TED演讲:短信是语言杀手(8)

 If somebody from 1973 looked at what was on a dormitory message board in 1993,  如果一个1973年的人看着1993年一个学生宿舍信息栏，

the slang would have changed a little bit since the era of Love Story,  俚语等习惯用语会跟爱情故事时代有些不同，

but they would understand what was on that message board.  但是他们会看明白那个信息栏上的内容。

Take that person from 1993-not that long ago,  我们让1993年的那个人－这可不算太久远，

this is Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure -- those people.  那还是比尔和泰德历险记时代，

Take those people and they read a very typical text written by a 20-year-old today.  我们让这些人读现在20岁年轻人写的一段短信。

Often they would have no idea what half of it meant because a whole new language has developed among our young people doing something as mundane¹ as what it looks like to us when they're batting around on their little devices.  他们应该通常连一半的内容都猜不出来，因为我们的年轻人已经发展出了一种新的语言，它是通过在孩子们的小设备上的看似平常的敲敲打打中演变出来的。

So in closing, if I could go into the future,  总结一下，如果我可以穿越到未来，

if I could go into 2033,  如果我去到2033年，

the first thing I would ask is whether David Simon had done a sequel to The Wire. I would want to know.  我会问的第一个问题就是大卫?西蒙拍没拍火线的续集。

And I really would ask that and then I'd want to know actually what was going on on Downton Abbey.  我真的会问这个的，我还会想知道唐顿庄园到底发生了什么。

That'd be the second thing.  这是第二个问题。

And then the third thing would be,  第三个问题就是，

please show me a sheaf of texts written by 16-year-old girls,  请给我一叠16岁姑娘们写的短信，

because I would want to know where this language had developed since our times,  因为我想知道这个语言已经发展成什么样子了，

and ideally I would then send them back to you and me now so we could examine this linguistic² miracle happening right under our noses. 更好的就是我可以把这些短信发给现在的大家和我，我们就可以研究研究这个当下正在发生着的语言奇迹。

Thank you very much.  非常感谢。

Thank you. 谢谢大家。 

1 mundane   

adj.平凡的；尘世的；宇宙的

参考例句：

• I hope I can get an interesting job and not something mundane.我希望我可以得到的是一份有趣的工作，而不是一份平凡无奇的。
• I find it humorous sometimes that even the most mundane occurrences can have an impact on our awareness.我发现生活有时挺诙谐的，即使是最平凡的事情也能影响我们的感知。

2 linguistic   

adj.语言的，语言学的

参考例句：

• She is pursuing her linguistic researches.她在从事语言学的研究。
• The ability to write is a supreme test of linguistic competence.写作能力是对语言能力的最高形式的测试。