝕) of children’s productive value in a maturing industrial economy, the decline in birth and death rates, especially in child mortality(死亡率), and the development of the companionate family (a family in which members were united by explicit bonds of love rather than duty) were all factors critical in changing the assessment of children’s worth. Yet “expulsion(驅逐) of children from the ‘cash nexus (連繫),’..although clearly shaped by profound changes in the economic, occupational, and family structures,” Zelizer maintains, “was also part of a cultural process ‘of sacralization’ of children’s lives.” Protecting children from the crass(完全的) business world became enormously important for late-nineteenth-century middle-class Americans, she suggests; This sacralization was a way of resisting what they perceived as the relentless(嚴苛的) corruption of human values by the marketplace.
第三段介紹這個兒童價值觀念的轉換是起因於產業因素、出生率、死亡率、家庭情感等...還有大眾普遍對市場態度的改變,因為對兒童神聖化。
In stressing the cultural determinants of a child’s worth, Zelizer takes issue with practitioners of the new “sociological economics,”(特別注意,這是指Zelizer與一些SE的觀點不同 take issue with = disagree) who have analyzed such traditionally sociological topics as crime, marriage, education, and health solely in terms of their economic determinants. Allowing only a small role for cultural forces in the form of individual “preferences,” these sociologists tend to view all human behavior as directed primarily by the principle of maximizing economic gain. Zelizer is highly critical of this approach, and emphasizes instead the opposite phenomenon: the power of social values to transform price. As children became more valuable in emotional terms, she argues, their “exchange” or “surrender” value on the market, that is, the conversion of their intangible worth into cash terms, became much greater.第四段則是本文畫龍點睛之處,作者雖然指出SE會認為一切都該是從經濟角度出發,因此既然兒童不工作,就沒有價值,但事實上,社會價值的轉變,反而讓兒童的價值更為巨大。注意take issue with這個片語,是disagree的意思,表示作者、書的作者都和SE的看法相反
37. It can be inferred from the passage that accidental-death damage awards in America during the nineteenth century tended to be based principally on the (推論題)
(A) earnings of the person at time of death
(B) wealth of the party causing the death
(C) degree of culpability of the party causing the death
(D) amount of money that had been spent on the person killed
(E) amount of suffering endured by the family of the person killed
見本文第一段,一個小時死亡時未獲賠償,就是因為他沒辦法給家裡賺錢
38. It can be inferred from the passage that in the early 1800’s children were generally regarded by their families as individuals who (推論題)
(A) needed enormous amounts of security and affection
(B) required constant supervision while working
(C) were important to the economic well-being of a family
(D) were unsuited to spending long hours in school
(E) were financial burdens assumed for the good of society
答案為C,見本文第二段
39. Which of the following alternative explanations of the change in the cash value of children would be most likely to be put forward by sociological economists as they are described in the passage? (細節題)
(A) The cash value of children rose during the nineteenth century because parents began to increase their emotional investment in the upbringing of their children.
(B) The cash value of children rose during the nineteenth century because their expected earnings over the course of a lifetime increased greatly.
(C) The cash value of children rose during the nineteenth century because the spread of humanitarian ideals resulted in a wholesale reappraisal of the worth of an individual
(D) The cash value of children rose during the nineteenth century because compulsory education laws reduced the supply, and thus raised the costs, of available child labor.
(E) The cash value of children rose during the nineteenth century because of changes in the way negligence law assessed damages in accidental-death cases.
答案為B,見本文第四段
*40. The primary purpose of the passage is to (主題類型題)
(A) review the literature in a new academic subfield
(B) present the central thesis of a recent book
(C) contrast two approaches to analyzing historical change
(D) refute a traditional explanation of a social phenomenon
(E) encourage further work on a neglected historical topic
答案是B,要小心不見得每題都是依態度做題
41. It can be inferred from the passage that which of the following statements was true of American families over the course of the nineteenth century? (細節題)
(A) The average size of families grew considerably
(B) The percentage of families involved in industrial work declined dramatically.
(C) Family members became more emotionally bonded to one another.
(D) Family members spent an increasing amount of time working with each other.
(E) Family members became more economically dependent on each other.
答案是C
*42. Zelizer refers to all of the following as important influences in changing the assessment of children’s worth EXCEPT changes in
(A) the mortality rate
(B) the nature of industry
(C) the nature of the family
(D) attitudes toward reform movements
(E) attitudes toward the marketplace
答案是D,見本文第三段,ABCE都能找到,就是D沒提,提到reformer是第二段,與本題不合,B選項在第三段第一句就有提到
本文結論
社會科學類型文章普遍不難,但會考一堆推論題
本文應該是Argument的文章,仍然是結尾更為重要
社會科學類型文章的主題型問題還是不好答,是否該用態度做題相當難拿捏
細節題的定位還是不簡單,要特別小心