词汇大师(Wordmaster)--Slang Flashcards

Broadcast on COAST TO COAST: February 19, 2004

AA: I'm Avi Arditti with Rosanne Skirble, and this week on Wordmaster -- a new way to learn slang.

RS: It's a pack of sixty cards with slang terms on one side. Definitions and synonyms¹ are on the back, plus a humorous illustration.

AA: Jen Bilik says her company in California has sold twenty-thousand sets of Slang Flashcards since their release in September. They're meant for fun, but they seem like they could be a useful teaching tool.

RS: We'd read about them, but not actually seen all the cards. So we asked Jen Bilik to come down to VOA's Los Angeles studio and quiz us on some of the words.

BILIK: "OK, well tell me if you know the meaning of 'sick.'"

RS: "Sick. Sick could be very positive."

AA: "That's right."

RS: "Like 'that's a sick joke,' meaning gee² that's really funny."

AA: "Really good."

RS: "It's a really good joke."

BILIK: "Exactly, exactly, and that's of course a frequent slang process, is to take something that's negative and make it positive, like 'bad.'"

AA: "OK, what's another term?"

BILIK: "Another term is 'off the hook.'"

AA: "Meaning other than in, 'let someone off the hook,' meaning absolve³ them of responsibility."

BILIK: "Exactly. Other than that."

AA: "Oh!"

RS: "Off the hook ... like better than better?"

BILIK: "Exact -- you're good!"

AA: "Huh. How did you know that?"

RS: "Well, I have a teen-age son."

BILIK: "Ah, that'll do it!" [laughter]

AA: "My daughter doesn't use that. I haven't heard that."

BILIK: "It's 'off the hook' or an alternate pronunciation is 'off da hook,' off da hook. And it primarily means fun or enjoyable, as in 'that charades⁴ game was off the hook.' And in this particular card, two women are having a very lovely dinner with a white linen⁵ tablecloth⁶, and one says to the other: 'You liked the ballet? Well, the symphony was off the hook.'" [laughter]

RS: "Better than better."

AA: "OK, keep going here. This is starting to bother me."

RS: "Let's see if we can do three-for-three here."

BILIK: "Well, here's one that I think might stump⁷ you: 'grip.'"

RS: "Oh, get a grip!"

AA: "No, that'd be too easy."

BILIK: "That's too easy."

AA: "And not a suitcase."

BILIK: "No."

RS: "And not a handle on something."

AA: "Wait, a grip, get a grip ... "

BILIK: "Suitcase is the closest so far."

AA: "OK, because that's an old term for a suitcase."

RS: "To carry something from one place to another?"

BILIK: "No, it's a noun."

RS: "It's a noun."

AA: "Can you give us a hint?"

BILIK: "It's an indication of quantity."

RS: "Like a lot of something."

BILIK: "Yes ... "

AA: "Huh."

BILIK: " ... exactly."

RS: "Three-for-three."

BILIK: "For example, 'she got a grip of cash in her fanny pack.'"

AA: "Huh. OK, another one."

BILIK: "Uh, 'crib' -- this is an easy one."

AA: "Well, yeah, it's a home."

RS: "Now see, I didn't know that. And the picture?"

BILIK: "The picture is of a group of tourists standing⁸ in front of a castle, pointing to what seems to be the next castle, and saying to her friends, 'How much cheddar do you think it takes to heat a crib like that?' And 'cheddar' is another of the slang vocabulary words."

RS: "A lot of money."

BILIK: "Yes."

AA: "Not cheese."

BILIK: "Exactly."

AA: "I'll have to remember that. And, uh, keep going. "

RS: " ... when we're looking at our next castle."

BILIK: "Actually the synonyms for cheddar are cheese, ends, bones, dough⁹, flow, bank and cha-ching."

AA: "And any last one that you want to stump us with --assuming we don't do this, you know, for the next two or three months and go through all sixty of these!"

BILIK: "OK, how about 'biter.'"

RS: "Biter."

AA: "I haven't heard that. Biter ... "

RS: "Kind of like a tease?"

BILIK: "Close."

RS: "Ummm ... "

AA: "Come on, you can do it. ... Come on, Rosanne."

RS: "Sounds like ... looks like ... little word ... big word! [laughter]"

AA: "A biter. Is it -- what context is it used in?"

BILIK: "It's something that you would call somebody. It's negative. For doing something."

RS: "Abusive verbally?"

BILIK: "No. Actually it means somebody who's kind of a copycat."

AA: "A biter?"

BILIK: "Somebody who steals others' ideas or imitates others. The picture on this card is of a boy and a girl in the computer lab, and the boy has made a very beautiful graph on his screen, and the boy is saying to the girl: 'You're such a biter. Go calculate your own pi chart.' And then bite, the verb,' is to copy, as in 'he bit off my lyrics¹⁰.'"

AA: "Now, one thing, some of this slang I'm imaging is maybe more regional than others. I mean, people coming to the United States could travel many states and maybe not hear some of these? Or ... "

BILIK: "Oh, absolutely, absolutely. And we tried -- you know, I'm sure it's probably weighted toward the Southern California. But we tried to -- you know, we all have cousins and friends and friend's kids all over the country, so we tried not only to get terms from them, but also we vetted¹¹ the actual list through them, so that they could check off the ones that they did use, the ones that they didn't use, how frequently they used or heard them, or if a word was totally dead."

RS: Jen Bilik spoke¹² to us from the VOA bureau in Los Angeles. She's the founder¹³ of Knock Knock, a design company in Venice, California. If you're on the Internet, you can learn more about these Slang Flashcards at knockknock-dot-biz.

AA: We'll post a link at voanews.com/wordmaster. That's our Web site. And don't forget our e-mail address -- it's [email protected]. With Rosanne Skirble, I'm Avi Arditti.

1 synonyms   

同义词( synonym的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• If you want to grasp English, you must carefully discriminate synonyms. 如果你想掌握好英语，你必须仔细区分同义词。
• Study the idioms and synonyms l wrote down before your test. 学考试前我给你写的习惯用语和同义字。

2 gee   

n.马；int.向右！前进！，惊讶时所发声音；v.向右转

参考例句：

• Their success last week will gee the team up.上星期的胜利将激励这支队伍继续前进。
• Gee,We're going to make a lot of money.哇！我们会赚好多钱啦！

3 absolve   

v.赦免，解除（责任等）

参考例句：

• I absolve you,on the ground of invincible ignorance.鉴于你不可救药的无知，我原谅你。
• They agree to absolve you from your obligation.他们同意免除你的责任。

4 charades   

n.伪装( charade的名词复数 )；猜字游戏

参考例句：

• She and her three brothers played charades. 她和3个兄弟玩看手势猜字谜游戏。 来自辞典例句
• A group of children were dressed to play charades. 一群孩子穿着夜礼服在玩字迷游戏。 来自辞典例句

5 linen   

n.亚麻布，亚麻线，亚麻制品；adj.亚麻布制的，亚麻的

参考例句：

• The worker is starching the linen.这名工人正在给亚麻布上浆。
• Fine linen and cotton fabrics were known as well as wool.精细的亚麻织品和棉织品像羊毛一样闻名遐迩。

6 tablecloth   

n.桌布，台布

参考例句：

• He sat there ruminating and picking at the tablecloth.他坐在那儿沉思，轻轻地抚弄着桌布。
• She smoothed down a wrinkled tablecloth.她把起皱的桌布熨平了。

7 stump   

n.残株，烟蒂，讲演台；v.砍断，蹒跚而走

参考例句：

• He went on the stump in his home state.他到故乡所在的州去发表演说。
• He used the stump as a table.他把树桩用作桌子。

8 standing   

n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的

参考例句：

• After the earthquake only a few houses were left standing.地震过后只有几幢房屋还立着。
• They're standing out against any change in the law.他们坚决反对对法律做任何修改。

9 dough   

n.生面团；钱，现款

参考例句：

• She formed the dough into squares.她把生面团捏成四方块。
• The baker is kneading dough.那位面包师在揉面。

10 lyrics   

n.歌词

参考例句：

• music and lyrics by Rodgers and Hart 由罗杰斯和哈特作词作曲
• The book contains lyrics and guitar tablatures for over 100 songs. 这本书有100多首歌的歌词和吉他奏法谱。

11 vetted   

v.审查（某人过去的记录、资格等）( vet的过去式和过去分词 )；调查；检查；诊疗

参考例句：

• The recruits were thoroughly vetted before they were allowed into the secret service. 情报机关招募的新成员要经过严格的审查。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• All staff are vetted for links with extremist groups before being employed. 所有职员录用前均须审查是否与极端分子团体有关。 来自辞典例句

12 spoke   

n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说

参考例句：

• They sourced the spoke nuts from our company.他们的轮辐螺帽是从我们公司获得的。
• The spokes of a wheel are the bars that connect the outer ring to the centre.辐条是轮子上连接外圈与中心的条棒。

13 Founder   

n.创始者，缔造者

参考例句：

• He was extolled as the founder of their Florentine school.他被称颂为佛罗伦萨画派的鼻祖。
• According to the old tradition,Romulus was the founder of Rome.按照古老的传说，罗穆卢斯是古罗马的建国者。