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  3. Many things about language are a mystery, and many will always remain so. But some things we do know. First, we know that al

Many things about language are a mystery, and many will always remain so. But some things we do know. First, we know that al

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问题     Many things about language are a mystery, and many will always remain so. But some things we do know.
    First, we know that all men in the world have a language of some sort. There is no race of men anywhere on earth so backward that it has no language. And, in historical times, there has never been a race of men without a language.
    Second, there is no such thing as a primitive language. There are many peoples whose cultures are undeveloped, who are, as we say, uncivilized, but the languages they speak are not primitive. In all known languages we can see complexities that must have been tens of thousands of years in developing. This has not always been well understood: indeed, the direct contrary (反面) has often been stated. Popular ideas of the language of the American Indians will illustrate. Many people have supposed that the Indians communicated in a very primitive way. Study has proved this to be nonsense. There are, or were, hundreds of American Indian languages, and all of them turn out to be very complicated and very old. They are certainly different from the languages that most of us are familiar with, but they are no more primitive than English and Greek.
    A third thing we know about language is that all languages are perfectly adequate. That is, each one is a perfect means of expressing the culture of the people who speak the language.
    Finally, we know that language changes. It is natural and normal for language to change: the only languages which do not change are the dead ones. This is easy to understand if we look backward in time. Change goes on in all aspects of language. Grammatical features change as do speech sounds, and changes in vocabulary are sometimes very extensive and may occur very rapidly.
    Vocabulary is the least stable part of any language.
What does the word "adequate" (Para. 4) most probably mean?
选项 A、Primitive.
B、Unique.
C、Sufficient.
D、Proper.
答案D
解析 词语理解题。根据文章第四段第二句中的That is(也就是说)可知，第二句具体解释了第一句的内容。由第二句内容“每种语言都是讲本语言的人表达其文化的完美工具”可推知，adequate在本句中意为“合适的，恰当的”。故选D。
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