The media can impact current events. As a graduate student at Berkeley in the 1960s, I remember experiencing the events related to the People’s Park that were occurring on campus. Some of these events were given national media coverage in the press and on TV. I found it interesting to compare my impressions of what was going on with perceptions obtained from the news media. I could begin to see events of that time feed on news coverage. This also provided me with some healthy insights into the distinctions between these realities.

　　Electronic media are having a greater impact on the people’s lives every day. People gather more and more of their impressions from representations. Television and telephone communications are linking people to a global village, or what one writer calls the electronic city. Consider the information that television brings into your home every day. Consider also the contact you have with others simply by using telephone. These media extend your consciousness and your contact. For example, the video coverage of the 1989 San Francisco earthquake focused on “live action” such as the fires or the rescue efforts. This gave the viewer the impression of total disaster. Television coverage of the Iraqi War also developed an immediacy. CNN reported events as they happened. This coverage was distributed worldwide. Although most people were far away from these events, they developed some perception of these realities.

　　In 1992, many people watched in horror as riots broke out on a sad Wednesday evening in Los Angeles, seemingly fed by video coverage from helicopters. This event was triggered by the verdict in the Rodney King beating. We are now in an age where the public can have access to information that enables it to make its own judgments, and most people, who had seen the video of this beating, could not understand how the jury was able to acquit the policemen involved. Media coverage of events as they occur also provides powerful feedback that influences events. This can have harmful results, as it seemed on that Wednesday night in Los Angeles. By Friday night the public got to see Rodney King on television pleading, ‘Can we all get along?” By Saturday, television seemed to provide positive feedback as the Los Angeles riot turned out into a rally for peace. The television showed thousands of people marching with banners and cleaning tools. Because of that, many more people turned out to join the peaceful event they saw unfolding on television. The real healing, of course, will take much longer, but electronic media will continue to be a part of that process. (436 words)

　　Notes：media coverage 媒体报导。 
 
　　feed on 以…为食物，以…为能源，以…为来源。

　　1. The best title for the text would be ____________.

　　A. Positive Aspects of Media Reports B. How Media Cover Events at Present

　　C. The 1992 Los Angeles Riots and Their Causes D. The Strong Effect of Media on Current Events

　　2. All the following statements are true except _____________.

　　A. electronic media can extend one’s contact with the world

　　B. all the events occurring on the university campus at Berkeley were given national media coverage

　　C. video coverage of the 1989 San Francisco earthquake gave the viewers the impression of total disaster

　　D. those living far away from a certain event can also have some perception of realities by watching television

　　3. The term “electronic city” in Paragraph 2 refers to _____________.

　　A. Berkeley B. Earth C. Los Angeles D. San Francisco

　　4. The 1992 Los Angeles riots broke out because _____________.

　　A. video coverage from helicopters had made people angry

　　B. video coverage had provided powerful feedback

　　C. the jury proclaimed the policemen involved innocent

　　D. people there were not satisfied with policemen involved

　　5. It can be inferred from the text that _____________.

　　A. the 1992 Los Angeles riots lasted a whole week

　　B. most people hesitated to side with the verdict of the jury

　　C. media coverage of events as they occur can have good or bad results

　　D. Rodney King seemed very angry when he appeared on television on Friday

　　Text 4 (课外阅读)

　　The population is growing more quickly in some parts of the world than others. The continents with the fastest growth rates are Latin America (2.9 per cent) and Africa (2.6 per cent). Asia comes third (2.1 per cent) but because its present population is so large it is there that by far the greatest number of people will be added before the end of the century.

　　The main reason is not so much a rise in birth rates as a fall in death rates as a result of improvements in public health services and medical care. Many more babies now survive infancy, grow up and become parents, and many more adults are living into old age so that populations are being added to at both ends. In Europe and America the death rate began to fall during the Industrial Revolution. In the developing countries of Africa, Asia and Latin America the fall in death rate did not begin till much later and the birth rate has only recently begun to fall.

　　This sudden increase in the population of the developing countries has come at a difficult time. Even if their population had not grown so fast they would have been facing a desperate struggle to bring the standard of living of their people up to the point at which there was enough food, housing, education, medical care and employment for everyone to have a reasonable life. The poor countries are having to run faster and faster in their economic activity in order to stay in the same place, but the gap in wealth between rich and poor countries grows wider every year.

　　Statistics show that rapid population growth creates problems for developing countries. So why don't people have fewer children? Statistics from the developed countries suggest that it is only when people's living standards begin to rise that birth rates begin to fall. There are good reasons for this. Poor countries cannot afford social services and old age pensions, and people's incomes are so low that they have nothing to spare for savings. As a result, people look to their children to provide them with security in their old age. Having a large family can be a form of insurance. And even while they are still quite young, children can do a lot of useful jobs on a small farm. So poor people in a developing country will need to see clear signs of much better conditions ahead before they will think of having smaller families. But their conditions cannot be improved unless there is a reduction in the rate at which population is increasing. This will depend on a very much wider acceptance of family planning(计划生育) and this, in turn, will mean basic changes in attitudes. (458 words)

　　Note: not so much … as … 与其说是 …，倒还不如说是 …。

　　1. Asia will add to itself the greatest number of population in the next decade because it has the ______________.

　　A. highest birth rate B. lowest death rate

　　C. fastest growth rate D. largest present population

　　3. According to paragraph 2, the rapid growth of population is mainly due to ______________.

　　A. the decline in death rates across the world

　　B. the sharp increase in birth rates all over the world

　　C. the prolonged lives of old people in developing countries

　　D. the improvement of people's living standard in developed countries

　　3. In the sentence "... populations are being added to at both ends" (Paragraph 2), the words "both ends" refer to both

　　_______________.

　　A. birth rate and death rate B. babies and old people

　　C. developed and developing countries D. poor and rich people

　　4. According to the statistics from the developed countries, ______________.

　　A. birth rates will not fall until people's living standards begin to rise

　　B. the death rate in America began to fall only after the Industrial Revolution

　　C. the developing countries are running faster and faster in their economic activity

　　D. only when the people's living conditions begin to improve will the world population stop growing

　　5. It can be concluded from the last paragraph that ______________.

　　A. people in developing countries have smaller families as a rule

　　B. there is no way to ease the population problem in poor countries

　　C. rich countries are helping poor people improve their living conditions

　　D. family planning is essential to the final solution of the population problem