2012年英语专业四级听力真题 短文3
日期:2014-01-01 08:30

(单词翻译:单击)

New words enter the English language all the time.
新词汇一直源源不断地进入英语。
In fact, English has always been in a state of evolution.
事实上,英语一直处于进化的状态。
And in recent years, more and more words and phrases have entered the language.
近年来,越来越多的单词和短语进入了英语。
But where do all these new words come from?
但是这些新词是从哪里来的呢?
Words come out of the culture that they represent and they describe.
词汇来自于他们所表示和描述的文化。
So if you've got a new development in medicine, for example, bird flu, then you'll get a new word coming out of that.
所以如果医学上有了新进展,比如禽流感,那么我们就能从中得到一个新词汇。
If there is a military conflict, that may well bring all sorts of new words to the fore.
如果出现军事冲突,那很可能会出现各种各样的新词。
Going back in time, the First and Second World Wars were times of great creativity of language because people from different countries met each other and exchanged their words and words developed from there.
回望历史,两次世界大战期间,语言展现了其伟大的创造力,因为不同国家的人们相遇并交换了彼此的词汇,新词由此出现。
So, words come from the playground.
所以,词汇来源于运动场。
They come from politics.
词汇来源于政治。
They come from any area of life, because every area of life is changing from day to day.
词汇来自生活的各个领域,因为生活的每个领域都在不断变化。
And does English have more words than any other language?
英语词汇是不是比其他语言多?
It certainly has more than other European languages and probably more than any other language in the world.
一定比其他欧洲语言词汇要多,而且可能比世界上任何其他语言都要多。
English is put together from so many different bits.
英语是由许多不同的部分拼凑而成的。
Originally, it was a Germanic language.
最初,它是日耳曼语。
And then after the Norman conquest in 1066,there was enormous influx of French words.
1066年诺曼征服之后,大量的法语词汇涌入。
And it comes from a country, the United Kingdom, which was quite an expansive trading colonial power in the past.
它是联合王国语言,而过去联合王国是一个非常庞大的贸易殖民大国。
And all these have brought all sorts of other new words into the language.
所有这些都催生了各种各样的新词。

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重点单词
  • militaryadj. 军事的 n. 军队
  • conflictn. 冲突,矛盾,斗争,战斗 vi. 冲突,争执,抵触
  • enormousadj. 巨大的,庞大的
  • influxn. 流入,河口,辐辏 涌进; 汇集[C][S1] an
  • creativityn. 创造力,创造
  • describevt. 描述,画(尤指几何图形),说成
  • evolutionn. 进化,发展,演变