密歇根新闻广播 一个坏苹果会毁了其他的吗？

 

TWTS: Does one bad apple spoil the others? Not according to the Osmonds

As stories of police brutality¹ and anti-police brutality protests continue to dominate the headlines, you may have noticed some people placing the blame on “a few bad apples.”

However, as a listener named Louis Finkelman recently wrote to us, this expression “has changed its meaning 180 degrees in the past few decades.”

Ben Zimmer, a linguist² and language columnist³ for the Wall Street Journal, recently discussed “a few bad apples” and its transformation⁴ on ABC News.

As Zimmer points out, this idiom goes back to at least 1340 in English. The original phrase was, “A rotten apple quickly infects its neighbor.” It meant that a rotten apple, or a rotten person, corrupts⁵ others. By the 18th century, we start to see phrases like “one bad apple spoils the barrel.”

This idiom largely died out at the end of the 19th century, but it made a comeback in the 20th century with a new meaning. Zimmer points out that by this time, most people were purchasing apples individually at grocery stories, where rotten apples are rarely seen:

"If the previous image [of a rotten apple] isn't related to our lives significantly anymore, it sort of disconnects it from its original context. And once the phrase is out there again and people are saying 'one bad apple,' you think, 'What could that mean?' Then you can assign it new meaning."

Another factor that likely helped solidify⁶ the idiom’s new meaning was the 1970 song “One Bad Apple” by the Osmonds. Many of you probably remember this peppy hit from the group’s Saturday morning cartoon, whether it be fondly or otherwise.

This song interprets the phrase to mean that an entire group shouldn't be judged by the actions of one person. Or, as the Osmonds so eloquently⁷ put it, “One bad apple don’t spoil the whole bunch, girl.”

The phrase and its new meaning take off in the 1980s. Feel free to blame the Osmonds.

1 brutality   

n.野蛮的行为，残忍，野蛮

参考例句：

• The brutality of the crime has appalled the public. 罪行之残暴使公众大为震惊。
• a general who was infamous for his brutality 因残忍而恶名昭彰的将军

2 linguist   

n.语言学家；精通数种外国语言者

参考例句：

• I used to be a linguist till I become a writer.过去我是个语言学家，后来成了作家。
• Professor Cui has a high reputation as a linguist.崔教授作为语言学家名声很高。

3 columnist   

n.专栏作家

参考例句：

• The host was interviewing a local columnist.节目主持人正在同一位当地的专栏作家交谈。
• She's a columnist for USA Today.她是《今日美国报》的专栏作家。

4 transformation   

n.变化；改造；转变

参考例句：

• Going to college brought about a dramatic transformation in her outlook.上大学使她的观念发生了巨大的变化。
• He was struggling to make the transformation from single man to responsible husband.他正在努力使自己由单身汉变为可靠的丈夫。

5 corrupts   

（使）败坏( corrupt的第三人称单数 )； （使）腐化； 引起（计算机文件等的）错误； 破坏

参考例句：

• The unrighteous penny corrupts the righteous pound. 不正当得来的便士使正当得来的英镑也受到玷污。
• Blue cinema corrupts the souls of people. 黄色电影腐蚀人们的灵魂。

6 solidify   

v.(使)凝固，(使)固化，(使)团结

参考例句：

• Opinion on this question began to solidify.对这个问题的意见开始具体化了。
• Water will solidify into ice if you freeze it.水冷冻会结冰。

7 eloquently   

adv. 雄辩地(有口才地, 富于表情地)

参考例句：

• I was toasted by him most eloquently at the dinner. 进餐时他口若悬河地向我祝酒。
• The poet eloquently expresses the sense of lost innocence. 诗人动人地表达了失去天真的感觉。