Unit 10 The Jeaning of America答案综合教程二

Unit 10 The Jeaning of America

Key to the Exercises

Text comprehension

I.

B

II.

1. F 2. T 3. T 4. T 5. T

III.

1. Because they symbolize “a manly and legitimate passion for equality …”; They draw no distinctions and recognize no classes and they are favored by all the American people.

2. Levi Strauss went West, taking with him canvas to sell for tenting. Since the canvas wasn’t suitable for tenting, he had them tailored into stiff but rugged pants which were badly demanded by miners. So Strauss was in business.

3. The word “jeans” derives from Genes, the French word for Genoa, where a similar cloth as that used by Strauss was produced; and “blue” refers to indigo, the color Strauss had his cloth dyed, hence the pants got their name “blue jeans”.

4. At first blue jeans were largely confined to the working people of the West. During the dude ranch craze of the 1930s, they were first introduced to the East. Another boost for them came in World War II, when blue jeans were declared an essential commodity and were sold only to people engaged in defense work.

5. Blue jeans can be purchased for the suitably proletarian look, and they adapt themselves to any sort of idiosyncratic use, and are suitable for various decorations and ornamentations.

6. The structure of the title is “the + v.ing + of + noun”, which indicates passive voice, like “the making of history”, while the noun “jean” is used as a verb. So the title means that America is “jeaned” or America became jeaned, i.e. America is made a country under the fashion of jeans or jeans became an overwhelming fashion in America.

IV.

1. They do not show differences in the wearer’s professions and social status; they only show that the wearer is as American as most Americans in jeans.

2. For two years, he worked as a peddler of low social status, dragging heavy bags of various articles from door to door and trying to sell them, but he could barely manage to support himself.

Structural analysis of the text

1. The incidents that led to the birth of blue jeans:

1) Levi’s accidental discovery of the need of the miners in the West for sturdy pants that would stand up to the rigors of the digging.