VOA慢速英语2020 父亲节与抢功劳

Welcome to Words and Their Stories from VOA Learning¹ English.

On this program we explore common expressions in American English.

In the United States on the third Sunday of June we celebrate Father's Day! So, today we celebrate fathers with some expressions that use the word "father" and "dad".

Let's begin with a great father idiom!

Success has many fathers but failure is an orphan².

An orphan is a child whose parents have died. Without parents, orphans³ can often feel alone in the world. There is no adult to claim them, so to speak.

We can say the same about failures. Often people, do not want to claim them as their own. People may not want to take ownership⁴, for example, of a project at work that is a complete bust⁵ -- you know, a failure.

On the other hand, it is not uncommon⁶ for people to fight over ownership of a big success. They always want to be on the right side of history.

"It was my idea!" "No, it wasn't. I thought of it ages ago." "Well, I did most of the work!"

You get the idea.

So, this idiom means that people like belonging to a successful cause but they distance themselves from a failed one.

Here's how you can use it.

Let's say a new business opens in your community. Everyone is excited about it! Some even invest⁷ money. It is the talk of the town. Then, it fails. People who once supported it don't seem to remember supporting it.

When those people say to you, "Oh, I knew it would fail. It was doomed⁸ from the very beginning." You can say to them, "Success has many fathers but failure is an orphan."

Now, you could say that creating the United States of America was a success. And there is a group of men who are famous for being on the right side of history.

We call them the Founding Fathers.

We capitalize these two words when we are talking about any member of the group who wrote the United States Constitution in 1787. Some of the most famous Founding Fathers are George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, John Adams and Benjamin Franklin.

However, following the success of the musical Hamilton, perhaps Alexander Hamilton has temporarily won the title of "most famous" Founding Father.

But Founding Fathers aren't just found in history books and on the Broadway stage. We also use this term in other situations.

A founding father is a person who starts or develops a new movement, idea or some other big concept⁹. Used this way, however, we do not capitalize "founding father."

The Founding Fathers of the U.S. are highly¹⁰ respected and admired by most people. Our next type of father isn't.

Not all dads are the greatest. In fact, some leave their families and provide no money to help to raise their children. We have a special name for these dads – deadbeat dads.

Just for the record, some moms do this, too. But we'll have to cover that term next Mother's Day!

And that's Words and Their Stories.

I'm Anna Matteo.

欢迎来到VOA学英语《词汇掌故》节目。

在节目中，我们探索美式英语里的常见表达。

人们会在美国六月的第三个星期日庆祝父亲节！因此，今天我们用一些和“father（父亲）”以及“dad（爸爸）”相关的表达致敬父亲们。

让我们从一个超棒的与父亲相关的习语开始吧！

一个人如果成功了，很多人会互相抢功劳，若失败了，没有人想要理他，大家都想要跟他划清界限（Success has many fathers but failure is an orphan）。

“orphan（孤儿）”是一个父母双亡的孩子。失去父母，孩子往往感觉在世界上活着很孤独。可以说没有成年人认领他们。

我们也可以同样这样形容失败。一般人们不愿意承认自己失败了。人们也许不想获得所有权，例如，工作上一个彻底破灭的项目的所有权，你知道，就是一个失败的项目。

另一方面，人们为了巨大的成功而争抢功劳的事情并不罕见。他们总是想站在历史正确的一边。

“这是我的主意！”“不是你的主意。我很久以前就想到了。”“好吧，绝大部分工作都是我做的！”

你懂了吧。

因此，这个习语的意思是人们喜欢将一份成功的事业归功于自己，但是他们会撇清自己与失败的事业的关系。

下面是它的用法介绍。

假设你的社区里有一家新公司开业。所有人都很高兴！其中一些人甚至投资了这家公司。这家公司成了镇上人们的热门话题。后来，它倒闭了。那些曾经资助过这家公司的人似乎不记得自己曾经资助过。

当那些人对你说：“哦，我知道那家公司会倒闭。这事是从一开始就注定了的。”你可以对他们说：“一个人如果成功了，很多人会互相抢功劳，若失败了，没有人想要理他，大家都想要跟他划清界限。”

你可以说创造美国是一件成功的事情。有几个人因为站在了历史正确的一边而因此出了名。

我们称那几个人为“Founding Fathers（美国之父/美国开国元勋）”。

当谈及1787年起草美国宪法的成员之一时，我们会将这两个单词大写。其中最有名的一些美国之父就是乔治·华盛顿、托马斯·杰斐逊、约翰·亚当斯、本杰明·富兰克林。

然而，在音乐剧《汉密尔顿》之后，也许亚历山大·汉密尔顿暂时赢得了“最著名”的国父称号。

但是，“Founding Fathers（国父们）”这个短语不是只出现在历史课本里和百老汇舞台上。我们也在其他情境下使用它。

“founding father（创立人）”指的是启动或者开创了一个新的举措、创意或者一些别的大的概念。这种用法下，“founding father”这两个单词不用大写。

“美国之父”是受多数人尊崇和景仰的。我们接下来的这类“father（父亲）”就不是这样了。

并非所有父亲都是伟大的。实际上，一些父亲抛弃了家人，而且孩子的抚养费不给一分钱。这种爸爸，我们有一个专门的称呼：deadbeat dads（游手好闲的父亲）。

顺便告诉你，一些妈妈也是这样的。但是我们将在下一个母亲节的时候再讨论这个短语！

这就是本期的《词汇掌故》节目。

我是安娜·马特奥。

1 learning   

n.学问，学识，学习；动词learn的现在分词

参考例句：

• When you are learning to ride a bicycle,you often fall off.初学骑自行车时，常会从车上掉下来。
• Learning languages isn't just a matter of remembering words.学习语言不仅仅是记些单词的事。

2 orphan   

n.孤儿；adj.无父母的

参考例句：

• He brought up the orphan and passed onto him his knowledge of medicine.他把一个孤儿养大，并且把自己的医术传给了他。
• The orphan had been reared in a convent by some good sisters.这个孤儿在一所修道院里被几个好心的修女带大。

3 orphans   

孤儿( orphan的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• The poor orphans were kept on short commons. 贫苦的孤儿们吃不饱饭。
• Their uncle was declared guardian to the orphans. 这些孤儿的叔父成为他们的监护人。

4 ownership   

n.所有(权)，所有制

参考例句：

• The house is under new ownership.那栋房子已易新主。
• He claimed ownership of the house.他声称那幢房子归他所有。

5 bust   

vt.打破；vi.爆裂；n.半身像；胸部

参考例句：

• I dropped my camera on the pavement and bust it. 我把照相机掉在人行道上摔坏了。
• She has worked up a lump of clay into a bust.她把一块黏土精心制作成一个半身像。

6 uncommon   

adj.罕见的，非凡的，不平常的

参考例句：

• Such attitudes were not at all uncommon thirty years ago.这些看法在30年前很常见。
• Phil has uncommon intelligence.菲尔智力超群。

7 invest   

v.投资；投入(时间等)；授予，赋予

参考例句：

• I have decided to invest in a new car.我已经决定买一辆新汽车。
• The best time to invest is now.现在是投资的最佳时机。

8 doomed   

命定的

参考例句：

• The court doomed the accused to a long term of imprisonment. 法庭判处被告长期监禁。
• A country ruled by an iron hand is doomed to suffer. 被铁腕人物统治的国家定会遭受不幸的。

9 concept   

n.概念，观念，思想

参考例句：

• A small baby has no concept of right and wrong.婴儿没有是非概念。
• He was asked to define his concept of cool.他被要求说明自己关于“酷”的定义。

10 highly   

adv.高度地，极，非常；非常赞许地

参考例句：

• It is highly important to provide for the future.预先做好准备非常重要。
• The teacher speaks very highly of the boy's behaviour.老师称赞这个男孩的表现。