2022年经济学人 办公室的考古学（1）

Business

商业版块

Bartleby: The archaeology¹ of the office

巴托比：办公室的考古学

A walk around the workplace is also a trip back in time

在工作场所散步也是一次时光旅行

The office is where colleagues meet, work and bond.

办公室是同事见面、工作和联系的地方。

But it is also a time capsule, a place where the imprint² of historic patterns of working are visible everywhere.

但它也是一个时间胶囊，在办公室里，过往工作模式的印记随处可见。

The pandemic has heightened this sense of the office as a dig site for corporate³ archaeologists.

疫情暴发后，办公室可供企业考古学家挖掘的感觉更加浓厚。

It isn’t just that covid-19 has left its own trace in the fossil record, from hand sanitisers to social-distancing stickers.

这不仅仅是因为新冠肺炎在企业化石记录中留下了自己的痕迹，比如洗手液以及保持社交距离的警示贴纸等。

It is also that items which were useful in the pre-covid world make less sense now; and that things which were already looking quaint⁴ seem positively⁵ antiquated⁶.

还有一个原因是，疫情前有用的东西现在变得没那么有用了；疫情前看起来就已经过时的东西，现在看来也确实过时了。

The most obvious artefact is the landline phone, a reminder⁷ of the days when mobility⁸ meant being able to stand up and keep talking.

最明显的“手工艺品”就是座机，它让人想起以前那时候，移动的意思就是可以站着说话。

Long after people have junked them in their personal lives—less than 15% of Americans aged⁹ between 25 and 34 had one at home in the second half of 2021, according to the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention—landline phones survive in offices.

人们私下已经抛弃了座机--美国疾病控制与预防中心的数据显示，2021年下半年，25-34岁的美国人中只有不到15%的人家里还有座机--这么长时间过去了，座机却仍然在办公室里屹立不倒。

There might be good theoretical reasons for this persistence¹⁰: they offer a more secure and stable connection than mobile phones, and no one frets¹¹ that they are about to run out of battery.

从理论角度来看，座机能存活至今可能是有充分理由的：座机的连接比手机更安全稳定，人们也不必担心座机电量会耗尽。

In practice the habit of using them was definitively¹² lost during the pandemic.

而实际上，在疫情期间，用座机这种习惯完全消失了。

Now they sit on desk after desk, rows of buttons unpressed, ringtones unheard, cords tellingly unknotted.

现在，座机安坐在一张又一张桌子上，一排排按钮无人问津，一声不响，电线也明显一丝不乱。

Landlines were already well on their way out before covid-19 struck.

在新冠肺炎来袭之前，座机就已经很过时了。

Flipboard charts have suffered a swifter reverse.

在翻转板上画图表这种方式落伍得更快。

These objects signal a particular type of torture—people physically¹³ crowded together into a room while an idiot sketches¹⁴ a quadrant with a marker pen and points meaningfully to the top-right-hand corner.

其应用场景就是一种特殊的酷刑--人们挤在一个房间里，看着一个白痴用记号笔画出一个象限，再意味深长地指向右上角。

The idiot is still making quadrants but is now much more likely to use a slide deck.

那个白痴还是在制作象限，但现在用的工具更有可能是幻灯片。

The crowd is still being tortured but is now much more likely to be watching on a screen.

那群人仍然在遭受折磨，但他们现在看的地方更有可能是块屏幕。

The office still has flipboards, but they are stowed in corners and their topmost pages are slowly yellowing.

办公室里还是有翻转板的，只不过都被收在角落里，顶层的纸张正在慢慢泛黄。

1 archaeology   

n.考古学

参考例句：

• She teaches archaeology at the university.她在大学里教考古学。
• He displayed interest in archaeology.他对考古学有兴趣。

2 imprint   

n.印痕，痕迹；深刻的印象；vt.压印，牢记

参考例句：

• That dictionary is published under the Longman imprint.那本词典以朗曼公司的名义出版。
• Her speech left its imprint on me.她的演讲给我留下了深刻印象。

3 corporate   

adj.共同的，全体的；公司的，企业的

参考例句：

• This is our corporate responsibility.这是我们共同的责任。
• His corporate's life will be as short as a rabbit's tail.他的公司的寿命是兔子尾巴长不了。

4 quaint   

adj.古雅的，离奇有趣的，奇怪的

参考例句：

• There were many small lanes in the quaint village.在这古香古色的村庄里，有很多小巷。
• They still keep some quaint old customs.他们仍然保留着一些稀奇古怪的旧风俗。

5 positively   

adv.明确地，断然，坚决地；实在，确实

参考例句：

• She was positively glowing with happiness.她满脸幸福。
• The weather was positively poisonous.这天气着实讨厌。

6 antiquated   

adj.陈旧的，过时的

参考例句：

• Many factories are so antiquated they are not worth saving.很多工厂过于陈旧落后，已不值得挽救。
• A train of antiquated coaches was waiting for us at the siding.一列陈旧的火车在侧线上等着我们。

7 reminder   

n.提醒物，纪念品；暗示，提示

参考例句：

• I have had another reminder from the library.我又收到图书馆的催还单。
• It always took a final reminder to get her to pay her share of the rent.总是得发给她一份最后催缴通知，她才付应该交的房租。

8 mobility   

n.可动性，变动性，情感不定

参考例句：

• The difference in regional house prices acts as an obstacle to mobility of labour.不同地区房价的差异阻碍了劳动力的流动。
• Mobility is very important in guerrilla warfare.机动性在游击战中至关重要。

9 aged   

adj.年老的，陈年的

参考例句：

• He had put on weight and aged a little.他胖了，也老点了。
• He is aged,but his memory is still good.他已年老，然而记忆力还好。

10 persistence   

n.坚持，持续，存留

参考例句：

• The persistence of a cough in his daughter puzzled him.他女儿持续的咳嗽把他难住了。
• He achieved success through dogged persistence.他靠着坚持不懈取得了成功。

11 frets   

基质间片； 品丝（吉他等指板上定音的）( fret的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• The river frets away the rocks along its banks. 河水侵蚀了两岸的岩石。
• She frets at even the slightest delays. 稍有延误她就不满。

12 definitively   

adv.决定性地，最后地

参考例句：

• None of the three super-states could be definitively conquered even by the other two in combination. 三个超级国家中的任何一国都不可能被任何两国的联盟所绝对打败。 来自英汉文学
• Therefore, nothing can ever be definitively proved with a photograph. 因此，没有什么可以明确了一张照片。 来自互联网

13 physically   

adj.物质上，体格上，身体上，按自然规律

参考例句：

• He was out of sorts physically,as well as disordered mentally.他浑身不舒服，心绪也很乱。
• Every time I think about it I feel physically sick.一想起那件事我就感到极恶心。

14 sketches   

n.草图( sketch的名词复数 )；素描；速写；梗概

参考例句：

• The artist is making sketches for his next painting. 画家正为他的下一幅作品画素描。
• You have to admit that these sketches are true to life. 你得承认这些素描很逼真。 来自《简明英汉词典》