(单词翻译:单击)
正文部分
Do French Women Make Best Mothers and Lovers
法国女人是欧洲最优质的女人吗？
French women lead Europe as mothers, workers and in health and sex appeal, say some of the country's leading sociologists.
欧洲资深社会学家日前指出，法国女人不仅能成为好母亲、好职员，并且身体健康、性感迷人，她们是欧洲最优质的女人。
Academic research has lent a little support to President Jacques Chirac's Bastille Day insistence that France should not envy Britain, despite recent jolts to national pride: desperately high unemployment, plummeting spending power and London's victory over Paris to hold the 2012 Olympics.
以上学术研究给予总统雅克·希拉克在法国国庆日上坚持的“法国无须羡慕英国”这个说法一些支持，尽管当时法国的民族自豪感正受到威胁：极其高的失业率，骤然下降的消费率以及伦敦战胜巴黎成为2012奥运会的主办城市。
Ahead of a seminar on European population trends in Tours this week, sociologists and statisticians have come up with a series of figures that prompted the daily paper Libération to headline a report yesterday: "The French woman: at work, seductive and fertile."
本周在图尔市召开了有关欧洲人口趋势的研讨会，在此之前，社会学家和统计学家总结出了一系列的数据，促使解放日报昨天将一份题为《法国女人：干练、性感、生育能力强》的研究报告设为头条。
The paper described French females as "champions of Europe" for producing babies and longevity. Official figures put them on a par with the Irish in terms of fertility, with 1.9 children born to each woman, compared with 1.7 in Britain or 1.4 in America.
报告指出，法国女人在生育能力和寿命发面是欧洲最优质的女人。生育能力方面的官方数据，法国和英国接近。平均每个法国妇女生育1.9个孩子，而英国妇女为1.7个，美国妇女为1.4个。
On life expectation, French women are said to vie with the Spanish, reaching an average age of nearly 84.
在寿命方面，法国妇女的平均寿命达到84岁，可以和西班牙人相媲美。
Commentators and experts anxious for something good to say about the "French model"—shorter working hours, entrenched labour rights and a social security system that critics say France cannot afford—speculate that it has much to do with the supposed supremacy of womanhood.
评论家和专家指出法国妇女的这些优势得益于“法国劳动者模式”——工作时间短、劳动权利明确、社会保障制度稳定等（批评家们称法国并不能承担这些）——而这些也主要和所谓的霸权主义有关系。
Aids to an emancipated womanhood include France's municipal crèches, supervised homework sessions, subsidised holiday camps for children and generous family allowances.
对一个被解放女人的帮助包括法国市政提供托儿所，监督孩子家庭作业，对孩子度假露营的补贴以及慷慨的家庭津贴。
Even the much-derided 35-hour working week plays its part, theoretically giving working mothers more time to spend with their children without losing out at work.
甚至每周35个小时的工作时间也起了作用，它使得许多法国母亲在不耽误工作的情况下，获得更多照顾孩子的时间。
划红精讲
1. ahead of 在……之前
eg. He had to work hard to remain ahead of his classmates.
他必须努力学习以保持他在同学中的领先地位。
eg. The soldiers probed cautiously ahead of them for mines.
士兵们小心翼翼地探测前方的地雷。
2. come up with
(1) 赶上；接近，走近：
eg. I came up with them as they were rounding the corner.
他们正在拐弯时，我赶上了他们。
(2) 提出，提议：
eg. We weren't able to come up with any new suggestions.
我们提不出任何新建议。
3. put ... on a par with 把……等同于
eg. On the other side, the payment they get is can't be put on a par with the stars.
另外，科学家们所得的报酬也根本无法和那些娱乐明星相提并论。
eg. The New Multilateralism must put global development on a par with international finance.
新的多边体系必须对全球发展问题与国际金融问题给予同等重视。
4. vie with 与……抗争
eg. All three countries vie with England in the battle for international students.
这三个国家都在与英国争夺国际学生。
eg. Each plan has to vie with many others just to get a second look from investors.
为了能让投资人再看一眼，每个计划都要和其他计划形成竞争之势。
