Taylor Swift has been named Billboard’s Woman of the Year 2014, making her the first artist to receive the award twice.
The award goes to the female artist who “has shaped and inspired the music industry with her success, leadership and innovation” over the last year. Previous winners include Pink, Beyonce and Katy Perry.
Swift will receive the prize at the Billboard Women in Music award ceremony on 12 December in New York.
“As one of the most influential artists of her generation, Taylor Swift has seen incredible success on the Billboard charts,” said Janice Min, co-president and chief creative officer of Guggenheim Media’s Entertainment Group, which includes Billboard.
“Over the course of her career, she’s charted 60 entries on the Billboard Hot 100 - the most of any female artist since her debut in 2006. We are tremendously excited to be honouring her as the 2014 Billboard Woman of the Year for the second time.”
Taylor Swift is a seven-time Grammy winner and the best-selling digital music artist of all time. Earlier this week it was announced she would be performing on The X Factor results show this weekend.
On Thursday she appeared in the performed in the Radio 1 Live Lounge, where she sang her current hit Shake It Off and covered Vance Joy’s Riptide.
Swift has just featured on the cover of British Vogue and explained what it was like to do high profile interviews.
“I don’t really have anything to hide at this point,” she told Fearne Cotton. “It’s sort of understood that anything I do is going to be discussed and dissected and debated and I’m used to that dynamic now.” She added: “I’m very proud of the way my life is. I’m 24, I’m single, feeling very independent. A lot of fun things have happened in my life.”What can be inferred from the first two paragraphs?
| A．Taylor Swift is the first artist to receive the award twice. |
| B．Taylor Swift is one of the four winners. |
| C．Taylor Swift has shaped and inspired the music industry with her success, leadership and innovation |
| D．The award goes to the female artists. |
The Award Ceremony will be held on __________.
| A．on 12 November in New York |
| B．on 12 December in Washington |
| C．on 12 November in Washington |
| D．on 12 December in New York |
According to Janice Min, _____________________.
| A．Taylor Swift is a seven-time Grammy winner and the best-selling digital music artist of all time |
| B．Taylor Swift appeared in the performed in the Radio 1 Live Lounge |
| C．Taylor Swift is worthwhile to be given the award a second time |
| D．Taylor Swift would be performing on The X Factor results show this weekend. |
From the last paragraph, we can see Taylor Swift was ____________.
| A．sad | B．unhappy |
| C．delighted | D．indifferent |
What makes a gift special? Is it the price you see on the gift receipt? Or is it the look on the recipient's face when they receive it that determines the true value? What gift is worth the most?
This Christmas was debating what to give my father. My dad is a hard person to buy for because he never wants anything. I pulled out my phone to read a text message from my mom saying that we were leaving for Christmas shopping for him when I came across a message on my phone that I had locked. The message was from my father. My eyes fell on a photo of a flower taken in Wyoming, and underneath a poem by William Blake. The flower, a lone dandelion standing against the bright blue sky, inspired me. My dad had been reciting those words to me since I was a kid. That may even be the reason why I love writing. I decided that those words would be my gift to my father.
I called back. I told my mom to go without me and that I already created my gift. I sent the photo of the cream-coloured flower to my computer and typed the poem on top of it. As I was arranging the details another poem came to mind. The poem was written by Edgar Allan Poe; my dad recited it as much as he did the other. I typed that out as well and searched online for a background to the words of it. The poem was focused around dreaming, and after searching I found the prefer picture. The image was painted with blues and greens and purples, twisting together to create the theme and wonder of a dream. As I watched both poems passing through the printer, the white paper colouring with words that shaded my childhood, I felt that this was a gift that shaped my childhood; I felt that this was a gift that my father would truly appreciate.
Christmas soon arrived. The minute I saw the look on my dad's face as he unwrapped those swirling black letters carefully placed in a cheap frame, I knew I had given the perfect gift.The idea for a special gift began to form when the author was _____.
| A．doing shopping |
| B．having a debate |
| C．reading a message |
| D．leaving for Wyoming |
The author’s inspiration for the gift came from _____.
| A．a photo of a flower |
| B．a story about a kid |
| C．a call from the mother |
| D．a text about Christmas |
The underlined word “it” in Paragraph 3 refers to a poem by _____.
| A．the father |
| B．the author |
| C．William Blake |
| D．Edgar Allan Poe |
The author made the gift by _____.
| A．searching for the poems online |
| B．drawing the background by hand |
| C．painting the letters in three colours |
| D．matching the words with pictures |
What is the main purpose of the passage?
| A．To show how to design images for gifts. |
| B．To suggest making gifts from one’s heart. |
| C．To explain how computers help create gifts. |
| D．To describe the gifts the author has received. |
You just think you know what will make you happy. Researchers in the new science of happiness know better. They have evidence that married people on average end up being no happier than they were before the wedding. Winning the lottery (彩票) will probably reduce your pleasure in ordinary events that used to make you happy. And being in good health isn't as much of a factor as the right genes when it comes to satisfaction.
Soligman and Diener studied 222 Illinois college students to find out what the happiest 10% had in common. It turned out they were extroverts (外向的人), had more friendships and romantic relationships, but didn't exercise more and didn't feel they had more good events in their lives than those who weren’t as happy.
Some of the results come as a surprise. A classic study of lottery winners and people with spinal (脊骨) cord injuries, for instance, found that neither event changed their lives as much as observers thought they would.
Gilbert is looking into how accurately people predict what will make them happy, he turns out, not accurately at all. What we think will ring us pleasure – a new car, the home team winning the NCAA championship, a move to California-usually doesn't bring us as much as we expected, and the positive impact doesn't last as long. The good news is that we also over estimate the impact of catastrophic (灾难性的) events. Even with data from research pouring in, scientists still don't have an easy answer to what we all want to know: How do I get long-term life satisfaction? The answers they do have are often the same ones that philosophers and priests have been giving us for centuries. It's just nice to have them backed up with hard data.What does the passage mainly discuss?
| A．A research on happiness. |
| B．The level of happiness. |
| C．The secrets of happiness. |
| D．The prediction of happiness. |
The happiest people have the following characters except that _____.
| A．they are rich |
| B．they are outgoing |
| C．they are very sociable |
| D．they don’t pay more attention to exercise |
According to the passage, we can know if the hurricane happens, it will cause _____.
| A．more suffering than people expect |
| B．as much suffering as people expect |
| C．less suffering than people expect |
| D．nothing is mentioned about it |
Which of the following is TRUE according to the passage?
| A．We ourselves know what makes us happy the best. |
| B．The happiest 10% in the world have nothing in common. |
| C．People can predict the things that make them happy accurately. |
| D．We just need to do what the philosophers and priests tell us to keep happy. |
A spiraling (呈螺旋形的) tower made from thousands of books in dozens of languages is the later landmark in Buenos Ares, named the World Bok Capital this year.
Called the Tower of Babel, the 25-metrehigh tower by Argentine artist Marta Minujin is made from 30,000books, donated by readers, libraries and more than 50embassies.
Climbing up its seven floors, visitors to the tower hear music composed by Minujin and the voice of the artist repeating the word “book” in scores of languages.
“Building this tower is really a wonder,”Minujin said, standing before the structure as curious passers-by looked at a downtown city square. “A hundred years from now, Peple will say 'there was a Tower of Babel in Argentina... and it didn't need translation because art needs no translation'.”
Minujin, who worked with US artist Andy Warhol, built a full-scale mode of the Parthenon in Buenos Aires in1983, using books banned by the military dictatorship(专政) that ended that year.
This year's book tower marks Buenos Aires' naming as the 2011 · World Book Capital by the United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO).
“We've been laying books for 10 days straight,” said Sebastian Atienza, 26, who works for the company that built the tower under Minujin's command. “But it's worth it. It's where all languages come together.”
When the exhibit ends later this month, Minujin said literature lovers will be allowed to come and pick one book each. The rest will be brought down to start a new archive (档案馆) that has already been named The Library of Babel, the name of a story by Argentina's most famous author, Jorge Luis Borges.According to the passage, the Tower of Babel _____.
| A．is made from 30,000 books from nearly 50 countries |
| B．is designed by American artist Marta Minujin |
| C．will hold the book exhibition for 10 days |
| D．has a height of twenty-five metres |
After the book exhibition, most books will be _____.
| A．handed out among visitors |
| B．donated to UNESCO |
| C．sent to Argentina’s new archive |
| D．bought by Jorge Luis Borges |
The passage is probably taken from a(n) _____.
| A．advertisement |
| B．tourism guide |
| C．textbook |
| D．newpapers |
The research carried out by the University of Bari in Italy could help prove hospitals who are accused of wasting money on art and decoration as it suggests a pleasant environment helps patients ease discomfort and pain.
A team headed by Professor Marina de Tommaso at the Neurophysiopathology Pain Unit asked a group of men and women to pick the 20 paintings they considered most ugly and most beautiful from a selection of 300works by artists such as Leonardo da Vinci and Sandro Botticelli. They were then asked to look at either the beautiful paintings, or the ugly paintings, or a blank panel while the team zapped(照射) a short laser pulse at their hand, creating a sensation as if they had been stuck by a pin. He subjects rated the pain as being a third less intense while they were viewing the beautiful paintings, compared with when looking at the ugly paintings or the blank panel. Electrodes measuring the brain's electrical activity also confirmed a reduced response to the pain when the subject looked at beautiful paintings.
While distractions, such as music, are known to reduce pain in hospital patients, Professor Marina de Tommaso says this is the first result to show that beauty plays a part.
The findings, reported in New Scientist, also go a long way to show that beautiful surroundings could aid the healing process.
“Hospitals have been designed to be functional, but we think that their artistic aspects should be taken into account too,” said the neurologist. “Beauty obviously offers a distraction that ugly paintings do not. But at least there is no suggestion that ugly surroundings make the pain worse.” “I think these results show that more research is needed into the field how a beautiful environment can alleviate suffering.”
Pictures they liked included Starry Night by Vincent Van Gogh and Botticelli's Birth of Venus. Pictures they found ugly included works by Pablo Picasso, the Italian20thcentury artist Antonio Buenoand Columbian Fernando Botero.“ These people were not art experts so some of the pictures they found ugly would be considered masterpieces by the art world,” said Professor Marina de Tommaso.The underlined word “alleviate” in Paragraph 5 probably means “_____”.
| A．cure | B．ease |
| C．improve | D．kill |
How many artists have been mentioned in the passage?
| A．4. | B．5. |
| C．6. | D．7. |
Which of the following is TRUE about the view of Professor Marina de Tommaso’s?
| A．Beautiful surroundings could help to heal sufferings completely. |
| B．Hospitals must take their artistic aspects into consideration first. |
| C．Ugly surroundings will surely make the pain worse. |
| D．Both music and beauty can reduce pain in hospital patients. |
From the last paragraph, we know that _____.
| A．some artists’ paintings were beautiful, so they were masterpieces |
| B．only art experts could judge whether they were masterpieces or not, though ugly |
| C．the artists mentioned above were not really art masters |
| D．some of them were art masters, while others were not |
Which of the following is the most suitable title for the passage?
| A．Beautiful surroundings can ease pain. |
| B．Ugly paintings could be masterpieces. |
| C．More paintings should be done in the field. |
| D．Latest environmental research |
Welcome to one of the largest collections of footwear (鞋类) in the world that will make you green with envy. Here at he Footwear Museum you can see exhibits (展品) from all over the world. You can find out about shoes worn by everyone from the Ancient Egyptians to pop stars.
| Room 1 The celebrity () footwear section is probably the most popular in the entire museum. Started in the 1950s there is a wide variety of shoes and boots belonging to everyone from queens and presidents to pop stars and actors! Most visitors find the celebrities' choice of footwear extremely interesting. |
Room 2 Most of our visitors are amazed-and shocked-by the collection of “special purpose” shoes on exhibition here at the Museum of Footwear. For example, there are Chinese shoes made of silk that were worn by women to tie their feet firmly to prevent them from growing too much! |
| Rome 3 As well as shoes and boots the museum also exhibits shoe-shaped objects. The variety is unbelievable. For example, there is a metal lamp that resembles a pair of shoes, and Greek wine bottles that look like legs! |
The Footwear Library People come from all over the world to study in our excellent footwear library. Designers and researchers come here to look up information on anything and everything related to the subject of footwear. |
Where would you find a famous singer’s shoes?
| A．Room 1. |
| B．Room 2. |
| C．Room 3. |
| D．The Footwear Library. |
All exhibits in each room _____.
| A．share the same theme |
| B．have the same shape |
| C．are made of the same material |
| D．belong to the same social class |
Which of the following is true according to the text、
| A．The oldest exhibits in Room 1 were made in the 1950s. |
| B．Room 2 is the most visited place in the museum. |
| C．Room 3 has a richer variety of exhibits than the other two. |
| D．Researchers come to the Footwear Library for data. |
The purpose of the text is to get more people to _____.
| A．do research |
| B．design shoes |
| C．visit the museum |
| D．follow celebrities |