Questões de Vestibular Comentadas sobre inglês

OUR WORD OF THE YEAR FOR 2019 IS THEY


English lacks a gender-neutral singular pronoun to correspond with singular pronouns like everyone or someone, and as a consequence they has been used for this purpose for over 600 years. Recently though, they has also been used to refer to a person whose gender identity is nonbinary, a sense that is increasingly common in published text, social media, and in daily personal interactions between English speakers. There's no doubt that its use is established in the English language, which is why it was added to the Merriam-Webster dictionary in September of 2019. Nonbinary they was also prominent in the news in 2019. Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal (WA) revealed in April that her child is gender-nonconforming and uses they. And the American Psychological Association’s blog officially recommended that singular they be preferred in professional writing over “he or she” when the reference is to a person whose gender is unknown or to a person who prefers they.
(Adaptado de https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/word-of-the-year/ they. Acessado em 29/04/2020.)
De acordo com o texto, o fato de uma palavra simples, como o pronome “they”, ter sido escolhida como a palavra do ano de 2019 se justifica pela necessidade de

Catherine Fletcher, Tue 4 Feb 2020

The decision by a UK University to close history, modern languages and politics degrees in favour of more “careerfocused” courses has been widely criticised. The problem lies in reducing university education to what sells to employers. A society – and a world – urgently needs people who have the education to think about big issues, which aren’t only scientific or technological: they’re also about the ways that people have made, and continue to make, decisions. The humanities matter. And it matters that students from all backgrounds have the opportunity to join in these world-changing discussions.

Roger Brown, Mon 10 Feb 2020

Catherine Fletcher is completely correct to warn about the damage that current policies are doing to the humanities. But her warning comes much too late. As I and other scholars have shown, the problem started with a government green paper which declared that the fundamental purpose of higher education was to serve the economy. Until we recover the idea that higher education is as much about the public good as anything else, we will never be able to sustain the humanities as an essential component of a balanced curriculum. Unfortunately, there is very little sign that this has been grasped by any of our current policymakers.

(Adaptado de www.theguardian.com/education/2020/feb/10/humanities-are-notthe-right-courses-to-cut. Acessado em 22/05/2019.)

Os textos acima concordam quanto à identificação de um problema nos cursos universitários no Reino Unido, mas divergem quanto

A curious item was found among Beethoven’s effects, locked away in a drawer, at the time of his death: three letters, written but apparently never sent (they may have been sent but returned to him), to the “Immortal Beloved.” The content, which varies from high-flown poetic sentiments to banal complaints about his health and discomfort, makes it clear that this is no literary exercise but was intended for a real person. The month and day of the week are given, but not the year. The periods 1801–02, 1806–07, and 1811–12 have been proposed, but the last is the most probable. The most cogent arguments regarding the identity of the person addressed, those by Maynard Solomon, point to Antonie Brentano, a native Viennese, who was the wife of a Frankfurt merchant and sister-in-law to Beethoven familiar Bettina Brentano.
(Adaptado de https://www.britannica.com/biography/Ludwig-van-Beethoven. Acessado em 29/07/20.)
A partir do conteúdo do texto, pode-se afirmar que

A situação abaixo ocorreu em uma entrevista com a atriz Scarlett Johansson e o ator Robert Downey Junior, que atuaram juntos em um filme.

(Disponível em https://www.cracked.com/blog/14-epic-comebacks-stars-gave-tostupid-interview-questions/. Acessado em 25/06/20.)
Em sua resposta, a atriz

The adverb that best conveys the of the underlined word in the sentence "Hopefully, the mayor will think bigger" (paragraph 5) is: