Università degli Studi di Napoli “L’Orientale”

Dipartimento di Studi letterari, linguistici e comparati

“Lingue, Letterature e Culture dell’Europa e delle Americhe”, Lingue e Culture Comparate
(S. d’Avanzo, B. Del Villano, A. Ferrillo, V. Leonardi)

Prova Scritta Lingua e linguistica inglese III 25 gennaio 2017

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Part 1:
Reading Comprehension
Read the following passage carefully and then answer the questions.
Vienna named world’s top city for quality of life
Vienna is the world’s best city to live in, Baghdad is the worst and London, Paris and New York do not
even make it into the top 35, according to international research into quality of life. German-speaking
cities dominate the rankings in the 18th Mercer Quality of Life study, with Vienna joined by Zurich,
Munich, Dusseldorf and Frankfurt in the top seven. Paris has tumbled down the league, falling ten
places to 37th, just ahead of London at 39th, almost entirely because of the city’s vulnerability to
terrorist attacks.
The study examined social and economic conditions, health, education, housing and the
environment, and is used by big companies to assess where they should locate and how much they
should pay staff. Vienna’s social democratic government has a long tradition of investing in high-
quality social housing, making the city almost uniquely affordable among major cities. “I live in a
100sq-metre turn-of-the-century apartment in a good area about 20 minutes’ walk from the city centre. But
my rent is just €800 a month.” An equivalent apartment in London would cost upwards of £2,000 and even
more in New York, ranked 44th in the table.
. US cities perform relatively poorly in the study, largely because of issues around personal safety and crime.
The highest ranking city in the US is San Francisco, at 28th; Boston is 34th. Canadian cities, led by
Vancouver, far outrank their US rivals in the table. “You don’t realize how safe Vienna is until you head
abroad,” said Hartlauer. “We also have terrific public transport, with the underground working 24 hours at
weekends, and it only costs €1 per trip. There are more students in Vienna than any other German-speaking
city. It’s a very fast growing, young and lively city,” she added – though she conceded she works for the
city’s tourist board. Vienna has long been overlooked by British weekend city break tourists, who instead
flock to Barcelona or Berlin and tend to think of Austria as somewhere for skiing, lakes and mountains. But,
after an increase in budget flights from regional British cities such as Manchesterand Edinburgh, Vienna is
fast catching up asa popular destination. In 2015, there were 588,000 British visitors to Vienna, up 18% on
the year before. The flow is both ways; Martin Eichtinger - Austrian ambassador to London, who lived in
Vienna for 20 years - said London has become the number one city destination for Austrian visitors. “Vienna
has ranked top in the last seven published rankings,” said Mercer. “It scores highly in a number of categories;
it provides a safeand stable environment to live in, a high level of public utilities and transport facilities and
good recreational facilities.”
The European migrant crisis, which has seen large numbers of refugees and asylum seekers pass through
Vienna en route to Germany, has had little impact on the city of nearly 1.8 million people, said Eichtinger.
“We have managed to accommodate 90,000 refugees in Austria but the numbers have slowed in recent
months.” London has never been in the quality-of-life top ten, says Mercer, damaged by its poor scores for
air pollution, traffic congestion and climate. After London, Edinburgh is the next-ranking British city, in 46th
place. Paris has suffered the biggest fall in the most recent rankings. “Paris remained stable for several years
but has, this year, dropped ten places in the overall ranking,” said Mercer. “The drop was essentially due to
the terrorist attacks in 2015. However, it is important to highlight that safety issues are a very highly
weighted factor within the ‘basket’ so any small adjustments can have a big impact onthe ranking.”
Auckland in New Zealand was the highest ranking English-speaking city in the survey, in third place,
followed by Vancouver in fifth. Australian cities also perform very highly in the survey, with Sydney 10th
and Melbourne 15th. The Economist has consistently ranked Melbourne as the world’s most livable city,
although its survey has been criticized as too Anglocentric. War and political unrest are behind all the worst-
ranked cities in the world. Surprisingly, Damascus is named as only the seventh worst, ranked better than not
just Baghdad but also Bangui in Central African Republic, Sana’a in Yemen, Port-au-Prince in Haiti,
Khartoum in Sudan and N’Djamena in Chad.
Adapted from The Guardian 23/02/2016

A. Answer the following questions related to the text above using your own words:

1. What factors does the survey examine?

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2.What according to Helena Hartlauer is the difference between Vienna, London and New York?

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3. Until recently Vienna was not a very popular city for British tourists. Why has this has changed?

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4. Why does Mercer believe that the fall of Paris in the ranking may be contested?

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. 5. What common factor links the worst-ranked cities in the world?

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……/10
B. Cloze Test: Fill in the blanks and insert the word which best fits each space. Use only ONE word in
each space.
Adolescence

One of the _______________ irritating conventional wisdoms of recent times is that adolescence is
a horrendously traumatic and stressful phase of life characterized ______________ rebellion and
dissent. Adolescence can be a time of ________________ disorientation and discovery. The
transitional period can bring about issues of independence and self-identity; many adolescents face
tough choices _________________ schoolwork, sexuality, drugs, alcohol, and social life. Yet a
somewhat unholy alliance of therapists and preachers pontificates about the rupture that occurs with
the entry into adolescent status, the special and separate culture, the biological and psychological
_________________. The expectation is of trouble. This is not to suggest that adolescence is a
golden age, a wondrous period of growth, self-exploration, self-discovery. It can be these things but
it is ________________a time of pain, embarrassment, self-doubt and loss. As a developmental
phenomenon, adolescence is indeed unique to man. This delay in attainment _______________full
growth and sexual maturity is _________________ by many experts to be essential to man’s longer
and richer development. Seen from ________________a perspective, adolescence acquires a
positive evolutionary value. Easing the child ______________adulthood is the primary task of
adolescence. ……/10

C. Sentence Transformation
Complete the second sentence so that it has a similar meaning to the first sentence, using the word given. Do
not change the word given. You must use between two and five words including the word given.

1. It was a mistake to leave the car unlocked. (SHOULDN’T)

You _____________________________________________________ the car unlocked.

2)‘ I’m sorry I’m late,’ she said. (APOLOGIZED)

She _____________________________________________________________ late.

3) She led me to believe I could call her whenever I wanted. (IMPRESSION)

I _________________________________________________ that I could call her whenever I wanted.
4) It’s a very formal cocktail party. (DRESS)
We are expected ______________________________________for the cocktail party.

5) I haven’t been swimming for nearly a year. (LAST)

The _________________________________________________ was nearly a year ago.
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D. Translate into Italian the parts in bold in the above Reading Comprehension.

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