盘点2011年度英文热词

英语自学网

Sock puppet thinking about actual sock puppets with buttons for eyes and so on. We're talking about internet "sock puppets" here: in other words, people pretending to be someone else on the internet in order to win an argument – or, in the case of Amina Arraf, Syrian lesbian blogger, to further a cause. Amina's blog was held up as an inspiration – until "she" was revealed to be a 40-year-old student from the University of Edinburgh. Adding to the confusion, days later, one of the editors of a lesbian website that had promoted Amina's blog also turned out to be a man. It was a bit like the end of Some Like it Hot. Some began to suspect that lesbians, like leprechauns, might not actually exist at all. Fortunately, Channel 5 soon scotched these rumours with a docusoap set in a lesbian bar. Speaking of which …
         马甲登录（Sock puppet）Sock puppet原本是指用袜子做的木偶，加上纽扣作为它的眼睛。但是现在我们要说的是网络新语“马甲登录（Sock puppet）”：换句话说，就是指人们为了引发热议或发起一项活动（譬如阿米娜·阿拉芙博客）而在网络上假装成他人。这位署名Amina Arraf的博客主自称是一名叙利亚女同性恋，其博客曾一度被视为精神家园。后来其真实身份曝光，原来“她”是英国爱丁堡大学的一位男生，“芳龄”四十。一波未平一波又起，没过多久，某女同性恋网站的一位编辑被证实是男性，“她”曾热捧阿米娜的博客。这有点象电影《热情似火》里的情节。当有人开始质疑阿米娜的真实性，恰巧，一家女同性恋酒吧里播出了英国第五频道的一部纪录片，于是流言迅速终结。
            
            

entwo

        Structured reality
       
        Once upon a time we had docusoaps. Now we have The Only Way is Essex, Made in Chelsea and Desperate Scousewives … and what do they have in common? No, apart from that. That's right! They're all "structured reality" shows. "Structured reality" essentially means "not quite real": the people featured in the show are actual people, with actual thoughts and feelings and relationships and kidneys and anuses and so on, but the situations they find themselves in for the purposes of the show are slightly massaged into position by the producers. In other words, they're told to stand in a particular spot and toss a glass of wine over their boyfriend because he cheated on them in last week's episode.
        Christ. Imagine if that was your life.
        But it isn't your life. You're just watching it. And when you tune in to a structured-reality show you, the viewer, are actively choosing to spend 60 minutes watching a glossy-looking soap opera performed by non-actors half-improvising a non-script. It's precisely like a scene from an old-school porn film in which a plumber and a frustrated housewife trade clunky dialogue, but with better lighting and no onscreen sex. Speaking of which …
         
        虚拟现实（Structured reality）
        　　过去有真人秀节目，当下也有，比如《埃塞克斯是唯一的生活方式》、《切尔西制造》、《绝望的利物浦主妇》...它们的共同点在哪？没错！他们全都是“虚拟现实”秀。“虚拟现实”的本质就是“亦真亦假”：剧中人物是真实的，他们的想法、情感、关系以及身体等等都是真实的，但是出于节目播出效果的考虑，制作人对情景在真实的基础上作了少许的修改。比如在上周的剧情中，他们受指定要求站在某个规定的位置，拿起一瓶酒砸向“劈腿”男友。
        　　啊！假如这就是你的生活。事实上并非如此，你不过是位看客。选择真人秀节目档，实际上就是选择花上60分钟观看一部貌似不做作的电视剧：没有角色扮演，没有剧本，夹杂有即兴创作的那种。准确地说，就像老派情色电影中的某个场景，水管工和失意的主妇在有一搭没一搭地对白，光线明亮却没有性爱场面。
            
            

entwo

        Merkozy Throughout the latter part of the year, every economist was debating one issue: would the eurozone collapse? Or crumble? Or meltdown and dribble into an abyss? No one could decide which combination of words best described the inevitable impending disaster. Eventually they gave up and simply started screaming. In a bid to distract them, German chancellor Angela Merkel and French president Nicolas Sarkozy stood beside each other at press conferences and made reassuring cooing noises.
        Ever since Ben Affleck and Jennifer Lopez were rechristened "Bennifer" (100 years ago, in 1982), any two proximate individuals appearing in a newspaper must have their names combined by law. Sometimes it catches on ("Brangelina") and sometimes it sorta catches on (eg Big Brother twins "Samanda"; famous until toppled by "Jedward"), but it's rarely used in broadsheets (referring to "the killings of Frose West" is expressly forbidden by the Guardian's style guide).
        "Merkozy", however, was a fun nickname even the driest business news section could print without blushing (although in the case of the FT it was hard to tell).
        What did "Merkozy" actually mean? Nothing. But it provided light relief from all that depressing stuff about bond yields. Speaking of which …
        　　默克齐(Merkozy)
        　　今年下半年，所有的经济学家都在议论同一个问题：欧元区是否会瓦解？或分裂？或解体？或万劫不复？什么样的合成词能准确描述这场火烧眉毛的灾难？没有人能给出答案。最终，他们泄气了，开始歇斯底里地叫喊。为了安抚他们，德国总理安吉拉·默克尔和法国总统尼古拉斯·萨科齐双双亮相新闻发布会，齐唱双簧提振民心。
        　　自从本·阿弗莱克和詹妮弗·洛佩兹被媒体戏称为本妮佛（Bennifer）后，但凡出现关系亲密的两人，媒体都会依葫芦画瓢把他们的名字进行拼合。比如，一会儿出来个布拉吉莉娜（"Brangelina"，即Brad Pitt和 Angelina Jolie），一会儿又冒出山姆曼达Samanda（《老大哥》中的双胞胎sam和amanda；后来又有"Jedward"后起之秀（选秀节目中的双胞胎John和Edward），不过，这些合成词倒是不常出现在宣传海报上。
        　　不管怎样，Merkozy这词还是造得挺有趣，就连最正经的商业新闻版都堂而皇之地加以使用（但对于FT金融时报就难说了）。
        　　Merkozy一词用意何在？也许没什么特别。但它为水深火热的国债危机缓解了一丝压力。
            
            

enone

        Bond yields
        Approximately 10,000 cryptic economic phrases suddenly popped up in news reports this year, nonchalantly bandied about as if the viewer knew what they meant. It was all "bond yield" this and "sovereign debt" that. Impenetrable. At one point, numbers were given "haircuts". That's like something out of Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds or a Spike Milligan poem. No wonder the economy's in such a mess.
        If something can't be described in plain English, maybe you shouldn't base an entire society on it. Just saying. As it is, the whole thing's been a pointless endeavour. Speaking of which …
        　　国债收益率
        　　今年，有近万个含义模糊的经济词汇见诸报端。媒体如此不负责任地滥用新词，仿佛读者都知晓这些词似的。一会儿说“bond yield”，一会儿又提“sovereign debt”。实在令人费解。有时候甚至连数字都遭受篡改。如同披头士的经典老歌《Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds》或者喜剧演员史派克·密利根Spike Milligan的诗歌一样令人迷幻。难怪整个经济一团糟。
        　　如果用英语还说不清一件事，那英语也不可能是世界上最通用的语言了。随口说说，就等于是白说了。
            
            

enthree

        Planking
        The widespread distribution of camera-studded smartphones has led humankind to experiment with things it had never bothered attempting before, "planking" being a prime example. This was a shortlived craze that involved posing for a photograph while lying facedown in a rigid plank-like position. A game of planking one-upmanship quickly swept the internet, with plankers planking in increasingly perilous locations (eg balanced on hotel balconies, atop mountains, within the hearts of collapsing stars, etc) until clumsiness took over and people started toppling off things and dying. Oh, how the laughter dried in our throats. We thought it was harmless fun. But God had other plans.
        Recently killed plankers whose bodies hadn't been carted away yet could always save face by pretending to have invented "stiffing" – lying on the ground being authentically dead. Sadly stiffing failed to take off as a meme until Muammar Gaddafi did it in October, creating front-page news in the process. If only he'd found a way to monetise the craze, he'd have been loaded. But he didn't. Because he was dead. Speaking of which …
        　　趴街一族
        　　带摄像头的智能手机的普及让人类进入了前所未有的超级体验，比如“趴街planking”就是其中的典例。趴街是指一个人面部朝下，以腹部为支撑点，全身象木板一样笔直地趴在各种物体上，然后拍下照片上传网上。 “趴街大比拼”在网络上迅速走红：趴客有意选择各种高难度的地点（比如酒店阳台，山顶，塌陷的五角星的中心等等），结果丑态百出，或是摔落下来，或是摔个半死。哎，只引得观众激动得喊破喉咙。笑归笑，现实可不是儿戏。
        　　近期丧命的趴客也许颜面尚存，他们的躯体还直直地躺在原地，让人以为是趴客的新花样-“挺尸”。 可悲的“挺尸”，没有一具吸引到众人的眼球，除了穆阿迈尔·卡扎菲Muammar Gaddafi，他十月份丧生，其死亡照片蜂拥登上头版。
            
            

enfive

        Arab spring
        Toppling leaders was all the rage in 2011 as people across the Arab world collectively decided they'd had just about enough of this bullshit. To the casual TV viewer, the Arab spring was initially confusing: previously, whenever the news showed you footage of furious Arabs marching in the streets, they were chanting "Death to the west" or burning effigies of John Barrowman or something. Now suddenly they were the good guys, and their despised dictatorial leaders were the bad guys – but the news hadn't really bothered explaining who these bad guys were before. The Tunisian president is a ruthless tyrant, you say? Why didn't you tell me this earlier?
        It was as if these Arab despots had only just landed on the planet, like the intergalactic megabaddies from Superman II, and the news was playing catchup. We didn't know their names or what they looked like, or have much of a clue as to why they were unpopular – unless, like megabaddie Colonel Gaddafi, they'd previously done something awful to us, in which case we'd not only cheer from the sidelines, but also lend air support.
        Basically, in terms of narrative, things hadn't been set up clearly enough during the first act. Come on, news: you really must try harder to explain this stuff. Speaking of which …
       
        　阿拉伯之春　　2011年阿拉伯世界民众的不满情绪爆发，掀起一场推翻专制政体的运动热潮。对于“阿拉伯之春”事件的报道，起初让普通的电视观众有些摸不着头脑。因为在以前的电视镜头里，反映的是阿拉伯人在游行示威中一脸愤慨地高喊“诅咒西方”或者焚烧约翰·巴洛曼之类人物的肖像。而现在呢，他们的形象一下子突然转变成对抗独裁领导者的正义之士。可媒体又一直没报道过这些独裁者的所作所为。你说突尼斯总统是残忍暴君？那为什么不一早告诉我们？
        　　难道象《超人II》中星系间的megabaddies，这些阿拉伯独裁者才刚刚抵达这个星球，而媒体正迎头赶上？如果他们没有做出一些惊人的事（比如象卡扎菲上校这样），我们就无从知晓他们的名字和长相，更别提他们为什么不得人心。那么我们可能蒙在鼓里傻傻地夹道欢迎，并且还给予空中支持。
        　　说到新闻报道，不得不说，基本上前期的准备工作都做得不充分。拜托，媒体的朋友们：你们必须尽力对每件事都阐述清楚。
            
            

ensix

        Higgs Boson
        This year scientists got one step closer to confirming the existence of the Higgs Boson, aka the "God Particle". Prior to the breakthrough, only scientists knew what the Higgs Boson was, whereas afterwards, once the news had patiently explained it to everyone on the planet, only scientists knew what the Higgs Boson was.
        Like all complex scientific concepts, I find it hard to grasp for more than three minutes at a time. You can explain it to me, and I'll understand it, really I will, but the moment you walk away, the knowledge starts invisibly drifting out of my head. I call this mysterious phenomenon by which I shift from ignorance to enlightenment, and then back to ignorance – the Brooker Gap. When are scientists going to look into that phenomenon, hmm?
        　　希格斯玻色子（Higgs Boson）
        　　今年，科学家们进一步证实了希格斯玻色子（又称为“神之粒子”）的存在。在此突破之前，只有科学家知道希格斯玻色子为何物，事后虽有媒体耐心的解释报道，最终仍然只有科学家知道希格斯玻色子为何物。
        　　所有科学词汇都艰涩难懂，我的脑瓜子就很难掌握它们，过目即忘。你解释给我听，我能听明白，确实能听明白，但是你一走开，我的脑袋转眼就一片空白。，从混沌到开窍又回归混沌，我称这种奇妙的现象为布鲁克裂缝。
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