D) 100 years old
Questions 36 to 40 are based on the following passage:
Social change is more likely to occur in societies where there is a mixture of different kinds of people than in societies where people aresimilar in many ways. The simple reason for this is that there are more different ways of looking at things present in the first kind of society. There are more ideas, more disagreements in interest, and more groups and organizations with different beliefs. In addition, there is usually a greater worldly interest and greater tolerance in mixed societies. All these factors tend to promote social change by opening more areas of life to decision. In a society where people are quite similar in many ways, there are fewer occasions for people to see the need or the opportunity for change because everything seems to be the same. And although conditions may not be satisfactory, they are atleast customary and undisputed.
Within a society, social change is also likely to occur more frequently
and more readily in the material aspects of the culture than in the nonmaterial, for example, in technology rather than in values; in what has been learned later in life rather than what was learned early; in the less basic and less emotional aspects of society than in their opposites; in the simple elements
rather than in the complex ones; in form rather than in substance; and in elements that are acceptable to the culture rather than in strange elements.
Furthermore, social change is easier if it is gradual. For example, it
comes more readily in human relations on a continuous scale rather than one with sharp dichotomies ( 一分为二). This is one reason why change has not come
more quickly to Black Americans as compared to other American minorities,
because of the sharp difference in appearance between them and their white counterparts.
36.What kind of society tends to promote social changes?
A) A society where people are similar in many ways.
B) A society where there are only white people.
C) A society where there are only black people.
D) A society where there is a mixture of different kinds of people.
37.In a mixed society, there may be disagreement in ____.
A) ideas C) beliefs
B) interests D) all of the above
38.Which of the following is not true, according to the passage?
A) Social change is more likely to occur in the material aspect of society.
B) Social change is less likely to occur in what people learned when they were old.
C) Disagreement with and argument about conditions tend to promote
social change.
D) Social change tends to meet with more difficulty in basic and emotional aspects of society.
39.Social change is less likely to occur in a society where
people are quite similar in many ways because ____.
A) people there are easy to please
B) people there are less argumentary
C) people there have got so accustomed to their conditions that they seldom think it necessary to change
D) people there have same needs that can be satisfied without much difficulty
