词汇大师(Wordmaster)--Pretentious Language

February 9, 2005

AA: I'm Avi Arditti with Rosanne Skirble, and this week on Wordmaster: more "junk English."

RS: Back in 2001, we talked to writer Ken¹ Smith about his book "Junk English." In his words, "Junk English is much more than sloppy² grammar." "

Most often it is a trick we play on ourselves," he says, "to make the unremarkable seem important."

AA: Ken Smith is back with a sequel, "Junk English 2." I talked to him about some examples of what he considers pretentious³ language. Yet even he admits that sometimes, the best way to say something is not always what people want to hear.

KEN SMITH: "If you speak precisely⁴ in idiomatic⁵ American English, it almost sounds pretentious, because idiomatic American English is very casual. So you've got the sort of pretentious variant⁶, you've got the normal variant and then you've got sort of the junk English variant falling off to the other side.

"So say you take a word like, I don't know, 'talk.' Now, if you wanted to say that with sort of a pretentious air, you'd say 'converse⁷.' It's not necessarily wrong. But it has a sort of a snobbish⁸ air to it that's not really casual as American English is. But if you wanted to go over to the junk English side, you'd say 'you know, we need to dialogue.'

"Using dialogue as a verb, that's definitely junk English. And the problem is that sometimes you have to understand what the purpose of the language is. Do you want to be correct? Do you want to be clear? Or do you want to fit in with your crowd? It's almost like there's three different languages at play here."

AA: "Well, right -- take a word like 'succeed,' you could say 'I succeeded' or 'I did well.' What would be the junk ... "

KEN SMITH: "Well, 'succeed.' Well, I don't know -- you might have been 'impactful.' That might be a junk English use. I think actually 'impactful' is more 'effective.' Like if you were effective, the pretentious English variant of that would be, you were 'efficacious.' But the junk English is, you were 'impactful.'

"So there's a lot of examples like that. Well, like, 'new' is another good example -- 'new,' a simple word, but if you want to be pretentious you'd say 'oh, that's postmodern.' If you use it in art, that's fine, I mean it's an established sort of jargon⁹ in art. But I mean if you use it to describe something like 'oh, that's very postmodern,' if you're referring to a new car that you've got, I mean it's pretentious."

AA: "And elsewhere in your book I came across a word that we do hear a good bit lately, is the word 'meme,' and I've always wanted to -- "

KEN SMITH: "Oh meme, yeah."

AA: " -- to do something about that. First of all, could you explain what exactly is a meme?"

KEN SMITH: "Well, a meme is -- again, it's a term of philosophy. It's actually a term of science, meaning to sort of describe a thought or a belief or a behavior that can spread from one person to another within a culture. It's a very specific term. And again if you're using it in an academic sense, that's fine. But then the word has sort of spilled over, like so many terms do, into the general language. And that's just pretentious. 'I'm utterly¹⁰ enthralled¹¹ with your new meme.' You know, it's an idea. You had an idea or a thought. That's what a meme is in general usage."

AA: "And we should spell it: M-E-M-E. So it's not 'me-me', it's a meme [laughter]. And you say it's 'pretentious language for idea, slogan and so on.' Now but, as I've heard that term used, isn't it sort of like an idea that spreads like a virus?"

KEN SMITH: "Well, but all -- I mean, you could say that of any idea. I mean, you could make that analogy. That's just a metaphor¹² -- you know, 'that's viral marketing,' as they use in business terminology¹³. So is that a meme? I don't know. I think they're just ideas."

AA: "Now let me ask you, is there a term where you have to use the pretentious form of it?"

KEN SMITH: "It's not necessarily pretentious. I mean, some words I don't like but I can't think of a better way of saying it -- for example, 'multitasking.' I don't like 'multitasking.' It just seems kind of long and grating. But I honestly can't think of a better, more efficient way to say 'doing several things at once' or 'doing a lot of things at the same time,' which is what multitasking means. So it's a useful word. Much as I dislike it, I have to admit that it serves a purpose."

AA: "Now I'm looking at the cover of your book here. It's 'Junk English 2: the Inevitability¹⁴ of Sequelization.'"

KEN SMITH: "Yes."

AA: "Is that your idea of a joke?"

KEN SMITH: "Yes, it is. [laughter] The clean way of saying that would be 'the inevitable¹⁵ sequel.' But the junk English way is to say the 'inevitability of sequelization.' One of the ways of recognizing junk English is, it's tacking¹⁶ a lot of extra syllables¹⁷ onto specific words. For example, we cited impact before. Well, that's now become 'impactfulness,' which makes a bad thing worse. That's a problem that we have here in America. I'm not sure that people in other countries speaking English do that. I hope they don't."

AA: Ken Smith is a writer. His newest book is called "Junk English 2."

RS: If you'd like to "impact" your English learning, visit our Web site: voanews.com/wordmaster. And our e-mail address is。。。。。。。。。。。With Avi Arditti, I'm Rosanne Skirble.

 

1 ken   

n.视野，知识领域

参考例句：

• Such things are beyond my ken.我可不懂这些事。
• Abstract words are beyond the ken of children.抽象的言辞超出小孩所理解的范围.

2 sloppy   

adj.邋遢的，不整洁的

参考例句：

• If you do such sloppy work again,I promise I'll fail you.要是下次作业你再马马虎虎，我话说在头里，可要给你打不及格了。
• Mother constantly picked at him for being sloppy.母亲不断地批评他懒散。

3 pretentious   

adj.自命不凡的，自负的，炫耀的

参考例句：

• He is a talented but pretentious writer.他是一个有才华但自命不凡的作家。
• Speaking well of yourself would only make you appear conceited and pretentious.自夸只会使你显得自负和虚伪。

4 precisely   

adv.恰好，正好，精确地，细致地

参考例句：

• It's precisely that sort of slick sales-talk that I mistrust.我不相信的正是那种油腔滑调的推销宣传。
• The man adjusted very precisely.那个人调得很准。

5 idiomatic   

adj.成语的，符合语言习惯的

参考例句：

• In our reading we should always be alert for idiomatic expressions.我们在阅读过程中应经常注意惯用法。
• In his lecture,he bore down on the importance of idiomatic usage in a language.他在演讲中着重强调了语言中习惯用法的重要性。

6 variant   

adj.不同的，变异的；n.变体，异体

参考例句：

• We give professional suggestions according to variant tanning stages for each customer.我们针对每位顾客不同的日晒阶段，提供强度适合的晒黑建议。
• In a variant of this approach,the tests are data- driven.这个方法的一个变种，是数据驱动的测试。

7 converse   

vi.谈话，谈天，闲聊；adv.相反的，相反

参考例句：

• He can converse in three languages.他可以用3种语言谈话。
• I wanted to appear friendly and approachable but I think I gave the converse impression.我想显得友好、平易近人些,却发觉给人的印象恰恰相反。

8 snobbish   

adj.势利的，谄上欺下的

参考例句：

• She's much too snobbish to stay at that plain hotel.她很势利，不愿住在那个普通旅馆。
• I'd expected her to be snobbish but she was warm and friendly.我原以为她会非常势利，但她却非常热情和友好。

9 jargon   

n.术语，行话

参考例句：

• They will not hear critics with their horrible jargon.他们不愿意听到评论家们那些可怕的行话。
• It is important not to be overawed by the mathematical jargon.要紧的是不要被数学的术语所吓倒.

10 utterly   

adv.完全地，绝对地

参考例句：

• Utterly devoted to the people,he gave his life in saving his patients.他忠于人民，把毕生精力用于挽救患者的生命。
• I was utterly ravished by the way she smiled.她的微笑使我完全陶醉了。

11 enthralled   

迷住，吸引住( enthrall的过去式和过去分词 )； 使感到非常愉快

参考例句：

• The child watched, enthralled by the bright moving images. 这孩子看着那明亮的移动的影像，被迷住了。
• The children listened enthralled as the storyteller unfolded her tale. 讲故事的人一步步展开故事情节，孩子们都听得入迷了。

12 metaphor   

n.隐喻，暗喻

参考例句：

• Using metaphor,we say that computers have senses and a memory.打个比方，我们可以说计算机有感觉和记忆力。
• In poetry the rose is often a metaphor for love.玫瑰在诗中通常作为爱的象征。

13 terminology   

n.术语；专有名词

参考例句：

• He particularly criticized the terminology in the document.他特别批评了文件中使用的术语。
• The article uses rather specialized musical terminology.这篇文章用了相当专业的音乐术语。

14 inevitability   

n.必然性

参考例句：

• Evolutionism is normally associated with a belief in the inevitability of progress. 进化主义通常和一种相信进步不可避免的看法相联系。
• It is the tide of the times, an inevitability of history. 这是时代的潮流，历史的必然。

15 inevitable   

adj.不可避免的，必然发生的

参考例句：

• Mary was wearing her inevitable large hat.玛丽戴着她总是戴的那顶大帽子。
• The defeat had inevitable consequences for British policy.战败对英国政策不可避免地产生了影响。

16 tacking   

（帆船）抢风行驶，定位焊[铆]紧钉

参考例句：

• He was tacking about on this daily though perilous voyage. 他在进行这种日常的、惊险的航行。
• He spent the afternoon tacking the pictures. 他花了一个下午的时间用图钉固定那些图片。

17 syllables   

n.音节( syllable的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• a word with two syllables 双音节单词
• 'No. But I'll swear it was a name of two syllables.' “想不起。不过我可以发誓，它有两个音节。” 来自英汉文学 - 双城记