活的语言.pdfVIP

● … … ，、 T Rwecheontplvla。n1towocrokmedetoinACuhstinraaliafortotwstoudmyonths，teachingEnglishtouniversitystudents ItwasmyfirsttimeinChinaofrafew years ． andInoricedthat1washavingtroubleunderstandingthestudentswhentheyspokeChinese an10ngstthemselves．MyChineseusedtobeprettygood．When 1wasworkinginChinain the1980s。IscoredthehighestlevelpossibleintheHSK ，theChineseequivalentofTOEFL· Whycouldn’tIunderstandalotofwhattheysaidnow? Ofcourse，soree0fthiswasbecause my Chinese hasgonerusty。． Astheoldsayinggoes，ifyou don’tuse it，you lose it— practiceisSOimportantinlanguagelearning．Someofitmightalsohavebeenthatmyears a1accent．Butafterawhile，1becamemoreandYnoreconvinced hadnotadjustedtotheloc thatthemain reason why1washavingtroublewaslanguage shift．TheChineseoftoday simp1visn’tthesamelanguagethatIlearntbackinthe1970sand1980s． All1anguagesev0lveovertime．A classicexample inEnglish isthewordgay．Inmy parents，time，gaymeant “cheerful’’or “happy”．Thenaboutfiftyyearsago，itshiftedits meaningandcametomeanhomosexual4．BothEnglishandChinesehavechangedalotin the pastthirty years． Sometimes I even have trouble understanding my own teenag。 daughtersathome．TheEnglish thattheyspeakisnotexactlythesameastheEnglish I spokewhen1wastheirage． One0fthebiggestreasonsofrlanguageshift inrecentyearsistechnology．When1was v0un a indow wassomethingyouopenedtoletinsomefleshairandamold~ewasasmall anima1．Nowthevbc，threfertocomputers．Socialnetworking(itselfaredefinedconcept)has a1sogivenusnewwordssuchastweetin~．WhenIfirstlearntChinese，wangmeantan“et asinthegameoftennis，butnow itusuallyreferstotheinternet．Wenow havewordssuch as ^ (website)andwangba(intemetoafe)．Popularwebsiteshavebecomenewwords in themselves． Youngpeople in China today often use N0te