"Funemployment," "PIIGS" and "broken society" have all made their way into the Collins English Dictionary, reflecting the dominance of the economic downturn in last year's consciousness. |
"Funemployment," "PIIGS" and "broken society" have all made their way into the Collins English Dictionary, reflecting the dominance of the economic downturn in last year's consciousness. The latest technological trends have also been captured among the dozens of new inclusions, which were revealed Wednesday, with "tweetheart," "tweet tooth," "tweet-out," "iPad" and "intexticated" all entering the lexicon. "Funemployment" describes the enjoyment had while on an unforeseen break from work and "PIIGS" is an acronym for Portugal, Italy, Ireland, Greece and Spain, the countries most at risk from the European sovereign debt crisis. "Broken society" or "social recession" describe the perceived erosion of moral values while "ghost estate", an unfinished housing development abandoned due to the downturn, is now in the dictionary. Social networking site Twitter is responsible for the addition of "tweetheart," a person who uses the site and is much admired by other users. "Tweet tooth" is the strong urge to post a Twitter update while "tweet-out" is a greeting sent to a friend via the online service. The success of Apple's new "iPad" laptop computer is acknowledged while the addition of "itexticated," which means to be distracted while reading or writing a text message, exposes some of technology's draw-backs. Language-lovers in Glasgow whittled down the final list of new words after feeding written and spoken material from newspapers, websites, magazines, television and radio into a database over the past year. The obsession with celebrity culture is highlighted by the inclusion of "fauxmance," which is a non-existent relationship between stars concocted to attract media attention. Popular political terms are also included with "birther," used to describe a person who believes that US President Barack Obama was not born in America, making the new edition. The addition of "Chindonesia", a portmanteau word which blends China, India and Indonesia, reflects the shifting focus of world trade. There is the usual inclusion of curious buzz-phrases with "grow the beard", an informal term meaning to show a marked improvement in quality. (Read by Lee Hannon. Lee Hannon is a journalist at the China Daily Web site.) (Agencies) |
“失业乐活”(Funemployment)、“欧猪五国”(PIIGS) 和“破裂社会”(broken society)均被收录到《科林斯英语词典》中,这反映出了去年经济衰退在大众意识中占据的主导地位。 周三公布的被收入词典的几十个新词中,也捕捉到了最新的科技趋势,如“推特情人”(tweetheart)、“推文狂”(tweettooth)、“在推特上问候”(tweet-out)、“iPad”和“一边开车一边发短信的”(intexticated)等。 “失业乐活”用于形容在意外失业之后因享受空闲而感到的快乐。“欧猪五国”则是欧洲主权债务危机最严重的葡萄牙、意大利、爱尔兰、希腊和西班牙五国的首字母合成词。 “破裂社会”或“社会衰退”(social recession),描述的是人们可以察觉到的道德价值观被腐蚀的状况。“鬼宅”(ghost estate)一词也进入了词典,它指的是因经济衰退而停工的未建成的住宅区。 “推特情人”被收入词典,同社交网站推特(Twitter)有关,它指的是在推特网上颇受其它用户仰慕的推友。 “推文狂”说的是一种更新推文的强烈欲望。而“在推特上问候”指的是通过推特在线服务向朋友打招呼。 “iPad”被收入词典,表明苹果的iPad新型笔记本电脑得到认可。另外,“边开车边发短信”一词则暴露了科技的一些弊端,它指的是开车时由于看短信或编写短信而分心。 苏格兰格拉斯哥的语言爱好者在过去的一年时间内将许多报纸、网站、杂志、电视和电台的书面和口头材料汇入数据库,经过层层删减后确定了新词的最终名单。 “捏造恋情”(fauxmance)指的是明星们为吸引媒体注意捏造的恋情。该词被收入词典,也突出反映了大众对名人文化的热衷。 被录入新版词典的还有一些流行的政治词汇,如“出生地质疑者”。该词被用来指那些认为美国总统贝拉克•奥巴马并非在美国出生的人。 新词“亚洲铁三角”(Chindonesia)这一合成词是由中国、印度和印度尼西亚三国的英语名称合并而成的,反映出了世界贸易中心的转移。 和往常一样,新录入词典的词中还包括一些有趣的时髦词,如“长胡子”(grow the beard),它是一种用于表示质量明显提高的非正式说法。 相关阅读 (中国日报网英语点津 实习生强凤华 编辑:陈丹妮) |
Vocabulary: housing development: 【美】=housing estate (统建的)住宅区,住宅群 draw-back: a disadvantage or problem that makes something a less attractive idea(缺点;不利条件) whittle down: 减少,缩减(……的大小或数目) concoct: to invent a story, an excuse, etc. 虚构,杜撰,编造(故事、借口等) portmanteau word: 缩合词,合并词 buzz-phrase: 时髦的词组 |