VOA慢速英语2012 Words and Their Stories: A Final D.A.R.E.

Words and Their Stories: A Final D.A.R.E.

 

词汇典故：《美国地区英语词典》最后一册出版

Now, the VOA Special English program WORDS AND THEIR STORIES.

现在是美国之音慢速英语词汇典故。

Today we talk about words like honeyfuggle and pinkletink, puckerbrush and swop. These are words not found in most dictionaries. But you can find them in the Dictionary of American Regional English. Joan Houston Hall is the chief editor.

今天我们将讨论一些单词，像honeyfuggle，pinkletink, puckerbrush和swop。这些词在多数的词典中找不到。但你可以在《美国地区英语词典》中找到它们。

JOAN HOUSTON HALL: "The Dictionary of American Regional English, familiarly known as DARE by its acronym¹, is a collection of words and phrases and pronunciations and even bits of grammar and syntax that vary from one part of the country to another."

琼·休斯敦·霍尔：“《美国地区英语词典》，俗称为DARE，是一本包含各类单词、短语和发音，甚至包含美国各地有所不同的一些语法和句位法的合集。”

The fifth and final book in the series was published last week. Work on DARE first began in nineteen sixty-five under Frederic Cassidy, an English professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He and a team of eighty researchers traveled across the United States to document the words used by Americans to describe their daily lives.

该词典系列中的第五册，也就是最后一册已于上周出版。《美国地区英语词典》编撰工作由美国威斯康星大学（麦迪逊校区）英语教授弗雷德里克·卡西迪（Frederic Cassidy）于1965年开始进行。他和一个由80名研究人员组成的小组前往美国各地，记录美国人用于描述其日常生活的单词。

Ms. Hall says the final project is based on almost two and a half million responses to more than sixteen hundred questions.

霍尔女士说，最后一册是基于对一千六百多个问题的近二百五十万个回复编撰而成的。

JOAN HOUSTON HALL: "The questionnaire dealt with all sorts of things that have to do with our daily lives -- from time and weather and food and clothing and farming and plants and animals and religion, health, disease, honesty, dishonesty -- all the parts of our lives that we have words for."

霍尔：“这些调查问卷涉及到我们日常生活的方方面面--从时间、天气、食物、服饰、农业、植物、动物、宗教、健康、疾病、诚实、狡猾--我们生活中言语话及的方方面面。”

The first book, in nineteen eighty-five, contained the letters A to C. The fifth and final volume starts with slab² and ends with zydeco.

该词典的第一册出版于1985年，包含首字母从A到C的单词。第五册，也就是最后一册从字母S开始，到字母Z结束。

DARE contains almost sixty thousand words and terms. Ms. Hall says these can show where the people who use them are from.

《美国地区英语词典》包含了近6万个单词和专用名词。霍尔女士表示，这可以显示出使用这些单词的人来自何处。

JOAN HOUSTON HALL: "It’s amazing to see the tremendous variety of terms used for the same thing."

霍尔：“我们可以看到大量用于描述同一事物的各种各样的说法，这太惊人了。”

For example, in some areas, Americans call a carbonated drink a soda³; in others they call it pop. Some cook with a frying pan; others call it a skillet. And a party where everyone brings food is either a potluck or a pitch-in.

例如，在一些地区，美国人称碳酸饮料为苏打水（soda），另一个地方称之为汽水（pop）。一些人用平底锅（frying pan）烹饪，另一些称之为煎锅（skillet）。各人自带食物的聚会被称为聚餐派对（potluck或pitch-in）。

Linguist⁴ Ben Zimmer writes about language for the Boston Globe. He was not the only one excited at Ms. Hall's first public showing of the final DARE volume. It was at a meeting of the American Dialect Society in January.

语言学家本·齐默为波士顿环球报撰文语言类文章。他不是唯一一个为霍尔女士最后一册词典首次公开展示激动的人。这是在美国方言学会一月份的一次会议上。

BEN ZIMMER: "We all gathered together in the conference room and Joan showed off volume five. And there were audible gasps⁵ in the room. I mean, it might as well have been accompanied by an angelic chorus⁶. People just wanted to touch it like it was the holy relic⁷ or something."

齐默：“我们都聚集在会议室里，霍尔女士秀出了第五册。房间里只听得见喘息声。我的意思是，这可能就像是一个天使合唱团在伴奏。人们都想摸一摸这本词典，就像它是一件圣迹之类的东西一样。”

So now, what about honeyfuggle and those other words? Honeyfuggle means to cheat or trick. The earliest uses found were in the eighteen hundreds in the South. Pinkletink is the name that people in Martha’s Vineyard, Massachusetts, have given to a kind of tree frog. Puckerbrush is what people in northern New England call a tangled⁸ growth of bushes. And a swop is a small drink of liquor, at least in Annapolis, Maryland, and Greensburg, Pennsylvania.

那现在来看看honeyfuggle和其它那些单词是什么意思吧？Honeyfuggle是指欺骗或耍诡计。最早使用是在19世纪的美国南部。pinkletink是马萨诸塞州玛莎葡萄岛的人们给一种树蛙起的名字。Puckerbrush是新英格兰州北部称呼一种缠绕生长的灌木丛的名字。swop是一种小型酒饮料，至少在马里兰州的安纳波利斯和宾夕法尼亚州的格林斯堡是这样。

Here are a few others. The first person to enter a home on New Year’s Day is called a first-footer in some places. What do you call dust or lint⁹ that collects in pockets and under beds? Some Americans call it flug. And finally, getting the runaround is not a regional term; it means getting purposely delayed or lied to. But to some, runaround is an old term for a swelling¹⁰ or infection in a finger, especially around the nail. Yuck!

这还有另几个单词。在一些地方，元旦第一个进你家门的人被称为first-footer（元旦首位来客）。你怎么称呼床下卷集成团的灰尘或棉絮？一些美国人称之为flug。最后，getting the runaround不是一个地方性说法。它的意思是故意拖延或欺骗。但对一些地方来说，runaround是一种古老说法，用于描述手指，特别是指甲周围的肿胀或感染。这好恶心啊！

WORDS AND THEIR STORIES was written by June Simms.  I’m Faith Lapidus.

1 acronym   

n.首字母简略词，简称

参考例句：

• That's a mouthful of an acronym for a very simple technology.对于一项非常简单的技术来说，这是一个很绕口的缩写词。
• TSDF is an acronym for Treatment, Storage and Disposal Facilities.TSDF是处理，储存和处置设施的一个缩写。

2 slab   

n.平板，厚的切片；v.切成厚板，以平板盖上

参考例句：

• This heavy slab of oak now stood between the bomb and Hitler.这时笨重的橡木厚板就横在炸弹和希特勒之间了。
• The monument consists of two vertical pillars supporting a horizontal slab.这座纪念碑由两根垂直的柱体构成，它们共同支撑着一块平板。

3 soda   

n.苏打水；汽水

参考例句：

• She doesn't enjoy drinking chocolate soda.她不喜欢喝巧克力汽水。
• I will freshen your drink with more soda and ice cubes.我给你的饮料重加一些苏打水和冰块。

4 linguist   

n.语言学家；精通数种外国语言者

参考例句：

• I used to be a linguist till I become a writer.过去我是个语言学家，后来成了作家。
• Professor Cui has a high reputation as a linguist.崔教授作为语言学家名声很高。

5 gasps   

v.喘气( gasp的第三人称单数 )；喘息；倒抽气；很想要

参考例句：

• He leant against the railing, his breath coming in short gasps. 他倚着栏杆，急促地喘气。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• My breaths were coming in gasps. 我急促地喘起气来。 来自《简明英汉词典》

6 chorus   

n.合唱，合唱队，齐声

参考例句：

• Never before have I heard this song sung in chorus.我从来没有听过这首歌的合唱。
• The children repeated the words after her in chorus.孩子们跟她齐声朗读单词。

7 relic   

n.神圣的遗物，遗迹，纪念物

参考例句：

• This stone axe is a relic of ancient times.这石斧是古代的遗物。
• He found himself thinking of the man as a relic from the past.他把这个男人看成是过去时代的人物。

8 tangled   

adj. 纠缠的，紊乱的 动词tangle的过去式和过去分词

参考例句：

• Your hair's so tangled that I can't comb it. 你的头发太乱了，我梳不动。
• A movement caught his eye in the tangled undergrowth. 乱灌木丛里的晃动引起了他的注意。

9 lint   

n.线头；绷带用麻布，皮棉

参考例句：

• Flicked the lint off the coat.把大衣上的棉绒弹掉。
• There are a few problems of air pollution by chemicals,lint,etc.,but these are minor.化学品、棉花等也造成一些空气污染问题，但这是次要的。

10 swelling   

n.肿胀

参考例句：

• Use ice to reduce the swelling. 用冰敷消肿。
• There is a marked swelling of the lymph nodes. 淋巴结处有明显的肿块。