时间:2019-01-25 作者:英语课 分类:词汇大师(Wordmaster)


英语课

A: I'm Avi Arditti with Rosanne Skirble and, now that the Olympics are over, we're back with WORDMASTER. This week -- going for gold in using the dictionary!


RS: We looked up our friend Lida Baker 1. She teaches in the American Language Center at the University of California at Los Angeles, and writes textbooks for English learners.


AA: Lida Baker says a dictionary is "the most important tool that an English learner has." But, she says students often are not aware of the wealth of information in a dictionary.


RS: A good dictionary, that is -- one that lists not just all the definitions of a word, but also how to use that word correctly. For instance, a good dictionary warns you if a word is considered vulgar or otherwise offensive.


AA: Lida Baker says a good dictionary also helps you sort out the different meanings a word might have in different English-speaking countries.


TAPE: CUT ONE -- LIDA BAKER


"So if you look up, for instance, the word 'lift,' the first definition in my American English dictionary is, 鈥榠f you give someone a lift, you take them somewhere in your car, and a synonym 2 is a ride.鈥? So that is the most common meaning in American English, but if you read down a ways in this definition you will see a label that says 'British' and next to it you will see the words 'an elevator.'"


RS: That's right, an "elevator" in American English is a "lift" in British English.


AA: Lida Baker says another thing a good dictionary can tell you is how a word is generally used.


TAPE: CUT TWO -- BAKER/AA/RS


BAKER: "You'll see things ike 'formal,' 'informal,' 'humorous,' 'literary' or 'slang.' And a good example of this is the word 'chill.'"


RS: "C-h-i-l-l."


BAKER: "Right. When it's used as a verb it means to cool something down and it doesn't have any particular label, but definition number two has the label 'spoken and informal.' And the definition here is to relax instead of feeling angry or nervous. And there's an example sentence: "Shelley, just chill out, OK?"


AA: "That sounds like slang, to 'chill out.'"


RS: "Which is informal."


BAKER: "Spoken or informal, right. So the student looking at this definition would know that they shouldn't use this if they're writing a composition in a college course, or you probably shouldn't use this if you're talking to the president of your company during a job interview or something like that, a more formal situation."


AA: OK, now let's look up the word "frustration 3." Ah yes, here's the definition I'm looking for: "noun -- the feeling you get when you try to look up the correct spelling of a word that you have no clue how to spell."


TAPE: CUT THREE -- BAKER/AA


"I do not know a magical solution to this problem. Students from Asia tend to be exceptionally fine spellers in English even if they don't know what a word means. Students who come from other regions of the world have much more difficulty with spelling and they really get stuck in a situation like this if they don't know how to spell a word. Now there is something called a backward or reverse dictionary. Instead of finding the word with its correct spelling, you can look up a word based on the way it sounds, but I haven't actually seen one of these."


RS: So how do you choose the right dictionary? Well, Lida Baker says it all depends on what you're looking for.


TAPE: CUT FOUR -- BAKER


"If I'm reading a story for my own pleasure and I encounter a word and all I want is a quick and general sense of what the word means so that I can then continue with my pleasure reading, in a situation like that I might use a bilingual dictionary. I'll look it up, I'll find a one-word translation into my own language and then I'll keep on reading. But if my purpose is to learn English with the purpose of being able to use a word in an actual conversation or in writing a college composition or a business report, in a situation like that I would want to use an English-English dictionary that gives all the usage labels, the complete grammatical information, the example sentences and so on."


AA: Lida Baker comes to us from Los Angeles, where -- when she's not thumbing through dictionaries -- she writes textbooks for English learners and teaches at the American Language Center, part of the University of California Extension program.


RS: If you have a question, send it to us at VOA Wordmaster, Washington DC 20237 USA. Our e-mail address is word@voanews.com. With Avi Arditti, I'm Rosanne Skirble.


MUSIC: "Your Dictionary"/XTC



n.面包师
  • The baker bakes his bread in the bakery.面包师在面包房内烤面包。
  • The baker frosted the cake with a mixture of sugar and whites of eggs.面包师在蛋糕上撒了一层白糖和蛋清的混合料。
n.同义词,换喻词
  • 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。
  • The term 'industrial democracy' is often used as a synonym for worker participation. “工业民主”这个词常被用作“工人参与”的同义词。
n.挫折,失败,失效,落空
  • He had to fight back tears of frustration.他不得不强忍住失意的泪水。
  • He beat his hands on the steering wheel in frustration.他沮丧地用手打了几下方向盘。
学英语单词
abordage
accumulation error
activation record
adiabatic low-energy injection and capture experiment
administrative and budgetary committee
alisma plantagoaquatica l.var.orientale samuel
association number
batch costing method
BBS (building block system)
binary search algorithm
bite the thumbs at
bobbitted
bounded context constructor
bryde
centric axial load
chloroprenes
Chuchkovo
cialdini
cladly dressed
construction of water conservancy works
country of shipment
deputy section supervisor
display ruler
elementary optics
floats around
flow-control
friskle
gab session
gall duct irrigating instrument
garnishment of wages
generating set resonant vibration
give someone a brush
gossipmongerings
grent
heavy field artillery
homewards
homoiothermy
impales
index of employment cost
Karpero
koo
Lager-beer
langsten
left-hand lay wire rope
Leonian
let ... know
lilis
macroscopic reactor parameter
mail-bags
maintopmast
make up the story
mango roll
Microsoft Corporation
milk beverage
momentary value
Morrison crown
multitaper
mylonite zone
n.a.s.d
new years's banguet
nonlinear characteristic
norm reducing method
PCM telemetry
pharyngolamygdalitis
porcelain shell
porforin
presubmission
Profit-Sharing Plan
propylene carbonate
pulvis stomachicus
raw red fox skin
reversible airscrew
Santa Juana
SDH1
searchlighting antenna
separate edition
Serious Fraud Office
Sichuan Yi
sig quote
single cyclone dust collector
skg
sodium catechol acetate
sphacelated
standardized testing
steaming-hot
steel-framed woodlined silo
stein-kirk
stoppingly
surface inhomogeneity
tafflers
temperature programming
thermal Biot number
theyre
thyroid isthmus
up sb's street
variable capaciter
voltage-regulating circuit
Wachendorf's membrane
Waskesiu Lake
waterproofing work
woulding
WVSPA