The world’s native languages are dying out at an unprecedented(空前的) rate, taking with them irreplaceable(不能替代的) knowledge about the natural world, according to a new study.
The study identified five global “hot spots” where languages are vanishing faster than anywhere else ---- eastern Siberia, northern Australia, central South America, the US state of Oklahoma and the US Pacific Northwest. “Languages are suffering a global extinction crisis that greatly goes beyond the pace of species extinction,” linguistics(語(yǔ)言學(xué)的) professor David Harrison noted, who said half of the world’s 7,000 languages were expected to disappear before the end of the century.
Native people had an intimate(詳盡的) knowledge of their environment that was lost when their language disappeared, along with other certain things often unfamiliar to us, Harrison stressed. “Most of what we know about species and ecosystems is not written down anywhere, it’s only in people’s heads,” he said. “We are seeing in front of our eyes the loss of the human knowledge base.”
Harrison was one of a team of linguists who carried out the study. The researchers traveled to Australia this year to study native languages, some of the most endangered. According to Harrison, in Australia, they were heartened to see a woman in her 80s who was one of the only three remaining speakers of the Yawuru language passing on her knowledge to schoolchildren. He said such inter-generational exchanges were the only way native languages could survive. “The children had elected to take this course, no one forced them,” he said. “When we asked them why they were learning it, they said,‘This is a dying language, we need to learn it’.” Also, while there they found a man with knowledge of the  Amurdag  language, which had previously been thought extinct.
The researchers said all five of the hot spots identified were areas that had been successfully colonized and where a dominant language such as Spanish or English was threatening native tongues.
小題1:What does this text mainly talk about?
A．A study on native languages endangered.
B．The knowledge of native languages.
C．People’s efforts in saving native languages.
D．Harrison and his study on languages.
小題2:The underlined word“vanishing”in the second paragraph can be best replaced by        .
A．developingB．changingC．increasingD．Disappearing
小題3:According to Harrison, language extinction        .
A．causes the researchers lots of worries
B．speeds up the pace of species extinction
C．threatens the existing of Spanish and English
D．brings about a loss of knowledge about the environment
小題4:Which of the following can be described as good news?
A．Native languages became less endangered in Australia.
B．A man was found with knowledge of the Amurdag language.
C．Researchers were well received by native people in Australia.
D．Many schoolchildren showed interest in the Yawuru language.

小題1:A
小題2:D
小題3:D
小題4:B

試題分析：本文介紹了研究全球本地語(yǔ)言消失所帶來(lái)的嚴(yán)重影響，人們挽救本土語(yǔ)言的努力和使本地語(yǔ)言上消失的原因。
小題1:推斷題：通讀全文后可知本文主要研究全球本地語(yǔ)言消失所帶來(lái)的嚴(yán)重影響，人們挽救本土語(yǔ)言的努力和使本地語(yǔ)言上消失的原因，故選A。
小題2:細(xì)節(jié)題： developing發(fā)展；changing改變；increasing增加；Disappearing消失。通讀全文可知是巨額本土語(yǔ)言正在消亡，只有D項(xiàng)語(yǔ)文以最貼切，故選D。
小題3:細(xì)節(jié)題：根據(jù)Native people had an intimate(詳盡的) knowledge of their environment that was lost when their language disappeared當(dāng)土著人的語(yǔ)言消失的時(shí)候，他們關(guān)于環(huán)境的詳細(xì)知識(shí)也消失了，故選D。
小題4:推斷題：B、D項(xiàng)在文中均有提到，A、C項(xiàng)未被提及，故A、C是錯(cuò)誤的。根據(jù)while there they found a man with knowledge of the Amurdag language, which had previously been thought extinct他們發(fā)現(xiàn)有一個(gè)了解Amurdag語(yǔ)言的人,此前這種語(yǔ)言被認(rèn)為已經(jīng)滅絕。故這個(gè)消息是好消息，故選B。
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A．madeB．crashedC．mixedD．a(chǎn)pplied
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