為了讓廣大各位考生更好的復習，幫考網(wǎng)小編整理提供了GMAT考試:2011年GMAT考試閱讀材料16(附答案)，以供各位考生復習參考，希望對考生復習有所幫助。
In 1896 a Georgia couple suing for （sue for： v.控告） damages in the accidental death of their two year old was told that since the child had made no real economic contribution to the family， there was no liability for damages. In contrast， less than a century later， in 1979， the parents of a three-year-old sued in New York for accidental-death damages and won an award of $750，000.
The transformation in social values implicit in juxtaposing these two incidents is the subject of Viviana Zelizer’s excellent book， Pricing the Priceless Child. During the nineteenth century， she argues， the concept of the “useful” child who contributed to the family economy gave way gradually to the present-day notion of the “useless” child who， though producing no income for， and indeed extremely costly to， its parents， is yet considered emotionally “priceless.” Well established among segments of the middle and upper classes by the mid-1800’s， this new view of childhood spread throughout society in the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries as reformers introduced child-labor regulations and compulsory education （compulsory education： n.義務教育） laws predicated in part on the assumption that a child’s emotional value made child labor taboo.
For Zelizer the origins of this transformation were many and complex. The gradual erosion of children’s productive value in a maturing industrial economy， the decline in birth and death rates， especially in child mortality， and the development of the companionate family （a family in which members were united by explicit bonds of love rather than duty） were all factors critical in changing the assessment of children’s worth. Yet “expulsion of children from the ‘cash nexus （cash nexus： 金錢關系， 現(xiàn)金（交易）關系），’ although clearly shaped by profound changes in the economic， occupational， and family structures，” Zelizer maintains， “was also part of a cultural process ‘of sacrelization’ of children’s lives.” Protecting children from the crass business world became enormously important for late-nineteenth-century middle-class Americans， she suggests; this sacralization was a way of resisting what they perceived as the relentless corruption of human values by the marketplace.
In 1896 a Georgia couple suing for （sue for： v.控告） damages in the accidental death of their two year old was told that since the child had made no real economic contribution to the family， there was no liability for damages. In contrast， less than a century later， in 1979， the parents of a three-year-old sued in New York for accidental-death damages and won an award of $750，000.
The transformation in social values implicit in juxtaposing these two incidents is the subject of Viviana Zelizer’s excellent book， Pricing the Priceless Child. During the nineteenth century， she argues， the concept of the “useful” child who contributed to the family economy gave way gradually to the present-day notion of the “useless” child who， though producing no income for， and indeed extremely costly to， its parents， is yet considered emotionally “priceless.” Well established among segments of the middle and upper classes by the mid-1800’s， this new view of childhood spread throughout society in the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries as reformers introduced child-labor regulations and compulsory education （compulsory education： n.義務教育） laws predicated in part on the assumption that a child’s emotional value made child labor taboo.
For Zelizer the origins of this transformation were many and complex. The gradual erosion of children’s productive value in a maturing industrial economy， the decline in birth and death rates， especially in child mortality， and the development of the companionate family （a family in which members were united by explicit bonds of love rather than duty） were all factors critical in changing the assessment of children’s worth. Yet “expulsion of children from the ‘cash nexus （cash nexus： 金錢關系， 現(xiàn)金（交易）關系），’ although clearly shaped by profound changes in the economic， occupational， and family structures，” Zelizer maintains， “was also part of a cultural process ‘of sacrelization’ of children’s lives.” Protecting children from the crass business world became enormously important for late-nineteenth-century middle-class Americans， she suggests; this sacralization was a way of resisting what they perceived as the relentless corruption of human values by the marketplace.