Reference Question

Practice 2

Passage 1

A third technique was to dig irrigation ditches to bring water from the rivers water was sometimes
carried to the fields in jars, particularly if the season was dry. Some crops were planted where they
could be watered directly by the runoff from the clips.

Question. The word “they” in line 2 refers to ...

a. Fields
b. Jars
c. Crops
d. Walls

Passage 2

The second category of glaciers include those of a variety of shapes and sizes generally called
mountain or alpine glaciers. Mountain glaciers are typically identified by the landform that controls
their flow. One form of mountain glaciers that resembles an ice cap in that it flows outward several
directions is called an ice field.

Question. The word “it” in line 3 refers to ...

a. Glacier
b. Cap
c. Difference
d. Terrain

Passage 3

The Sapir-Whorf hypothesis is based on the idea that people experience their world through their
language, and that they therefore understand their world through the culture embedded in their
language. The hypothesis, which has also been called linguistic relativity, states that language shapes
thought. Studies have shown, for instance, that unless people have access to the word
“ambivalent,” they don’t recognize an experience of uncertainty due to conflicting positive and
negative feelings about one issue. Essentially, the hypothesis argues, if a person can’t describe the
experience, the person is not having the experience.

Question. The word they in line 5 refers to …

a. Studies
b. People
c. Positive and negative feelings
d. Shapes

A Solution for Better Human Resources

Passage 4

Hunter-gatherer societies demonstrate the strongest dependence on the environment of the various
types of preindustrial societies. As the basic structure of human society until about 10,000–12,000
years ago, these groups were based around kinship or tribes. Hunter-gatherers relied on their
surroundings for survival—they hunted wild animals and foraged for uncultivated plants for food.
When resources became scarce, the group moved to a new area to find sustenance, meaning they
were nomadic. These societies were common until several hundred years ago, but today only a few
hundred remain in existence, such as indigenous Australian tribes sometimes referred to as
“aborigines,” or the Bambuti, a group of pygmy hunter-gatherers residing in the Democratic
Republic of Congo. Hunter-gatherer groups are quickly disappearing as the world’s population
explodes.

Q. The word these groups in line 3 refers to …

a. Human society
b. Years ago
c. Preindustrial societies
d. Hunter-gatherer societies

Passage 5

A high level of appreciation for one’s own culture can be healthy; a shared sense of community
pride, for example, connects people in a society. But ethnocentrism can lead to disdain or dislike for
other cultures, causing misunderstanding and conflict. People with the best intentions sometimes
travel to a society to “help” its people, seeing them as uneducated or backward; essentially inferior.
In reality, these travelers are guilty of cultural imperialism, the deliberate imposition of one’s own
cultural values on another culture. Europe’s colonial expansion, begun in the 16th century, was
often accompanied by a severe cultural imperialism. European colonizers often viewed the people in
the lands they colonized as uncultured savages who were in need of European governance, dress,
religion, and other cultural practices. A more modern example of cultural imperialism may include
the work of international aid agencies who introduce agricultural methods and plant species from
developed countries while overlooking indigenous varieties and agricultural approaches that are
better suited to the particular region.

Q. The words these travelers refer to …

a. Its people
b. Them
c. Cultural values
d. People with the best intentions

A Solution for Better Human Resources