词汇大师-- A Busy Shopping Day for Sure

　　AA: I'm Avi Arditti and this week on WORDMASTER: With the national observance of Thanksgiving Day coming up this Thursday, we turn to a linguistic² mystery about the day after, which traditionally opens the Christmas holiday shopping season in America. Bonnie Taylor-Blake is a language detective. Actually that's not her only job.

　　BONNIE TAYLOR-BLAKE: "I'm actually a neuroscience researcher at the University of North Carolina, which is in Chapel³ Hill. I have an amateur's interest, though, in linguistics⁴ and folklore⁵ and history."
AA: "So here's a question we got by e-mail. It says, 'I've been living in the United States for almost twenty-nine years. Why do people call the day after Thanksgiving Day "Black Friday"?' And I understand you've done a little research into this."
BONNIE TAYLOR-BLAKE: "I should back up just for a second, though, and explain that he's in good company, because a lot of Americans were unfamiliar⁶ with the term Black Friday until about a decade ago. Its more modern application is in regard to profitability for the day. So a lot of people think that the black in Black Friday refers to ledger⁷ books going from negative values, which would be in the red, into positive values, which is into the black."
AA: "Which refers to the color of the ink that was used."
BONNIE TAYLOR-BLAKE: "Exactly right. And that's absolutely true and it's a perfectly⁸ valid⁹ explanation, though it may not be historically correct. Some research I did sort of indicates that this term probably originated in the late fifties, early sixties, and it was probably used as a term, sort of a pejorative¹⁰ term, a sort of tongue-in-cheek term to refer to the day after Thanksgiving. And this is in Philadelphia, by the way -- "
AA: "In the state of Pennsylvania."
BONNIE TAYLOR-BLAKE: "Exactly, as a day of sort of disaster and woe¹¹, where downtown Philadelphia was completely swamped with holiday shoppers. And we think that the police department, members of the police force sort of had this as a slang description for that day, because they were going to be faced with huge traffic woes¹² and probably snarling¹³ customers on sidewalks. It was just going to be a real headache for police and probably for transit¹⁴ workers like cab drivers and bus drivers as well."
AA: "So it wasn't the storekeepers, then, who were using that term?"
BONNIE TAYLOR-BLAKE: "My hunch¹⁵ is that storekeepers had heard that a lot of people were using this term jokingly to talk about that day, and my feeling is that they may have been a little afraid that this would keep shoppers from downtown Philadelphia.
"So I sense an effort on the part of retailers¹⁶ to try to convince the public that the black actually referred to a very bright day of sales for merchants. And therefore we get back to the old accounting¹⁷ practice of going from the red to the black."
AA: "How convenient."
BONNIE TAYLOR-BLAKE: "Yes, but the problem with that theory is, first of all, it's clear that that explanation for the meaning of Black Friday comes well after -- by about fifteen years -- the earliest citing we have for police using Black Friday with reference to the day. Another problem is, a huge financial disaster that took place in American history -- I think it was eighteen sixty-nine -- where there was a complete destruction of the gold market, and that is referred to as Black Friday.
"So why would merchants sort of gleefully adopt, out of the blue, this expression Black Friday when it actually has a bigger, larger meaning in American economic history as a complete failure of the economy."
AA: "Well, you know now there's another myth associated with Black Friday, and do you know what I'm talking about?"
BONNIE TAYLOR-BLAKE: "That it's the most profitable shopping day of the year?"
AA: "That's right."
BONNIE TAYLOR-BLAKE: "Unfortunately I don't really know all the data on that, but I do know that David and Barbara Mikkelson of snopes.com have looked at that very intensely and they've pretty much debunked¹⁸ that one. It's certainly a very profitable day, but it's not -- it probably on the top five."
AA: "Are you on the trail of any other terms?"
BONNIE TAYLOR-BLAKE: "Oh, a phrase that is really puzzling to linguists¹⁹, even amateur linguists like me, is the origin of 'the whole nine yards.'"
AA: "Aha."
BONNIE TAYLOR-BLAKE: "For example, if you're getting ready to go on a trip and you're packing your suitcase, you have a list of items and you want to make sure that you include 'the whole nine yards,' what you would ever possibly need on that trip."
AA: "What are going to be doing on Thanksgiving?"
BONNIE TAYLOR-BLAKE: "We're going to my sister's house in Cary, North Carolina, and having a traditional dinner there."
AA: "A big turkey and all?"
BONNIE TAYLOR-BLAKE: "Yep, the whole nine yards."
AA: Bonnie Taylor-Blake is an amateur linguist¹ when she's not working as a neuroscientist at the University of North Carolina. And that's WORDMASTER for this week. I'm Avi Arditti.

1 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。

2 linguistic   

adj.语言的，语言学的

参考例句：

• She is pursuing her linguistic researches.她在从事语言学的研究。
• The ability to write is a supreme test of linguistic competence.写作能力是对语言能力的最高形式的测试。

3 chapel   

n.小教堂，殡仪馆

参考例句：

• The nimble hero,skipped into a chapel that stood near.敏捷的英雄跳进近旁的一座小教堂里。
• She was on the peak that Sunday afternoon when she played in chapel.那个星期天的下午，她在小教堂的演出，可以说是登峰造极。

4 linguistics   

n.语言学

参考例句：

• She plans to take a course in applied linguistics.她打算学习应用语言学课程。
• Linguistics is a scientific study of the property of language.语言学是指对语言的性质所作的系统研究。

5 folklore   

n.民间信仰，民间传说，民俗

参考例句：

• Zhuge Liang is a synonym for wisdom in folklore.诸葛亮在民间传说中成了智慧的代名词。
• In Chinese folklore the bat is an emblem of good fortune.在中国的民间传说中蝙蝠是好运的象征。

6 unfamiliar   

adj.陌生的，不熟悉的

参考例句：

• I am unfamiliar with the place and the people here.我在这儿人地生疏。
• The man seemed unfamiliar to me.这人很面生。

7 ledger   

n.总帐，分类帐；帐簿

参考例句：

• The young man bowed his head and bent over his ledger again.那个年轻人点头应诺，然后又埋头写起分类帐。
• She is a real accountant who even keeps a detailed household ledger.她不愧是搞财务的，家庭分类账记得清楚详细。

8 perfectly   

adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地

参考例句：

• The witnesses were each perfectly certain of what they said.证人们个个对自己所说的话十分肯定。
• Everything that we're doing is all perfectly above board.我们做的每件事情都是光明正大的。

9 valid   

adj.有确实根据的；有效的；正当的，合法的

参考例句：

• His claim to own the house is valid.他主张对此屋的所有权有效。
• Do you have valid reasons for your absence?你的缺席有正当理由吗？

10 pejorative   

adj.贬低的，轻蔑的

参考例句：

• In the context of ethnic tourism,commercialization often has a pejorative connotation.摘要在民族旅游语境中，商品化经常带有贬义色彩。
• But news organizations also should make every effort to keep the discussion civil and to discourage the dissemination of falsehoods or pejorat

11 woe   

n.悲哀，苦痛，不幸，困难；int.用来表达悲伤或惊慌

参考例句：

• Our two peoples are brothers sharing weal and woe.我们两国人民是患难与共的兄弟。
• A man is well or woe as he thinks himself so.自认祸是祸，自认福是福。

12 woes   

困境( woe的名词复数 )； 悲伤； 我好苦哇； 某人就要倒霉

参考例句：

• Thanks for listening to my woes. 谢谢您听我诉说不幸的遭遇。
• She has cried the blues about its financial woes. 对于经济的困难她叫苦不迭。

13 snarling   

v.（指狗）吠，嗥叫， （人）咆哮( snarl的现在分词 )；咆哮着说，厉声地说

参考例句：

• "I didn't marry you," he said, in a snarling tone. “我没有娶你，"他咆哮着说。 来自英汉文学 - 嘉莉妹妹
• So he got into the shoes snarling. 于是，汤姆一边大喊大叫，一边穿上了那双鞋。 来自英汉文学 - 汤姆历险

14 transit   

n.经过，运输；vt.穿越，旋转；vi.越过

参考例句：

• His luggage was lost in transit.他的行李在运送中丢失。
• The canal can transit a total of 50 ships daily.这条运河每天能通过50条船。

15 hunch   

n.预感，直觉

参考例句：

• I have a hunch that he didn't really want to go.我有这么一种感觉，他并不真正想去。
• I had a hunch that Susan and I would work well together.我有预感和苏珊共事会很融洽。

16 retailers   

零售商，零售店( retailer的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• High street retailers reported a marked increase in sales before Christmas. 商业街的零售商报告说圣诞节前销售量显著提高。
• Retailers have a statutory duty to provide goods suitable for their purpose. 零售商有为他们提供符合要求的货品的法定义务。

17 accounting   

n.会计，会计学，借贷对照表

参考例句：

• A job fell vacant in the accounting department.财会部出现了一个空缺。
• There's an accounting error in this entry.这笔账目里有差错。

18 debunked   

v.揭穿真相，暴露( debunk的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• His theories have been debunked by recent research. 最近的研究揭穿了他的理论的真相。
• Some advertising slogans should be debunked. 某些夸大的广告用语应予揭露。 来自《简明英汉词典》

19 linguists   

n.通晓数国语言的人( linguist的名词复数 )；语言学家

参考例句：

• The linguists went to study tribal languages in the field. 语言学家们去实地研究部落语言了。 来自辞典例句
• The linguists' main interest has been to analyze and describe languages. 语言学家的主要兴趣一直在于分析并描述语言。 来自辞典例句