Unit 2 The title “Englishes” refers to the various styles of English. According to M. Joos, the style of a language may be classified from “high” to “low” on a five-point scale: frozen, formal, consultative, casual, and intimate. In recent years, people are becoming more aware of the English varieties, like Indian English, China English, Australian English etc. Figures of speech in English 1. simile: a figure of speech which makes a comparison between two unlike elements having at least one quality or characteristic in common. The comparison is purely imaginative, that is, the resemblance between the two unlike things in that one particular aspect exists only in our minds, in our “inward eye” and not in the nature of the things themselves. To make the comparison, words like as, as…as, and like are used to transfer the quality we associate with one to the other. e.g. The stars twinkle like diamonds in the sky. (shine brightly) Jim and Billy are as like as two peas. (Compare: Jim looks like his brother Billy.) Records fell like ripe apples on a windy day. (An association between the rapidity with which records were broken and the rapidity of ripe apples being blown down on a windy day.) As cold waters to a thirsty soul, so is good news from a far country. 2. metaphor: like a simile, also makes a comparison between two unlike elements, but unlike simile, this comparison is implied rather than stated. e.g. Jim was a fox. (Jim is as cunning as a fox.) The world is a stage. Life is a journey. Imperialism is a paper tiger. (Imperialism appears to be strong but inwardly it is weak.) 3. analogy: also a form of comparison, but unlike simile or metaphor, which usually concentrate on one point of resemblance, analogy draws a parallel between two unlike things that have several common qualities or points of resemblance. Analogy is chiefly used for the purpose of persuasion or for the explanation or exposition of an idea. e.g. The chess-board is the world; the pieces are the phenomena of the universe; the rules of the game are what we call the laws of Nature. The player on the other side is hidden from us. We know that his play is always fair, just and patient. But also we know, to our cost, that he never overlooks a mistake, or make the smallest allowance for ignorance. To the man who plays well, the highest stakes are paid, with that sort of overflowing generosity with which the strong shows delight in strength. And one who plays ill is checkmated------without haste, but without remore. 4. personification: a figure of speech that gives human form or feelings to animals, or life and personal attributes to inanimate objects, or to ideas and abstractions. e.g. I ran across a dim photograph of him the other day, going through some old things. He’s been dead twenty-five years. His name was Rex… and he was a bull-terrier. The wind whistled through the trees. If not always in a hot mood to smash, the sea is always stealthily ready for a drowning. feminine masculine  Nature Mother Nature the sun Apollo, the god of life and poesy and light  Earth Mother Earth rivers The Father of waters  5. metonymy: a figure of speech that has to do with the substitution of the name of one thing for that of another. e.g. The pen is mightier than the sword. She sets a good/poor table. (She provides good/poor food.) He took to the bottle. ( He took to drinking.) He has been appointed to the bench. ( the position of judge or magistrate) gray hair: old age English is, and always has been, the tongue of the common man. 6. euphemism: substitution of mild or vague or round-about expression for harsh or direct one; expression thus substituted. (See the examples in Text IB. P32) 7. hyperbole: the deliberate use of overstatement or exaggeration to achieve emphasis. e.g. She is the prettiest girl in the world. He almost died laughing. (He laughed heartily.) Hamlet: I loved Ophelia: forty thousand brothers could not, with all their quantity of love, make up my sum. Businessmen and manufacturers use hyperbole, too, for quite different purpose. It is not enough in such advertisements to say a thing is simply “good”: it must be perfect, colossal, spectacular, out-of-this-world, superb, gorgeous, fantastic, etc. and “big” becomes large, giant, ultra-large, king-size, jumbo. A few examples: OMEGA: The sign of excellence KONICA’s new Super SR100 for truer, purer, and richer color than ever before! MILD SEVEN An Encounter with Tenderness Japan’s best-selling Cigarette 555 Stands out for taste 8. understatement: (P. 29) Passage English is the most widely used language in the history of our planet. One in every seven human beings can speak it. More than half of the world’s books and three quarters of international mail are in English. Of all languages, English has the largest vocabulary—perhaps as many as two million words — and one of the noblest bodies of literature. Nonetheless, let’s face it. English is a crazy language. There is no egg in eggplant, neither pine nor apple in pineapple and no ham in a hamburger. English muffins weren’t invented in England or French fries in France. Sweetmeats are candy, while sweetbreads, which aren’t sweet, are meat. Sometimes I wonder if all English speakers should be sent to a mad house. In what other language do people drive on a parkway and park in a driveway? Ship by truck and send cargo by ship? Have noses that run and feet that smell? How can a slim chance and a fat chance be the same, while a wise guy and a wise man are opposite? How can overlook and oversee are opposites, while quite a lot and quite a few are alike? How can the weather be as hot as hell one day and cold as hell the next? You have to marvel at the glorious messiness of a language in which your house can burn up as it burns down, in which you fill in a form by filling it out and in which your alarm clock goes off by going on. English was invented by people, not by computers, and it reflects the creativity of the human race, which, of course, isn’t a race at all. That is why when stars are out they are visible, but when the lights are out they are invisible. And why, when I wind up my watch I start it, but when I wind up this speech I end it. Questions: 1. If the short passage is entitled The Glorious Messiness of English. How would you translate the title? 2. What has caused the messiness of English? Can you come up with one or two reasons? II. Words and Phrases Text IA scale: a set of standard a ruler with scales in inches and centimeters. 一把标有英寸和厘米刻度的尺子 a world map with a scale of 1:4,560,000. 一幅比例为1:4,560,000的世界地图 Beaufort wind scale: calm —— light air —— light breeze —— gentle breeze —— moderate breeze —— fresh breeze —— strong breeze —— moderate gale; near gale —— fresh gale —— strong gale —— whole gale —— storm —— hurricane supple: flexible haphazard: unsystematic hazard = danger hazardous = dangerous gracious, graceful address The president is going to address the nation on television this evening. tire of A good assistant in a bookshop should never tire of recommending good books to customers. Teachers should never tire of explaining. slovenly no more … than------ in no greater degree … than She is no more able to speak Italian than I am. Without a degree and with no experience of doing office work, the young man was no more fit to be a secretary than any of us. condemn: express strong disapproval nothing but ------ nothing other than; only What he said was nothing but empty talk. anything but: 绝不；并不 I will do anything but go there. 我决不到那里去。 That's anything but true. 那决不是真的。 ---Do you think he is smart? ---Anything but that. disapprove of: form an unfavorable opinion of I still disapprove of young men wearing their hair long because it is a sign of slovenliness, to say the least. I am sorry I must disapprove your action. 很抱歉，我必须指责你的行动。 Animal conservationists disapprove of experimenting on animals. 动物保护主义者不赞成用动物做试验。 The workers strongly disapprove of the firm's new methods on the assembly line. 工人们非常不赞成公司在装配线采取的的新方法。 reverse: change to the opposite strike somebody as: appear to somebody to be 14. Apprehend can imply awareness or consciousness that comes through the emotions or senses: Apprehend 能够意指来源于情感或感觉的认识或自我意识： ----We should not pretend to understand the world only by the intellect; we apprehend it just as much by feeling. (Carl Jung). “我们不应假装仅通过智力理解世界；我们通过感觉理解得一样多” （卡尔·荣格）。 Apprehend also denotes taking in with the mind: ----“Intelligence is quickness to apprehend” (Alfred North Whitehead). Both “情报很快会捕获的” （阿尔弗雷德·诺思·怀特黑德）。 Comprehend understand stress complete realization and knowledge: “To comprehend is to know a thing as well as that thing can be known” (John Donne). “No one who has not had the responsibility can really understand what it is like to be President” (Harry S Truman). grasp is to seize and hold an idea firmly: grasp 是指紧紧地抓住和保持一种想法。 “We have grasped the mystery of the atom and rejected the Sermon on the Mount” (Omar N. Bradley). Text IB Stop being coy — Stop being afraid of using plain, simple words. officialdom: government officials -dom: (something abstract) freedom, wisdom, boredom, martyrdom (a place) kingdom, dukedom, filmdom, stardom 3 Encyclopedia Britannica Some academic works, organizations or magazines are often named with some Latin words or suffixes. 本草纲目 Materia Medica 中华百科 Encyclopedia Sinica 中科院 Acadimia Sinica 心理学报 Acta Psychologia 美国百科Encyclopedia Americana 4. bloody-minded Our bloody-minded foreman wouldn't give us a tea break. 我们的领班故意刁难不给我们工间休息时间。 5. offbeat: not conforming to an ordinary type or pattern; unconventional: offbeat humor. 反传统的幽默 Quiz Two Name _____________ Score ____________ I. Explain the following words, phrases and sentences with plain words. 1. immortal: 2. supple: 3. slovenly: 4. senior citizen: 5. kick the bucket: 6. coma: 7. …would be too much like shooting sitting birds. 8. Many people cannot write them without having a slight feeling of guilt. 9. Some euphemisms are sufficiently offbeat to be funny. 10. It is the height of naivety to go round with a single yarstick. II. Fill in the blanks according to the texts of Unit 2. A ___________ knowledge of several styles may be worse than useless if we do not know the type of occasion on which each is _____________, or if we do not know when we are ____________ from one to another. Euphemisms are considered overly _________ and affected by ___________ writers. But it would be equally _____________ to _________ the judgment just as flatly. I am an old cripple, drawing an old-age ________, working hard to raise vast __________ of vegetables on an allotment. 5. All this effort to avoid unpleasantness is certain to fail, because the euphemism quickly _________ the stigma of the word it ____________. III. Translate the following Chinese into English, or English into Chinese. 1. bloody-minded: 2. senior citizen: 3. meat engineer: 4. Encyclopedia Sinica: 5. overstatement: 6. 去世： 7. 慈祥的笑容: 8. 对…产生影响: 9. 称呼她的方式: 10. 令人厌恶的陈词滥调: IV. Make a sentence with each given phrase. Your sentence should have no less than 12 words. no more…than: nothing but: appeal to tire of do away with: