2024年3月15日发(作者：)

U4:THE FUTURE OF ENGLISH 英语的未来

In the middle of sixteenth century, English was spoken by between four and

five millions of people, and stood fifth among the European languages, with

French, German, Italian, and Spanish ahead of it in that order, and Russian

following. Two hundred years later Italian had dropped behind but Russian had

gone ahead, so that English was still in fifth place. But by the end of the Eighteenth

Century it began to move forward, and by the middle of the Nineteenth it had

forced its way into first place. To-day it is so far in the lead that it is probably

spoken by as many people as the next two languages—Russian and German

combined.在16世纪中叶，有四五百万人说英语，说英语的人数在欧洲的语言中名列第

五。前四位依次是法语、德语、意大利语和西班牙语。俄语排在英语之后。两百年以后，

意大利语排名落后，而俄语的排名靠前了，英语依然处于第五位。到了18世纪末，英语

的地位开始上升。到19世纪中叶，英语已经跻身于第一位了。今天，英语的地位遥遥领

先，说英语的人数可能达到说后两种语言，即俄语和德语人数的总和。

How many people speak it today?It is hard to s those to whom

English is their native tongue,there are people who, though born to some other

language, live in English-speaking communities and speak English in their daily

business. More importantly, English is now spoken as a foreign language

throughout the world-very often, to be sure, badly, but nevertheless

understandably. It has become a platitude that one may go almost anywhere with

no other linguistic equipment and get on almost as well as in New York. 今天到底

有多少人说英语？这个问题难以回答。除了把英语作为母语的人以外，还有一些人虽然出

生在说其他语言的地方，但现在生活在说英语的社会，这些人在日常工作中说的是英语。

更重要的是，英语目前在世界范围里作为外语广泛使用—当然，在这些地方英语往往说得

蹩脚，但是也可以让人理解。你几乎可以去世界的任何一个地方，不会任何别的语言，也

能像在纽约一样过得顺利，这已成为司空见惯的事情。

In part, of course, its spread has been due to the extraordinary dispersion of

the English-speaking peoples. They have been the greatest travelers of modern

times, and the most adventurous merchants, and the most assiduous colonists.

Moreover, they have been, on the whole, poor linguists, and so they have dragged

their language with them, and forced it upon the human race.当然，英语得到普及，

部分原因是说英语的人分布极广。他们是现代最热衷旅行的人、最敢冒险的商人、最执着

的殖民主义者。除此以外，他们总体上学语言的能力很差，所以，他们走到哪里，便把自

己的语言带到哪里，并将之强加于人。

But there is more to the matter than this. English, brought to close quarters

with formidable rivals, has won very often, not by force of numbers,but by the

sheer weight of its merit. “In wealth, wisdom, and strict economy,” said the

eminent Jakob Grimm a century ago, “none of the other living languages can vie

with it.”To which the eminent Otto Jespersen was adding only the other day:

English is simple, it has clear sounds, it packs its words closely together, it is logical

in their arrangement,and it is free from all pedantic flubdub.但是，问题远不止如此。

英语在与其劲敌的竞争中取胜，往往不是因为数量原因，而完全是因为其优点。“在丰富

性、所包含的智慧、以及严谨的精炼程度方面，”著名的雅各布•格利姆在一个世纪之前说，

“没有一种现存的语言能与英语媲美。”而著名的奥托•耶斯佩森就在前几天对此加以补充

说：英语简单，发音清晰，词与词之间的结构紧密，词的安排组织有逻辑性，而且英语中

没有迂腐的废话。

When American pedagogues speak of the virtues of English they almost

always begin by hymning its enormous vocabulary, which is at least twice as large

as that of any other language. But this is not what enchants the foreigner; on the

contrary, the vast reaches of the vocabulary naturally alarm him. The thing that

really wins him is the succinctness and simplicity of those elements. We use, for all

our store of Latin polysyllables, a great many more short words than long ones,

and we are always trying to make the long ones short. What was once puniligrion

is now pun;what was gasoline only yesterday is already gas. No other European

language has so many three-letter words,nor so many four-word sayings."First

come,first served"-that is typically English,for it is bold, plain, and short.当美国的教

育工作者谈及英语的优点时，几乎总是一开始就赞美其词汇量之庞大。英语的词汇比任何

其他语言的词汇至少多一倍。然而，吸引外国人的并不是词汇量大，相反，浩瀚的词汇很

容易令外国人担忧。真正赢得外国人的是英语简练和纯朴的特征。尽管英语中有大量的源

于拉丁文的多音节词，但我们却更多地使用短词，少用长词。而且，我们总是努力把长词

缩短。以前使用的puniligrion现在缩短成了pun；昨天还是gasoline，今天已成为gas。

欧洲没有任何一种其他语言有这么多由三个字母构成的单词，也没有如此多由四个单词构

成的格言。“First come, first served”（先到先供应）便 是典型的英语，因为它一目了

然、朴实无华、短小精悍。

The English psychologist, believes, indeed, that 850 words are

sufficient for all ordinary purposes, and he has devised a form of simplified

English,called by him Basic, which uses no more. Of his 850 words no less than 600

are the names of things, which leaves only 250 for the names of qualities and

actions, and for all the linguistic hooks and eyes that hold sentences together. 英

国心理学家奥格登博士认为，在一般的交流中，850个词就足够了。他把英语改编成简单

的形式，将这种形式叫做基础英语。基础英语中的词汇不超过850个。在这850个词中，

有至少600个词表示事物的名称，剩下的250个词包括说明事物的特征和动作行为的词、

以及将句子连接在一起的语法词和小品词。

Does this seem too few? Then it is only to those who have forgotten one of the

prime characteristics of English—its capacity for getting an infinity of meanings

out of a single word by combining it with simple modifiers. Consider, for example,

the difference between the verbs to get, to get going, to get by, to get on to, to get

wise, to get off, to get ahead of, and to get over. Dr. Ogden proposes to rid the

language of a great many verbs—some of them irregular, and hence difficult—by

substituting such compounds for them. Why, for example, should a foreigner be

taught to say that he has disembarked from a ship? Isn’t it sufficient for him to

say that he has got off? And why should he be taught to say that he has recovered

from the flu, or escaped the police, or obtained a job? Isn’t it enough to say that

he has got over the first, got away from the second, and simply got the third?这些

词的数量是不是显得太少了？只有那些忘记了下面这一英语基本特征的人才会这么认为：

英语中同一个词与不同的小修饰词结合，便可以产生无数多的意思。例如，我们可以想一

想动词get 在下列组合中的不同意思：to get going, to get by, to get onto, to get wise,

to get off, toget ahead, to get over等。奥格登博士建议去掉英语中的大量动词——其

中一些是不规则动词，因而难以掌握，这些动词可以用上述短语动词来取代。例如，为什

么要教外国人说他已从船上“上岸”（disembark）？难道说他已“下船”(get off)不能

表达同样的意思吗？为什么要教他说从流感中“复原”（recover）、“逃避”（escape）

了警察,“获得”（obtain）了工作？难道说“流感好了”（get over the flu）、“甩开警

察”（get away from the police），或者简单地说“找到工作”（get a job）不足以表

达同样的意思吗？

But as English spreads, will it be able to maintain its present form? Probably

not. But why should it?Every successful effort at standardization seldom succeed.

The school-ma’am has been trying since the Revolution to bring American

English to her rules, but it goes on sprouting and it will eventually conquer the

English of England.但是随着英语的广泛传播，它是否能够保持现在的形式？也许不能。

但为什么要保持现在的形式呢？每次使英语规范化的所谓成功的努力其实很少成功。自从

大革命以来，学校女教师一直努力使美式英语遵守语法规则，但是，美式英语依然在不断

发展，最终必将征服英国英语。

This guess indeed is rather too easy to be quite sporting. English has been

yielding to American for fifty years past, and since the turn of the century it has

been yielding at a constantly accelerated rate. The flow of novelties in vocabulary,

in idiom, even in pronunciation, is now overwhelmingly eastward. We seldom

borrow an English word or phrase any more, though we used to borrow many; but

the English take in our inventions almost as fast as we can launch them. The

American movie, I suppose, is largely responsible for this change, but there are

unquestionably deeper causes too. English, is still a bit tight, a bit stiff, more than a

little artificial. But American, has gone on developing with almost Elizabethan

prodigality. All the processes of word-formation that were in operation in

Shakespeare’s England are still in operation here, and they produce a steady

stream of neologisms that he would have relished as joyfully as he relished the

novelties actually produced in his time.这种结局很容易猜出，甚至是可以肯定的。在过

去的50年里，英语一直屈从于美语。自世纪之交以来，英语屈从美语的速度不断加快。

新词汇、新习语、甚至新发音都以无法抗拒的势力源源不断传入东方。从前我们常常借用

很多英语词或短语，但现在很少这样做。但英语却吸纳我们创造的词，我们创造有多快，

其吸纳的速度几乎就有多快。我认为，美国电影固然对这一变化起了很大作用，但毫无疑

问，还有更深刻的原因。英语依然有点太严格、有点僵硬，且过于矫揉造作。而美语的发

展却像伊丽莎白时代一样繁荣。所有那些在英国莎士比亚时代应用的构词方法，现在依然

在美国应用着，新词源源不断地产生。如果莎翁健在，这些新词一定会使他欣喜若狂，就

像他所生活的时代产生的新词曾使他欣喜若狂一样。

The English, from the Age of Anne onward, have resisted the march of

American with a mixture of patriotic watchfulness and moral indignation, albeit

with steadily decreasing effectiveness. 自安妮时代以来，英国人就以一种带有爱国者的

警惕和义愤的复杂心情，来拒绝美语的进入，尽管效果在日渐下降。

The English travelers who began to swarm in America after 1800, gave willing

aid in this benign work, and scarcely one of them failed to record his horror over

the new American words that he encountered, and the unfamiliar American

pronunciation. Captain Basil Hall, who was here in 1827 and 1828, went to the

length of making a call upon Noah Webster, then over 70 years of age, to lodge his

protest.“Surely,” he said, “such innovations are to be deprecated?”“I don’t

know that,” replied Webster stoutly. “If a word becomes universally current in

America, why should it not take its station in the language?”“Because,”

answered Hall, with a magnificent resort to British complacency, “there are words

enough already.”1800年以后开始蜂涌来到美国的英国游客也心甘情愿支持这一有益的

工作。他们当中很少有人不对碰到的美国新词和陌生的美国发音感到惊恐。当海军上校巴

赛尔•霍尔1827年和1828年来到这里时，甚至打电话向70多岁的诺亚•韦伯斯特提出抗

议。“毫无疑问，”他说，“这种发明创造应该受到蔑视。” “我不这么认为，”韦伯斯

特坚决地回答，“如果一个词在美国普遍流行开来，为什么不应该收入语言中呢？”霍尔

只好以英国人典型的自满态度回答说：“因为现有的词汇已经足够了。”

This hostility continues into our own day. At regular intervals the London

dailies and weeklies break into sonorous complaints against the American invasion.

Even the relatively cautious and plainly useful simplicities of American spelling (as

in the -or words, for example) are sometimes denounced with great rancor. But it is

really too late for the English to guard the purity of their native tongue, for so

many Americanisms have already got into it that, on some levels at least, it is now

almost an American dialect. There are hundreds of them in daily use in England,

and many have become so familiar that an Englishman, on being challenged for

using them, will commonly argue that they are actually English.这种敌对情绪一直持

续到今天。每隔一段时间，伦敦的日报和周报便对美语侵入提出大声抗议。就连相对谨慎

而又绝对实用的美式简单拼写（如以-or结尾的词）有时也遭到极其强烈的指责。但是，

英国人现在来维护其本族语的纯洁性实在为时太晚了，因为已经有太多的美式用语进入英

语，英语至少在某种程度上已成为一种美式方言。在英国，数以百计的美语应用于日常生

活中，许多英国人对这些用语极其熟悉，因此在使用时，如果有人质问他为什么用美语，

他往往会辩解道，这些用语其实是英国英语。

There are Englishmen who believe that the time has come to compromise with

the invasion, and even to welcome it. The father of this pro-American party seems

to have been the late William Archer, who was saying so long ago as 1899 that

Americans had enormously enriched the language, not only with new words, but

with apt and luminous colloquial late Dr. Robert Bridges, Poet

Laureate from 1913 until his death in 1930, was of like mind with Archer.有些英国人

认为，现在已是向美语妥协的时候了，甚至应该欢迎美语了。美语支持者的鼻祖好像是已

故的威廉•阿切尔。他早在1899年就说过，美国用语大大丰富了英语语言，不仅为英语增

加了新词，而且增加了一些恰如其分、通俗易懂、带有口语特色的比喻用法。已故的罗伯

特•布里奇博士，从1913年到1930年去世为止，享有英国桂冠诗人的称号，他也与阿切

尔持同样观点。

I turn to Dr. Ogden’s list of fifty “international” nouns for the Basic

vocabulary,and find that no less than nine of them are American, not English. I turn

to Professor Ichikawa’s list of English words that have been taken into Japanese，

and Americanisms bristle from every page. Plainly enough, the conquest of the

world by English, if it ever comes off, will really be a conquest by American.我看了

看奥格登博士的基础英语里列出的50个“国际性”名词表，发现至少9个是美语，而不

是英语。我再看了看市川教授列出的已纳入日语的英语单词表，只见每一都有美语。显而

易见，如果有朝一日英语征服世界真的成为现实，征服世界的必将是美式英语。