 |
|
Bush and Blair Are Mangling
English | |
The English language is being destroyed by a "deadly virus of
management speak" which has infected the mouths and minds of politicians
like Tony Blair and George W. Bush, a leading UK journalist said recently.
The British Prime Minister and his ally the U.S. President are mangling the language, destroying
its meaning by avoiding the use of verbs, twisting nouns into verbs, and
endlessly repeating phrases until they become "zombified."
"It's deeply depressing," says John Humphrys, one of Britain's leading
political journalists and the author of a new book, "Lost for Words,".
Humphys' book laments the growth of "cliched, dumbed-down, inflated and
bogus management-speak" which he says now passes for English.
In particular he criticizes political leaders for being sucked into
using meaningless phrases and hackneyed mantras to disguise policies or
protect themselves from accountability.
Humphrys has been a journalist for 45 years and in his current post as
a presenter on BBC radio's news and current affairs program "Today," he
regularly interviews world leaders.
"The whole essence of a good lively democracy is that one has good
lively argument," he told reporters in an interview. "But this kind of
language kills real debate."
"And nobody is prepared to stand up and say: 'what does that mean?'
because the assumption is made that if you don't know what it means then
there is something wrong with you."
Humphrys says the original culprits in the destruction of English are
"business gurus who are trying to sell their own particular theories and
have invented their own ridiculous phrases and vocabulary to accompany
those theories."
But for him the more
sinister development is that such language has taken root
in political discourse.
Humphrys picks on Bush -- who once famously used the word
"misunderestimate" -- and pokes fun at him as someone who "often speaks as
though English were his second language."
He also labels the U.S. leader a "master of the language of political
manipulation" and accuses him of sweeping aside all the nuances of notions
like freedom, truth and democracy and instead firing the words out like
"dum-dum bullets."
Blair, too, is singled out as a king of language corruption.
Humphrys notes Blair's apparent fear of verbs and mocks inhis speeches,
which are peppered with verbless phrases like "new challenges, new ideas,"
or "for our young people, a brighter future" and "the age of achievement,
at home and abroad."
By using this technique, Humphrys says, Blair is simply evading
responsibility.
(Agencies) |
最近，一位英國資深記者說，英語正在遭到一種“官腔語言的致命病毒”的侵害，這種病毒已經感染了許多政治家的談吐和思想，其中包括托尼·布萊爾和喬治·布什。
英國首相布萊爾和他的盟友、美國總統布什都在“亂燉”英語，他們避免使用動詞、將名詞和動詞混為一談，還沒完沒了地重復某些詞組，直到它們變得“僵尸化”。就這樣，他們破壞了英語語言原有的意思。
約翰·漢弗萊斯說：“這讓人非常郁悶。”他是英國資深政治新聞記者之一，也是新書《失言》的作者。
漢弗萊斯的這本書表達了作者對“陳腐愚蠢、夸張虛偽的官腔語言”滋生的悲嘆，而這種語言現在（居然）被稱為英語。
他還特別批評了政府領導人們熱衷于使用無意義詞語和陳腐高調來偽飾政策或推脫責任的行為。
漢弗萊斯從事新聞工作已有45年，現在擔任英國BBC廣播電臺新聞時事節目《今天》的主持人。他定期采訪世界各國的領導人。
他在接受一次采訪時對記者說：“健康活躍的民主政治的所有精華就是能擁有健康活潑的言論。但是這種（僵化的）語言扼殺了真正的爭論和思辨。”
“沒有人愿意站起來問：‘那到底是什么意思？’因為大家都已認定，如果你不明白那是什么意思，那就是你出問題了。”
漢弗萊斯說，破壞英語語言的“始作俑者”是那些商界大亨，他們為了推銷自己的獨特理論，發明了許多獨有的荒誕詞語來“配合”那些理論。
但對漢弗萊斯來說，這類語言后來逐漸扎根于政治演說中，這才是更具有“災難性”的發展。
漢弗萊斯以曾因“錯誤地低估”一詞而出名的布什為例，嘲笑他是“似乎以英語為第二語言講話”的人。
他還為這位美國領導人貼上“用政治手段操縱語言的大師”的標簽，并指責他抹殺了自由、真相和民主等概念之間的一切細微差別，反倒把這些詞語像“達姆彈”一樣四處發射。
布萊爾也被（漢弗萊斯）列為“污染語言大王”。
漢弗萊斯提到，布萊爾在演說中對動詞和嘲諷語言有著明顯的畏懼，他的演說充斥著非動詞式的詞組，比如“新挑戰，新想法”，“為了我們的年輕一代，一個光明的未來”，還有“一個充滿成就的時代，無論國內還是國外”等。
漢弗萊斯說，布萊爾使用這種伎倆只是為了逃避責任。
（中國日報網站譯） |
Updated: 2004-11-24 17:25