關西學院大學で2013年に出題された問題です。パラグラフ毎に、月曜日と金曜日に解説を施して參ります。
次の英文を読み、下記の設問(Ａ～Ｃ)に答えなさい。
The human race is made ( 1 ) of individuals, but each is born and for the most part lives his or her life in a group context. Between various societies there can be great differences in the relative emphasis placed on the individual and the group. Certainly no difference is more significant between Japanese and Americans, or Westerners in general, than the greater Japanese tendency to emphasize the group, somewhat at the expense of the individual.
The Japanese are much more likely than Westerners to operate in groups or at least to see themselves as operating in this way. Where Westerners may at least put ( 2 ) a show of independence and individuality, most Japanese will be quite content to conform in dress, conduct, style of life, and even thought to the norms of their group. Maintaining “face,”* originally a Chinese term but one of universal applicability, is much on Japanese minds, but it is “face” before the other members of the group that most concerns them.
Part of this difference between Japan and the West is myth rather than reality. We have so idealized the concept of the independent individual, alone before God, the law, and society, that we see ourselves as free and isolated individuals far more than the facts warrant. Prevailing Japanese attitudes have tended to make the Japanese do the reverse. Group affiliations in Japan are very important, but the Japanese tend to emphasize these even beyond reality, attempting to interpret everything in terms of such things as personal factional alignments or habatsu in politics, family interrelationships, university provenance or gakubatsu, and personal support and recommendations. They like to insist that what counts is not one’s abilities but one’s kone, an abbreviation of the English word “connections.” The actual situations in Japan and the West, however, are much less widely different than the American myth of the independent spirit, for example, or the traditional Japanese ideal of selfless merging with the group would lead one to believe.
The balance ( 3 ) group and individual is also changing in Japan as elsewhere, and there are signs of coming together in this regard between Japan and the West. Modern technology in the West clearly produced conditions in which more individuals could win economic and other forms of independence from their families or other groupings than in earlier ages. In fact, the trend ( 4 ) this direction has become so extreme that the isolation of contemporary urban life is giving Westerners pause and is causing a sort of search for closer group relationships. In Japan the effects of modern technology have by no means gone so far, but they have had the same general effect as in the West, deemphasizing the group somewhat in ( 5 ) of the individual.
*face: 面子（めんつ）
設 問
A. 次の日本文（a～h）の中から、本文の内容と一致するものを３つ選びなさい。ただし、記号の順序は問いません。
a. 個人と集団のどちらに、より大きな重点をおくかは、社会によって異なっている。
b. 現代では、どの社会でも個人に大きな力点がおかれている。
c. 日本人と欧米人一般を比べれば、欧米人は集団を重視すると言える。
d. 個人と集団をめぐる日本と欧米における意識の違いは実際よりも誇張されている部分がある。
e. 集団意識や個人意識の日本と欧米における差は、時と共に次第に広がっている。
f. 最近では個人と集団に対する考え方は、欧米と同様に、日本でも変わりつつある。
g. 個人と集団をめぐる日本と欧米における意識の違いがなくなる兆候は見られない。
h. 欧米の近代技術は、より多くの個人が家族や他の集団と結びつこうとする意識に影響を与えることはなかった。
B. 空所（１～５）に入れるのに最も適当な語を、それぞれ下記（a～d）の中から１つ選びなさい。
(1) a. down b. in c. on d. up
(2) a. away b. off c. on d. up
(3) a. between b. in c. to d. with
(4) a. about b. by c. from d. in
(5) a. favor b. kind c. touch d. value
C. 下線部 Certainly no difference is more significant between Japanese and Americans, or Westerners in general, than the greater Japanese tendency to emphasize the group, somewhat at the expense of the individual. の日本語訳として最も適当なものを下記（a～d）の中から１つ選びなさい。
a. 日本人とアメリカ人、あるいは欧米人一般との違いで最も顕著なものは、日本人が集団を重視し、ある程度個人が犠牲になるということであるが、大きな違いはない。
b. 確かに、日本人とアメリカ人、あるいは欧米人一般との違いのうち最も顕著なものは、日本人が集団を重視するということであり、個人が犠牲になることではない。
c. 確かに、ある程度個人を犧牲にしてでも集団を強調しようとする傾向が強いということほど、日本人とアメリカ人、あるいは欧米人一般との違いで顕著なものはない。
d. 日本人とアメリカ人、あるいは一般の欧米人の違いの中で最も顯著なものは、日本人が集団を重視することは確かであるが、個人が犧牲になるということではない。
