英语考试阅读理解题的猜词技巧(2)
寻找文中相互对比、相互对照的线索来确定生词的含义。
在此类文章中,通常会出现一些表示意义转折、对比的词语:however, but, on the other hand, on the contrary, instead of, while, unlike, not, although, yet, despite, in spite of, in contrast, etc.
例一: A good supervisor can recognize instantly the adept workers from the unskilled ones.
根据句法结构可知the adept workers和 the unskilled ones.为对比关系,意义相反。由the unskilled ones可推出the adept workers为熟练工人。
例二:Someone liked milk, but others abhorred it.
通过but我们知道abhor是like的反义词,意为“厌恶”。
五、并列平行结构
它表示意义上的并列或相似关系。表示并列关系的词语为and, similarly, like, just as, also, etc.
例一:A child’s birthday party does not have to be a hassle; it can be a basket of fun, according to Beth Anacleria, an Evaston mother of two, aged 4 and 18 months.
分号前后为两个并列平行的分句,后一句意为“生日聚会可以充满快乐、乐趣”,我们可以推测hassle意为“混乱”。
例二:First put forward by the French mathematician Pierre de Fermat in the seventeenth century, the theorem had baffled and beaten the finest mathematical minds, including a French woman scientist who made a major advance in working out the problem, and who had to dress like a man in order to be able to study at the Ecole Polytechnique.
baffled 和beaten为并列平行关系,根据beaten可以推测出baffled意为“难倒,使受挫,阻碍”之意。
例三:John loves to talk, and his sisters are similarly loquacious.
根据and和similarly判定短语loves to talk 和loquacious.之间为同义比较,意为“健谈的”。
六、因果关系
它也是推测词义的一种重要方式。我们可以通过结果推测原因,亦可通过原因推测结果。
例句:The girl began to feel homesick because she had been away from her family for years.
根据原因状语从句和homesick本身的构词方法,我们推断它的词义为“想家的”。
七、举例法
即通过生词后面所举的例子来推断生词的含义。
例句:In this reading room, you can find almost all periodicals in China, such as: The World of English, Foreign Language in School, English Learning or Readers.
我们根据后面所举的例子,不难推断出periodicals是“期刊”之意。