英语单词大师：How 'Mavericks,' 'Earmarks'

 AA: I'm Avi Arditti with Rosanne Skirble, and this week on WORDMASTER: we continue our discussion with dictionary editor Ben Zimmer about terms related to the presidential campaign.

RS: "One word that's being associated with John McCain -- or John McCain wants to have associated with him -- is the term 'maverick¹.'"BEN ZIMMER: "It was originally the name of a cattle rancher in Texas whose name was Samuel Maverick, in the mid-nineteenth century. He was also a politician, but he owned a large herd² of cattle in Texas. And he was notorious because he never branded his cattle, as was usually done by the cattle ranchers. And he said that this was as a way of being less cruel to the animals. But his rivals, the other cattle ranchers in Texas, thought that this was just a ploy³ so that he could claim that any cattle that didn't have a brand were his, and that he could just claim them that way.

"In any case, this term maverick then was applied⁴ to the cattle themselves. 'Mavericks⁵' were unbranded calves⁶. And then, from there, it got extended to mean just someone who kind of runs wild, somebody who's very independent-minded, has a free spirit."RS: "Speaking of cruelty to animals, can you put lipstick⁷ on a pig?"BEN ZIMMER: "I wouldn't want to try, but -- "RS: "Explain that to me."BEN ZIMMER: " -- we've certainly heard a lot about lipstick on a pig. Barack Obama told a crowd, 'You can put lipstick on a pig but it's still a pig.' And then, very swiftly, the McCain campaign said that this was somehow directed at Sarah Palin. But we can see that this has a very interesting history, too.

"It's been used by lots of different people. In fact, John McCain himself used it just last year to describe Hillary Clinton's health care plan. And that's actually an old concept of taking a pig and trying to convert it into something pretty. There's even a biblical proverb, there's an echo from the Bible: 'As a ring of gold in a swine's snout, so is a beautiful woman who lacks discretion⁸.'

"But then it became a common source of expressions in the English language to refer to a pig that's somehow dressed up. So there are expressions like 'A hog⁹ in a silk waistcoat is still a hog.' And in the twentieth century then we get variations on that which involve other types of prettying up, including lipstick, or putting perfume on a pig. There's lots of different ways that people have talked about trying to convert something from ugly to pretty, or from useless to useful."AA: "A sow's ear into a silk purse."BEN ZIMMER: "Exactly. That's an expression that dates back to the mid-sixteenth century: 'You can't make a silk purse from a sow's ear.' So the idea is the ear of a sow, or a female hog, is something that is not very pretty at all and not very useful.

"Earmark is another pig-related term which originally referred to the marks on a pig's ear and eventually got used in politics to refer to this special set-aside money that's used for different projects, and that a congressman¹⁰ can try to bring these special appropriations¹¹ back to their home state or home district."RS: "Bring home the bacon, as it were."BEN ZIMMER: "Bring home the bacon. And bring home the pork, to use yet another pig expression."TERESA ROOF: "Well, pork products today are actually a lot leaner than in the past."AA: Teresa Roof must wince¹² at the irony¹³ anytime someone refers in politics to budgetary fat as pork. She is public relations manager for the National Pork Board, an industry group where an "earmark" can still refer to an identifying tag on a pig.

TERESA ROOF: "Compare the pigs from nineteen fifties. Today's model has slimmed down considerably¹⁴ with seventy-three percent less fat. And that's mainly due to the demand that consumers want a leaner product."AA: "Isn't the argument that some people have now that pork is almost too lean, that it's lost some of its flavor because they've cut some of the fat out?"TERESA ROOF: "There's various different breeds and various different models out there today to satisfy every consumer's need. There's an active niche¹⁵ market out there [for] people who are looking for a specific breed of pork, or pork to meet those demands, so there's basically everything out there on the market, for a wide variety of consumers."AA: That was Teresa Roof at the National Pork Board. And before that we heard from Ben Zimmer, executive producer of the Visual Thesaurus, an online thesaurus and dictionary. Part one of our discussion of terms related to the presidential campaign can be found at our Web site, voanews.com/wordmaster. You can also learn more about two other terms in the news right now: "bailout" and "golden parachute."And that's all for WORDMASTER this week. With Rosanne Skirble, I'm Avi Arditti. 

1 maverick   

adj.特立独行的；不遵守传统的；n.持异议者，自行其是者

参考例句：

• He's a maverick.He has his own way of thinking about things.他是个特异独行的人。对事情有自己的看法。
• You're a maverick and you'll try anything.你是个爱自行其是的人，样样事情都要尝试一下。

2 herd   

n.兽群，牧群；vt.使集中，把…赶在一起

参考例句：

• She drove the herd of cattle through the wilderness.她赶着牛群穿过荒野。
• He had no opinions of his own but simply follow the herd.他从无主见，只是人云亦云。

3 ploy   

n.花招，手段

参考例句：

• I think this is just a government ploy to deceive the public.我认为这只是政府欺骗公众的手段。
• Christmas should be a time of excitement and wonder,not a cynical marketing ploy.圣诞节应该是兴奋和美妙的时刻，而不该是一种肆无忌惮的营销策略。

4 applied   

adj.应用的；v.应用，适用

参考例句：

• She plans to take a course in applied linguistics.她打算学习应用语言学课程。
• This cream is best applied to the face at night.这种乳霜最好晚上擦脸用。

5 mavericks   

未烙印的牲畜( maverick的名词复数 )； 标新立异的人，不合常规的人

参考例句：

• And what about the Dallas Mavericks and Dirk Nowitzki? 那达拉斯小牛队和诺维斯基呢？
• And we see it with bringing Jason Kidd to the Dallas Mavericks. 而且我们看到它同实现基德向达拉斯小牛队。

6 calves   

n.(calf的复数)笨拙的男子，腓；腿肚子( calf的名词复数 )；牛犊；腓；小腿肚v.生小牛( calve的第三人称单数 )；（冰川）崩解；生（小牛等），产（犊）；使（冰川）崩解

参考例句：

• a cow suckling her calves 给小牛吃奶的母牛
• The calves are grazed intensively during their first season. 小牛在生长的第一季里集中喂养。 来自《简明英汉词典》

7 lipstick   

n.口红，唇膏

参考例句：

• Taking out her lipstick,she began to paint her lips.她拿出口红，开始往嘴唇上抹。
• Lipstick and hair conditioner are cosmetics.口红和护发素都是化妆品。

8 discretion   

n.谨慎；随意处理

参考例句：

• You must show discretion in choosing your friend.你择友时必须慎重。
• Please use your best discretion to handle the matter.请慎重处理此事。

9 hog   

n.猪；馋嘴贪吃的人；vt.把…占为己有，独占

参考例句：

• He is greedy like a hog.他像猪一样贪婪。
• Drivers who hog the road leave no room for other cars.那些占着路面的驾驶员一点余地都不留给其他车辆。

10 Congressman   

n.（美）国会议员

参考例句：

• He related several anecdotes about his first years as a congressman.他讲述自己初任议员那几年的几则轶事。
• The congressman is meditating a reply to his critics.这位国会议员正在考虑给他的批评者一个答复。

11 appropriations   

n.挪用（appropriation的复数形式）

参考例句：

• More commonly, funding controls are imposed in the annual appropriations process. 更普遍的作法是，拨款控制被规定在年度拨款手续中。 来自英汉非文学 - 行政法
• Should the president veto the appropriations bill, it goes back to Congress. 假如总统否决了这项拨款提案，就把它退还给国会。 来自英汉非文学 - 政府文件

12 wince   

n.畏缩，退避，（因痛苦，苦恼等)面部肌肉抽动；v.畏缩，退缩，退避

参考例句：

• The barb of his wit made us wince.他那锋芒毕露的机智使我们退避三舍。
• His smile soon modified to a wince.他的微笑很快就成了脸部肌肉的抽搐。

13 irony   

n.反语，冷嘲；具有讽刺意味的事，嘲弄

参考例句：

• She said to him with slight irony.她略带嘲讽地对他说。
• In her voice we could sense a certain tinge of irony.从她的声音里我们可以感到某种讥讽的意味。

14 considerably   

adv.极大地；相当大地；在很大程度上

参考例句：

• The economic situation has changed considerably.经济形势已发生了相当大的变化。
• The gap has narrowed considerably.分歧大大缩小了。

15 niche   

n.壁龛；合适的职务(环境、位置等)

参考例句：

• Madeleine placed it carefully in the rocky niche. 玛德琳小心翼翼地把它放在岩石壁龛里。
• The really talented among women would always make their own niche.妇女中真正有才能的人总是各得其所。