阅读理解
There are some differences in replying to compliment between Chinese and Americans. Americans
tend to accept the compliment while Chinese generally murmur(低语)some reply about not being worthy
of the praise. Here are two examples.
A young Chinese woman in the U.S. was complimented for the lovely dress that she was wearing.
"It's graceful. The colors are so beautiful!" She was pleased but somewhat embarrassed. In typical
Chinese fashion, she replied, "Oh, it's just an ordinary dress that I bought in China."
At a reception in an American college, a newly-arrived Chinese scholar was chatting with the hostess, who was an old friend. As an acquaintance(熟人)of hers came up, she said, "Ron, let me introduce
Mr. Chen, an outstanding physicist and one of the nicest people I know." Mr. Chen offered his hand to
the newcomer but looked at his hostess and said with a smile, "Should I feel ashamed, or should I tell him
you don't really mean it?"
In both cases, the words of the Chinese conveyed a message quite different from what was intended.
In the case of the Chinese woman, the reply could have meant that the one paying the compliment did
not know what a really good dress is; otherwise, how could she get so excited about an ordinary dress?
The implication(暗示)was that the American woman's taste in clothing was questionable. In the second
case, if Chen had not been smiling, he could have meant "You're just saying that to be polite; you don't
really mean that." So in one case, the person had poor judgment. In the other case, the hostess was not
sincere. Quite a gap between intention and message!
1. Which word can best replace the underlined word compliment in Paragraph 1?
A. praise
B. complaint
C. explanation
D. blame
2. Two examples are given in the passage to .
A. amuse the readers
B. draw readers' attention
C. support the author's opinion
D. arouse readers' interest
3. The following statements are true except .
A. both stories happened in the USA
B. Mr. Chen achieved achievements in physics
C. the dress was a beautiful one
D. Mr. Chen worked in the USA for long
4. The passage mainly tells us .
A. Americans like to praise people
B. Chinese people are very modest
C. culture varies in different countries
D. people should respect each other
