understand a problem. You begin to see a problem from different ways. This is helpful if you don’t agree with others.

28. What does the word “it” in Paragraph 4

mean?

A. Keeping away from illness. B. Using your right brain to create. C. Stopping some thoughts coming through. D. Allowing thoughts to come out in your

diary.

29. According to the passage, keeping diaries

can help ______.

A. get along with others B. understand things better C. know more about the old tradition D. become famous in the future

30. What is the main idea of the passage?

A. The advantages of keeping diaries. B. Keeping a diary with your left brain.

C. The ways of keeping a diary successfully. D. The reasons girls like keeping diaries.

C

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Like people from most countries, the people of the British Islands speak their own dialects (方言). A dialect is a different version (版本) of a main language. It has different words and is related (相关的) to the culture of the place in which it is spoken. It is usually spoken with a certain accent (口音). Although it may be different, a dialect is usually not so different that an outsider can’t understand what is being said.

Speakers of dialects in Britain are often proud of them. For this reason, when you visit an area with a dialect, especially when it is a place visited by tourists, gift stores will sell books about the local words.

The dialects of Northern Ireland have many words that the other British have never heard of. An unusual example I recently learned from this part of the world is “boke”, which means

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“vomit (呕吐)”. The nearly poetic (诗意的) words of the Cockneys (伦敦东区的人) of the East End of London are famous throughout the world because they can be so clever and humorous. Here is a piece of rhyming slang (押韵俚语): A “whistle and flute” is Cockney for “suit”.

It is true that there are fewer dialects in Britain today than there were a hundred years ago，and far fewer than there were 200 years ago. The reason is quite clear: The modern world and its chances for communication have made the differences between people much smaller. When people speak and listen to more people from a much larger area than their mothers and fathers did, the differences between the ways they speak get smaller.

This means that there are now far fewer problems understanding each other for the

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people of the British Islands. Also, English speakers from all over the world can generally understand each other. Of course, without dialects, it will be much more difficult for English as a second language to have such a big success all over the world!

31. According to Paragraph 1, we know that a dialect ______.

A. represents the main language B. has nothing to do with culture C. is a local version of a main language D. is too difficult for an outsider to

understand

32. How do people in Britain usually feel about

their dialects?

A. They take no notice of them.

B. They are not satisfied with them.

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