【英语语言学习】为什么英语如此奇怪

DAVE DAVIES, HOST:

This is FRESH AIR. The French are having a huge cultural row over some spelling changes the government's about to put into effect, particularly the elimination¹ of the circumflex - the little hat-shaped accent that sits on certain vowels³. It leads our linguist⁴ Geoff Nunberg to wonder why we never have controversies⁵ over spelling like the French do. Why do we insist on putting up with a spelling system that everybody acknowledges is a chaotic⁶ mess? Here's Geoff.

GEOFF NUNBERG: The French have gotten themselves into one of their recurrent linguistic⁷ lathers⁸, this one over the changes in their spelling that will be taking effect in the fall. The changes were originally proposed more than 25 years ago, but nothing much came of them, until the government recently announced that they'd be incorporated into the new textbooks, at which point traditionalists took to the barricades⁹. The government's made a point of calling the changes rectifications rather than reforms, and, on the whole, they're pretty minor¹⁰. A few words like le week-end (ph) and le strip-tease (ph) will lose their hyphens. The word for onion, oignon, will have to give up its silent I. But what people have gotten most worked up about is the near elimination of the circumflex. That's the pointy little hat that sits on top of the vowel² in words like hotel and tete-a-tete, marking the spot where a letter was lost sometime in the past.

The changes are supposed to make the written language easier to learn, but there too few of them to make much of a difference. Mastering written French is still going to be as much of a slog as it's always been. Bear in mind that this is a language that has eight different words all pronounced as oh (ph), each of them with its own distinctive¹¹ spelling. Even so, critics have attacked the reforms as a dumbing down of the language of Moliere and Victor Hugo. Opponents have launched a Twitter campaign with a hashtag #jesuiscirconflexe, echoing the Je Suis Charlie of the Charlie Hebdo attacks.

This being France, the debate is laced with political theater. The far-right National Front warned of the obliteration¹² of French cultural identity. And one critic compared the government to the Bolsheviks, who eliminated some letters of the Slavic alphabet when they came to power. When the reforms were originally announced by the socialist¹³ government of Francois Mitterrand, some proponents¹⁴ invoked¹⁵ the spirit of the French Revolution. The linguist Bernard Ciccolini compared the circumflex to a crown that sits on the heads of certain vowels and suggested tongue in cheek that the government was merely eliminating the last vestige¹⁶ of royalty¹⁷.

From where we sit, it's all entertainingly Gallic, but then, who are we to talk? Maybe the question isn't why the French get so worked up about spelling but why we don't. After all, it's not as if English orthography¹⁸ couldn't do with some rectifications of its own. But we haven't had a major controversy¹⁹ over spelling since the early 19th century when Americans got into a dustup over Noah Webster's proposals to make our spelling different from that of the English. We wound up making a few symbolic²⁰ changes, like dropping the U in honor and color and transposing the final letters of theater and center.

But having made our point, we were content to leave everything else as it was. Reformers since then have never stopped agitating²¹ for a more rational English spelling system. But all they have to show for their pains is that we've dropped the O-U-G-H in doughnut and thruway. We share with the French the honor of having the most difficult spelling systems in the world. But the similarity ends there. They see their spelling as a legacy²² of the literary history that shaped their cultural identity. As they see it, French spelling may be complicated, but it's basically rational, which, as it happens, is how they like to think of themselves, too.

Some scholars point out that English spelling, too, is often more rational than it appears. It can reveal etymologies²³ and the hidden relations between words, like the silent G of sign that's pronounced in signify.

But most of us prize our spelling for the very things that make it maddening. As someone once said, it's a chaotic concoction²⁴ of oddities. We like to think of it as cussed, unpredictable and not answerable to any higher authority, which, as it happens, is how we like to think of ourselves, too. So we take a kind of perverse²⁵ pride in all those sets of words where the same letters are pronounced differently - Susy but busy, oven but woven, cove²⁶ versus²⁷ move versus love.

English spelling is not a game for the weak at heart. And it has nothing to do with higher literary culture the way French spelling does. It's that toughness that we celebrate in the ritual of the spelling bee, which is a purely²⁸ oral exercise. In theory, you could win a spelling bee without actually knowing how to read or write at all. It's a contest that rewards diligence, not cultivation²⁹.

Where English spelling is concerned, the imperfect is our paradise. That's why we always resist the efforts to reform it. We may as well resign ourselves to knowing that students a century from now are still going to be wrestling with a dozen or so ways to spell the sound A. But we can take consolation³⁰ in knowing that the conservatism that deters³¹ us from trying to improve things also prevents us from changing them for the worst.

Our spelling isn't likely to be permanently³² corrupted³³ by texting abbreviations and the like, no more than it was led astray by the 20th century advertisers who spelled quick as K-W-I-K or the 19th century telegraph operators who shortened words to save time and money. We'll cling to our unreasonable³⁴ customs and we'll be saved from our own worst impulses.

DAVIES: Geoff Nunberg is a linguist who teaches at the University of California, Berkeley School of Information. Coming up, jazz critic Kevin Whitehead reviews some recently released Thad Jones/Mel Lewis Orchestra recordings³⁵ from 1966 at the Village Vanguard. This is FRESH AIR.

1 elimination   

n.排除，消除，消灭

参考例句：

• Their elimination from the competition was a great surprise.他们在比赛中遭到淘汰是个很大的意外。
• I was eliminated from the 400 metres in the semi-finals.我在400米半决赛中被淘汰。

2 vowel   

n.元音；元音字母

参考例句：

• A long vowel is a long sound as in the word"shoe ".长元音即如“shoe” 一词中的长音。
• The vowel in words like 'my' and 'thigh' is not very difficult.单词my和thigh中的元音并不难发。

3 vowels   

n.元音，元音字母( vowel的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Vowels possess greater sonority than consonants. 元音比辅音响亮。 来自《现代英汉综合大词典》
• Note the various sounds of vowels followed by r. 注意r跟随的各种元音的发音。 来自超越目标英语 第3册

4 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。

5 controversies   

争论

参考例句：

• We offer no comment on these controversies here. 对于这些争议，我们在这里不作任何评论。 来自英汉非文学 - 历史
• The controversies surrounding population growth are unlikely to subside soon. 围绕着人口增长问题的争论看来不会很快平息。 来自辞典例句

6 chaotic   

adj.混沌的，一片混乱的，一团糟的

参考例句：

• Things have been getting chaotic in the office recently.最近办公室的情况越来越乱了。
• The traffic in the city was chaotic.这城市的交通糟透了。

7 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。

8 lathers   

n.肥皂泡( lather的名词复数 )；紧张；激动；（马的）汗沫v.（指肥皂）形成泡沫( lather的第三人称单数 )；用皂沫覆盖；狠狠地打

参考例句：

• This toilet soap lathers so nicely and has several fragrances. 这种香皂起泡很多，并且有好几种香味。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》
• This soap lathers so nicely. 这种肥皂泡沫很多。 来自《简明英汉词典》

9 barricades   

路障，障碍物( barricade的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• The police stormed the barricades the demonstrators had put up. 警察冲破了示威者筑起的街垒。
• Others died young, in prison or on the barricades. 另一些人年轻时就死在监牢里或街垒旁。

10 minor   

adj.较小(少)的，较次要的；n.辅修学科；vi.辅修

参考例句：

• The young actor was given a minor part in the new play.年轻的男演员在这出新戏里被分派担任一个小角色。
• I gave him a minor share of my wealth.我把小部分财产给了他。

11 distinctive   

adj.特别的，有特色的，与众不同的

参考例句：

• She has a very distinctive way of walking.她走路的样子与别人很不相同。
• This bird has several distinctive features.这个鸟具有几种突出的特征。

12 obliteration   

n.涂去，删除；管腔闭合

参考例句：

• The policy is obliteration, openly acknowledged. 政策是彻底毁灭，公开承认的政策。 来自演讲部分
• "Obliteration is not a justifiable act of war" “彻底消灭并不是有理的战争行为” 来自演讲部分

13 socialist   

n.社会主义者；adj.社会主义的

参考例句：

• China is a socialist country,and a developing country as well.中国是一个社会主义国家，也是一个发展中国家。
• His father was an ardent socialist.他父亲是一个热情的社会主义者。

14 proponents   

n.（某事业、理论等的）支持者，拥护者( proponent的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Reviewing courts were among the most active proponents of hybrid rulemaking procedures. 复审法院是最积极的混合型规则制定程序的建议者。 来自英汉非文学 - 行政法
• Proponents of such opinions were arrested as 'traitors. ' 提倡这种主张的人马上作为“卖国贼”逮捕起来。 来自辞典例句

15 invoked   

v.援引( invoke的过去式和过去分词 )；行使（权利等）；祈求救助；恳求

参考例句：

• It is unlikely that libel laws will be invoked. 不大可能诉诸诽谤法。
• She had invoked the law in her own defence. 她援引法律为自己辩护。 来自《简明英汉词典》

16 vestige   

n.痕迹，遗迹，残余

参考例句：

• Some upright stones in wild places are the vestige of ancient religions.荒原上一些直立的石块是古老宗教的遗迹。
• Every vestige has been swept away.一切痕迹都被一扫而光。

17 royalty   

n.皇家，皇族

参考例句：

• She claims to be descended from royalty.她声称她是皇室后裔。
• I waited on tables，and even catered to royalty at the Royal Albert Hall.我做过服务生， 甚至在皇家阿伯特大厅侍奉过皇室的人。

18 orthography   

n.拼字法，拼字式

参考例句：

• In dictionaries,words are listed according to their orthography.在词典中，词是按照字母拼写顺序排列的。
• American and English orthography are very much alike.美语与英语的拼字方法非常相像。

19 controversy   

n.争论，辩论，争吵

参考例句：

• That is a fact beyond controversy.那是一个无可争论的事实。
• We ran the risk of becoming the butt of every controversy.我们要冒使自己在所有的纷争中都成为众矢之的的风险。

20 symbolic   

adj.象征性的，符号的，象征主义的

参考例句：

• It is symbolic of the fighting spirit of modern womanhood.它象征着现代妇女的战斗精神。
• The Christian ceremony of baptism is a symbolic act.基督教的洗礼仪式是一种象征性的做法。

21 agitating   

搅动( agitate的现在分词 )； 激怒； 使焦虑不安； （尤指为法律、社会状况的改变而）激烈争论

参考例句：

• political groups agitating for social change 鼓吹社会变革的政治团体
• They are agitating to assert autonomy. 他们正在鼓吹实行自治。

22 legacy   

n.遗产，遗赠；先人(或过去)留下的东西

参考例句：

• They are the most precious cultural legacy our forefathers left.它们是我们祖先留下来的最宝贵的文化遗产。
• He thinks the legacy is a gift from the Gods.他认为这笔遗产是天赐之物。

23 etymologies   

n.词源学，词源说明( etymology的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• This dictionary does not give etymologies. 这部词典不介绍词源。 来自辞典例句
• Dictionaries are still good for obscure usages and etymologies. 字典依然擅长于不常用的用法和词源。 来自互联网

24 concoction   

n.调配(物)；谎言

参考例句：

• She enjoyed the concoction of foreign dishes.她喜欢调制外国菜。
• His story was a sheer concoction.他的故事实在是一纯属捏造之事。

25 perverse   

adj.刚愎的；坚持错误的，行为反常的

参考例句：

• It would be perverse to stop this healthy trend.阻止这种健康发展的趋势是没有道理的。
• She gets a perverse satisfaction from making other people embarrassed.她有一种不正常的心态，以使别人难堪来取乐。

26 cove   

n.小海湾，小峡谷

参考例句：

• The shore line is wooded,olive-green,a pristine cove.岸边一带林木蓊郁，嫩绿一片，好一个山外的小海湾。
• I saw two children were playing in a cove.我看到两个小孩正在一个小海湾里玩耍。

27 versus   

prep.以…为对手，对；与…相比之下

参考例句：

• The big match tonight is England versus Spain.今晚的大赛是英格兰对西班牙。
• The most exciting game was Harvard versus Yale.最富紧张刺激的球赛是哈佛队对耶鲁队。

28 purely   

adv.纯粹地，完全地

参考例句：

• I helped him purely and simply out of friendship.我帮他纯粹是出于友情。
• This disproves the theory that children are purely imitative.这证明认为儿童只会单纯地模仿的理论是站不住脚的。

29 cultivation   

n.耕作，培养，栽培（法），养成

参考例句：

• The cultivation in good taste is our main objective.培养高雅情趣是我们的主要目标。
• The land is not fertile enough to repay cultivation.这块土地不够肥沃，不值得耕种。

30 consolation   

n.安慰，慰问

参考例句：

• The children were a great consolation to me at that time.那时孩子们成了我的莫大安慰。
• This news was of little consolation to us.这个消息对我们来说没有什么安慰。

31 deters   

v.阻止，制止( deter的第三人称单数 )

参考例句：

• The filth here deters all but the invited guest. 这里污秽不堪，除非有事，外人是裹足不前的。 来自辞典例句
• Many people believe that capital punishment deters crime. 很多人相信极刑能阻止犯罪。 来自互联网

32 permanently   

adv.永恒地，永久地，固定不变地

参考例句：

• The accident left him permanently scarred.那次事故给他留下了永久的伤疤。
• The ship is now permanently moored on the Thames in London.该船现在永久地停泊在伦敦泰晤士河边。

33 corrupted   

（使）败坏( corrupt的过去式和过去分词 )； （使）腐化； 引起（计算机文件等的）错误； 破坏

参考例句：

• The body corrupted quite quickly. 尸体很快腐烂了。
• The text was corrupted by careless copyists. 原文因抄写员粗心而有讹误。

34 unreasonable   

adj.不讲道理的，不合情理的，过度的

参考例句：

• I know that they made the most unreasonable demands on you.我知道他们对你提出了最不合理的要求。
• They spend an unreasonable amount of money on clothes.他们花在衣服上的钱太多了。

35 recordings   

n.记录( recording的名词复数 )；录音；录像；唱片

参考例句：

• a boxed set of original recordings 一套盒装原声录音带
• old jazz recordings reissued on CD 以激光唱片重新发行的老爵士乐