单词 | 极有可能 |
释义 | 〔garage〕It is difficult for a 20th-century imagination to envision a world without garages or a language without the wordgarage. However, probably before the 19thand certainly before the 18th century the word did not exist,and possibly before the end of the 19th century the thing itself did not exist.Our word is a direct borrowing of Frenchgarage, which is first recorded in 1802 in the sense "place where one docks.”The verbgarer, from which garage was derived, originally meant "to put merchandise under shelter,”then "to moor a boat,” and then "to put a vehicle into a place for safekeeping,”that is, agarage, a sense first recorded in French in 1901. English almost immediately borrowed this French word,the first instance being found in 1902.对于20世纪来说,很难想象一个没有车库的世界或者一种语言没有garage 这个词。 但可能在19世纪以前,或者肯定在18世纪以前这个词并不存在,而且极有可能在19世纪末期这个词本身也不存在。我们的单词是直接从法语中garage 这个词借来的, 第一次于1802年使用“停放的地方”这一含义。从动词garer 派生出来了 garage , 本意为“把货物放在保护处”,后成为“停靠船只”,而后又变成“为保管而把汽车放入一个地方”。也就是说garage 的含义是1901年在法语中记载的。 英语几乎马上借用了这个法语词汇,它的第一例可在1902年找到〔fun〕The use offun as an attributive adjective, as ina fun time, a fun place, most likely originated in a playful reanalysis of the use of the word in sentencessuch asIt is fun to ski, wherefun behaves syntactically like an adjective such as amusing or swell. The usage became popular in the 1950's and 1960's, though there is some evidence to suggest that it has 19th-century antecedents.Certainly the sense of this word makes it particularly susceptible to jocular treatment.But as with other such reanalyses (for example, in the expressiona whole 'nother ), the usage appears to have persisted after the original flavor had been lost.Thus there is no intimation of humorous intent in a press release that announces: fun 作为定语形容词使用, 如一段愉快的时光,一个娱乐场所, 极有可能源于对此词在某些句中用法的玩笑性再分析,如滑雪真好玩 从句法功能来讲, fun 在这里的用法象 amusing 或 swell 之类的形容词。 尽管有证据表明19世纪就出现这种用法了,但开始变得流行却在19世纪50,60年代。当然,此词的这层含义尤令人怀疑对方是否在打趣。但正如其他这类再分析词(例如,在句子a whole 'nother 中一样), 此用法在最初的含义都失去之后,还一直坚持使用下来。因此当报界发布以下消息时就从中找不出任何滑稽意味了: 〔chance〕Chances are good that you will win. Is there any chance of rain?极有可能你会赢。有可能下雨吗?〔smash〕[Probably of imitative origin] [极有可能来源于象声词] 〔shivaree〕Shivaree is the most common American regional form of charivari, a French word meaning "a noisy mock serenade for newlyweds"and probably deriving in turn from a Late Latin word meaning "headache.”The term, most likely borrowed from French traders and settlers along the Mississippi River,was well established in the United States by 1805;an account dating from that year describes a shivaree in New Orleans: "The house is mobbed by thousands of the people of the town, vociferating and shouting with loud acclaim . . . many[are] in disguises and masks; and all have some kind of discordant and noisy music, such as old kettles, and shovels, and tongs. . . . All civil authority and rule seems laid aside" (John F. Watson).The wordshivaree is especially common along and west of the Mississippi River, giving it an unusual north-south dialect boundary (most dialect boundaries run east-west in the United States).Alva L. Davis and Raven I. McDavid, Jr., callshivaree "one of the most widely distributed folk terms borrowed by American English from any European language.” Some regional equivalents arebelling, used in Pennsylvania, West Virginia, and Ohio; horning, from upstate New York, Rhode Island, and western New England; andserenade, a term used chiefly in the South Atlantic states. Shivaree 是 charivari 这个词在美国的最普通的地方形式, charivari是个法语词,意思是“一种为新婚夫妇演奏的喧闹的嘲弄式小夜曲”,这个词本身可能是从一个意思为“头痛”的后期拉丁文演变而来。这个词极有可能是从密西西比河沿岸的法国商人和拓居者那儿借用而来,到了1805年这个词已经在美国深深地扎根了;一份可以追溯到这一年的记录描写了新奥良的演奏这种小夜曲的情况: “房子里挤满了成千从镇上来的人,喧嚷着,叫喊着,大声欢呼…许多人 化了装,带了面具,所有的人都搞出某种不和协、喧闹的音响,比如用旧水壶,铲子,钳子…一切世俗的权威和规则好象已经被放到了一边” (约翰F·华生) 。shivaree 这个词在密西西比河沿岸和该河以西尤为常见, 这样密西西比河就成了一个不寻常的方言区的南北分界线(而在美国大多数方言区的分界线都是东西向的)。阿尔瓦·L·戴维斯和小拉文·I·麦克戴维把shivaree 这个词称为“美国英语从欧洲语言中借来的民间用语中流传最广的一个”。 其它地方方言中相当于这个词的词有belling 在宾夕法尼亚州、弗吉尼亚西部和俄亥俄州流传; 纽约州上半部份,罗德岛州,新英格兰西部的horning , 而大西洋沿岸南部各州主要用serenade 这个词 |
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