VOA名师答疑2024--Young' 和 'Younger的用法

'Young' or 'Younger'

Hello! This week on Ask a Teacher, we answer a question from David in China.

Question

Hello,

My name is David, and I am from China.

Here comes a sentence "My mother had a sweet singing voice when she was younger". My question is that whether we can use "young" instead "younger" or not?

I am looking forward to receiving your reply.

Thank you very much.

David

Answer

Thank you for writing, David. This is a good question.

The short answer is yes. You can use "young" instead of "younger." But using "young" instead of "younger" does change the meaning of the sentence just a bit.

Let's look at the differences between the two choices.

"Young" and "younger" are both adjectives². Adjectives are words that describe nouns³. "Younger" is a comparative⁴ adjective¹. Comparative adjectives are used to compare two people or things. Comparative adjectives are easy to recognize because they often have an "-er" ending. They are also often, but not always, followed by the conjunction⁵ "than."

Let's look again at David's original example sentence:

My mother had a sweet singing voice when she was younger.

In this situation, "younger" is describing "mother." But it is not so clear what is being compared. That is because we sometimes leave out information from a sentence. Even without the extra information, however, the listener⁶ or reader is still likely to understand the full thought or meaning.

As readers, we understand the full meaning of David's sentence to be: My mother had a sweet singing voice when she was younger than she is now.

We do not know how old the mother is now. But we know she had a sweet singing voice when she was younger than her current⁷ age.

Let's say, for example, that the writer's mother is 60 years old. The writer of the sentence could mean that his mother had a sweet singing voice when she was 40 years old, for example. Or the writer could mean that his mother had a sweet singing voice when she was 15 years old. Both 15 years old and 40 years old are younger than 60.

Now let's consider how the sentence's meaning might change if we were to use "young" instead of "younger." The sentence would be:

My mother had a sweet singing voice when she was young.

The meaning has changed just a bit. Now it is clear that the writer means⁸ his mother had a sweet singing voice when she was a young person, or in her youth.

We hope this explanation has helped you, David.

1 adjective   

n.形容词；adj.形容词的，用作形容词的

参考例句：

• Don't apply that adjective to me.不要用那个字眼来形容我。
• The adjective loose has several senses. 形容词loose有几个义项。

2 adjectives   

n.形容词( adjective的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• We can form nouns from adjectives. 我们可以用形容词来构成名词。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Attributive adjectives precede the noun. 定语形容词位于名词前。 来自《简明英汉词典》

3 nouns   

n.名词；名词( noun的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• French differs from English in having gender for all nouns. 法语不同于英语，所有的名词都有性。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Nouns join to form compounds. 名词和名词结合构成复合词。 来自《简明英汉词典》

4 comparative   

adj.比较的；相比较而言的；相对的

参考例句：

• After many hardships,he now lives in comparative ease.经过许多困难之后，他现在的生活相对舒适。
• Let's make a comparative study of the two languages.让我们将这两种语言作一下比较研究。

5 conjunction   

n.联合，连接，接合；连接词

参考例句：

• Two or more sentences may be joined together by a conjunction.两个或两个以上的句子可以用连词连接。
• The conjunction of heavy rains and high winds caused flooding.暴风雨的同时发生引起了洪水泛滥。

6 listener   

n.听众；收听者

参考例句：

• I'm a regular listener to her show.我经常收听她的节目。
• She became an attentive listener.她变成了一个专心致志的聆听者。

7 current   

n.涌流，趋势，电流，水流，气流；adj.当前的，通用的，流通的，现在的，草写的，最近的

参考例句：

• Electric current is often powerful enough to kill a man.电流常强得足以致命。
• There is a story about her in the current number.最近一期上有关于她的故事。

8 means   

n.方法，手段，折中点，物质财富

参考例句：

• That man used artful means to find out secrets.那人使用狡猾的手段获取机密。
• We must get it done by some means or other.我们总得想办法把它干完。