新版大学英语unit_7相关资料.docVIP

引言译文： 有些语言拒绝引入新词。另一些语言，如英语，则似乎欢迎新词的引入。罗伯特·麦克尼尔回顾英语的历史，得出结论说，英语对变化的包容性体现了根深蒂固的自由思想。 The Glorious Messiness of English The story of our English language is typically one of massive stealing from other languages. That is why English today has an estimated vocabulary of over one million words, while other major languages have far fewer. 英语中绚丽多彩的杂乱无章现象 罗伯特·麦克尼尔 我们的英语的历史是典型的大量窃取其它语言的历史。正因为如此，今日英语的词汇量据估计超过一百万，而其它主要语言的词汇量都要小得多。 　 French, for example, has only about 75,000 words, and that includes English expressions like snack bar and hit parade. The French, however, do not like borrowing foreign words because they think it corrupts their language. The government tries to ban words from English and declares that Walkman is not desirable; so they invent a word, balladeur, which French kids are supposed to say instead -- but they dont. 例如，法语只有约75,000个单词，其中还包括像snack bar（快餐店）和 hit parade（流行唱片目录）这样的英语词汇。但法国人不喜欢借用外来词，因为他们认为这样会损害法语的纯洁性。法国政府试图逐出英语词汇，宣称Walkman（随身听）一词有伤大雅，因此他们造了个新词balladeur让法国儿童用——可他们就是不用。 Walkman is fascinating because it isnt even English. Strictly speaking, it was invented by the Japanese manufacturers who put two simple English words together to name their product. That doesnt bother us, but it does bother the French. Such is the glorious messiness of English. That happy tolerance, that willingness to accept words from anywhere, explains the richness of English and why it has become, to a very real extent, the first truly global language. Walkman一词非常耐人寻味，因为这个词连英语也不是。严格地说，该词是由日本制造商发明的，他们把两个简单的英语单词拼在一起来命名他们的产品。这事儿我们不介意，法国人却耿耿于怀。由此可见英语中绚丽多彩的杂乱无章现象。这种乐意包容的精神，这种不管源自何方来者不拒的精神，恰好解释了英语为什么会这么丰富，解释了英语缘何在很大程度上第一个成了真正的国际语言。 How did the language of a small island off the coast of Europe become the language of the planet -- more widely spoken and written than any other has ever been? The history of English is present in the first words a child learns about identity (I, me, you); possession (mine, yours); the body (eye, nose, mo