首页
登录
职称英语
The rise of English is a remarkable success story. When Julius Caesar landed
The rise of English is a remarkable success story. When Julius Caesar landed
游客
2024-02-27
29
管理
问题
The rise of English is a remarkable success story. When Julius Caesar landed in Britain nearly two thousand years ago, English did not exist. Five hundred years later, English, incomprehensible to modern ears, was probably spoken by about as few people as currently speak Cherokee (an American Indian language)-and with about as little influence. Nearly a thousand years later, at the end of sixteenth century, when William Shakespeare was in his prime, English was the native speech of between five and seven million English people and it was, in the words of a contemporary, "of small reach, it stretched no further than this island of ours, never not there over all. "
Four hundred years later, the contrast is extraordinary. Between 1600 and the present, in armies, navies, companies, and expeditions, the speakers of English-including Scots, Irish, Welsh, American, and many more-traveled into every corner of the globe, carrying their language and culture with them. Today English is used by at least 750 million people, and barely half of those speak it as a mother tongue. Some estimates have put that figure Closer to one billion. Whatever the total, English at the end of the twentieth century is more widely scattered, more widely spoken and written, than any other language has ever been. It has become the language of the planet, the first truly global language.
The statistics of English are astonishing. Of all the world’s languages, it is arguably the richest in vocabulary. The compendious (简明) Oxford English Dictionary lists about 500,000 words; and a further half million technical and scientific terms remain uncatalogued. About 350 million people use the English vocabulary as a mother tongue: about one tenth of the world’s population, scattered across every continent and surpassed, in numbers, though not in distribution, only by the speakers of the many varieties of Chinese. Three quarters of world’s mail, and its telexes and cables, are in English. So are more than half the world’s technical and scientific periodicals: it is the language of technology from Silicon Valley to Shanghai. [br] The word "contemporary"(Para.1) most likely means ______.
选项
A、person in modern time
B、a person who studies old English
C、a scholar who studies Shakespeare
D、a person in Shakespeare’s tinie
答案
D
解析
根据上下文猜测 contemporary 意为和莎士比亚同时代的人。
转载请注明原文地址:https://tihaiku.com/zcyy/3488519.html
相关试题推荐
IntheU.S.,highschoolEnglishclasses___________(往往把重点放在)improvingwritingski
Thereasonforoursuccessisourpeopleand____________(他们是被如何对待的以及他们对公司的感受如何
[originaltext]TherearethreegroupsofEnglishlearners:beginners,interm
[originaltext]TherearethreegroupsofEnglishlearners:beginners,interm
[originaltext]TherearethreegroupsofEnglishlearners:beginners,interm
[originaltext]Thequestforsuccessalwaysbeginswithatarget.AsYogiBe
[originaltext]Thequestforsuccessalwaysbeginswithatarget.AsYogiBe
[originaltext]W:Well,Charles,Imustsaythatyourshopisprettyremarkable.
Youshouldknowthatpridewill______(妨碍你成功)getinthewayofyoursuccess
ThreeEnglishdictionariespublishedrecentlyalllayclaimtopossessinga
随机试题
[originaltext]M:I’vebeenworkingreallyhardinthepastsemesterandIgota
[originaltext]Speechisoneofthemostimportantwaysofcommunicating.It
ThispassageisareportonthegrowingnumberofAmericanswhoadoptchildrenf
垄断竞争市场长期均衡条件是()。 ①边际收益MR=长期边际成本LMC=短期边
★下列关于人民陪审员的说法不正确的是哪些?() A.除了社会影响较大的诉讼案
唾液腺多形性腺瘤出现?A、筛孔结构 B、黏液池 C、软骨样区域 D、颗粒细
甲是某公司的股东,意欲请求公司收购其期权,下列情形中符合法律规定的是()A.
以下关于劳动的效用说法,错误的是()A.只有劳动对消费者具有效用和边际效用
下列几种架空电力线路采用的过电压保护方式中,哪几种做法不符合规范要求?()A.
下列建设工程施工合同跟踪的对象中,属于对业主跟踪的是()。A.成本的增减
最新回复
(
0
)