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  3. The beginning of what was to become the United States was characterized by inconsistencies in the values and behavior of its pop

The beginning of what was to become the United States was characterized by inconsistencies in the values and behavior of its pop

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问题     The beginning of what was to become the United States was characterized by inconsistencies in the values and behavior of its population, inconsistencies that were reflected by its spokesmen, who took conflicting stances in many areas; but on the subject of race, the conflicts were particularly vivid. The idea that the Caucasian race and European civilization were superior was well entrenched in the culture of the colonists at the very time that the "egalitarian" republic was founded. Voluminous historical evidence indicates that, in the mind of the average colonist, the African was a heathen, he was black, and he was different in crucial philosophical ways. As time progressed, he was also increasingly captive, adding to the conception of deviance. The African, therefore, could be justifiably treated as property according to the reasoning of slave traders and slaveholders.
    Although slaves were treated as objects, bountiful evidence suggests that they did not view themselves similarly. There are many published autobiographies of slaves; African-American scholars are beginning to know enough about West African culture to appreciate the climate in which the early captives were raised and which therefore could not be totally destroyed by the enslavement experience. This was a climate that denied individuality in collective terms. Individuals were members of a tribe, within which they had prescribed roles determined by the history of their family within the tribe. Individuals were inherently a part of the natural elements on which they depended, and they were actively related to those tribal members who once lived and to those not yet born.
    The colonial plantation system which was established and into which Africans were thrust did virtu ally eliminate tribal affiliations. Individuals were separated from kin; interrelationships among kin kept together were often transient because of sales. A new identification with those slaves working and living together in a given place could satisfy what was undoubtedly a natural tendency to be a member of a group. New family units became the most important attachments of individual slaves. Thus, as the system of slavery was gradually institutionalized, West African affiliation tendencies adapted to it.
    This exceedingly complex dual influence is still reflected in black community life, and the double consciousness of black Americans is the major characteristic of African-American mentality. Dubois articulated this divided consciousness as follows: " The history of the American Negro is the history of this strife—this longing to attain self-conscious manhood, to merge his double self into a better and truer self. In this merging, he wishes neither of the older selves to be best.
    Several black political movements have looked upon this duality as destructively conflict and have variously urged its reconciliation. Thus, the integrationists and the black nationalists, to be crudely general, have both been concerned with resolving the conflict, but in opposite directions.
The second paragraph is mainly about______.
选项 A、a reinterpretation of slave life based on new researches
B、the life of African-American scholars in their earlier years
C、the ways in which slaveholders controlled their slaves
D、the relationship of individual slaves to their community
答案A
解析 主旨题。第二段指出，大量证据显示，奴隶并不把自己看成是物品，随着许多关于奴隶自传的文章被出版，非洲裔美国学者开始充分了解西非文化，以便正确评价早期奴隶被驯养的环境以及不可能被奴役的经历完全破坏的环境。这说明，第二段主要是介绍人们对奴隶生活与环境的重新研究。A可以表达此意，为正确选项，B和C与文意不符；D是研究的内容，不能表达第二段的主题。
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