密歇根新闻广播 英式英语的不同之处

 

Have you ever heard someone describe the United States and another English-speaking country as two countries separated by a common language?

A listener named Randy Miller¹ wrote to us recently about some of the language differences he encountered while living in England.

There were words like lorry and lift that many of us already know, but Miller also found there were embarrassingly different meanings of some words, like suspenders and pants.

One difference that Miller found particularly striking has to do with the verb to table.

To table came to mean to lay something on the table of a legislature assembly or some other deliberative body. By the mid-1600s in England, if you tabled something, you were submitting it formally for discussion.

However, by the mid-1800s in the U.S., there's evidence that if you tabled something, you were actually postponing² discussion of it.

Interestingly, on the table seems to have the same meaning for all of us that it's up for discussion.

That means if you're in the U.S. and there's an issue on the table, it's up for discussion. But it you table it, it's not up for discussion. If that seems confusing, that's because it is.

What confusing words have you found while traveling in other English-speaking countries?

1 miller   

n.磨坊主

参考例句：

• Every miller draws water to his own mill.磨坊主都往自己磨里注水。
• The skilful miller killed millions of lions with his ski.技术娴熟的磨坊主用雪橇杀死了上百万头狮子。

2 postponing   

v.延期，推迟( postpone的现在分词 )

参考例句：

• He tried to gain time by postponing his decision. 他想以迟迟不作决定的手段来争取时间。 来自辞典例句
• I don't hold with the idea of postponing further discussion of the matter. 我不赞成推迟进一步讨论这件事的想法。 来自辞典例句