2017考研趣味阅读：韦氏词典宣布将“主义”选为2015年年度词汇

考研吧来源：中公考研 2015-12-17　

韦氏词典宣布将“主义”选为2015年年度词汇

Merriam-Webster declares 'ism' as word of the year for 2015

Merriam-Webster has picked a small but powerful suffix as word of the year: ism.

韦氏词典选取了短小却富有影响力的单词后缀“-主义”作为2015年年度词汇。

But not just any ism. The top isms to earn high traffic spikes and big bumps in lookups on the dictionary company's website in 2015 over the year before are socialism, fascism, racism, feminism, communism, capitalism and terrorism.

但不是任何主义都能当选。据韦氏公司的统计，在过去的一年中，韦氏大词典官方网站查询功能耗费流量最多的“主义”有社会主义，法西斯主义，种族主义，女权主义，共产主义，资本主义以及恐怖主义。

"We had a lot on our minds this year," mused Peter Sokolowski, the Springfield, Massachusetts-based company's editor at large, in a recent interview. "It's a serious year. These are words of ideas and practices. We're educating ourselves."

“今年，我们经历了很多，”马萨诸塞州斯普林菲尔德(Springfield)韦氏公司的编辑彼得·索科洛夫斯基在近期的采访中沉思道。“这是沉重的一年。这些词语背后都涵盖着相关理念和实践。我们在选词的过程中也训诫了自身。”

Pinpointing reasons why words go on the run at Merriam-Webster is an educated guess. The dictionary company tracks corresponding news events to link lookups to real life. And its researchers also crunch data in a way that filters out common words frequently looked up year after year after year when making their top annual choices.

人们考察韦氏词典选取年度词汇的原因仍然只是有根据的猜测。韦氏公司追踪相关新闻事件，将网站查询功能与现实生活衔接起来。调查人员在选取年度词汇时，将人们年复一年频繁查询的普通词汇过滤掉，进而处理相关数据。

Lookups for racism corresponded to release of video in November showing a white police officer shooting a black teenager in Chicago, and the criminal charges that followed. Merriam-Webster also saw a stronger correlation in heavy traffic on its site for that word and "fascist" and flash points in Republican Donald Trump's presidential campaign, including reports on his anti-Islam rhetoric.

人们查询种族主义时，会搜寻到发布于11月份的一个视频，内容是芝加哥有个白人警官开枪射杀了一名黑人青年，以及后续的刑事起诉。韦氏公司也发现了该视频与其网站上“种族主义”、“法西斯主义者”等词的高点击率有着密切联系，该视频也成为共和党人唐纳德·特朗普参与总统选举以及他做出反伊斯兰言论的导火索。

The isms often collide, driving each other in popularity, Sokolowski said.

不同主义间相互碰撞，使各自的名声越来越大，索科洛夫斯基说道。

"Fascism we more closely associate as the response to various acts of terrorism. After the attacks in Paris and the attacks in Colorado Springs and in San Bernardino, and because of Donald Trump's proposal to ban Muslims, we then see the word fascism spike," he said.

“当我们注意到各种恐怖主义行动时，我们便会进一步联想到法西斯主义。我们可以从巴黎袭击事件，科罗拉多斯普林斯(Colorado Springs)以及圣贝纳迪诺(San Bernardino)枪击事件，以及唐纳德·特朗普提议取缔伊斯兰教中看到法西斯主义的影子，”他说道。

Lookups of racism were high all year but had two noticeable spikes, one after the South Carolina church shootings and another amid the University of Missouri protests.

人们对种族主义的查询的热情全年高昂，同时在下述的两大事件中也可以看到它的影子，一是南卡罗来纳州教堂枪击案，另一个是密苏里大学学生的游行抗议活动。

Sokolowski, a lexicographer by training, said one spike in lookups for feminism came in April and corresponded with reports on an Ohio middle school student who wore a T-shirt with the word printed on it in a school photo, only to have it digitally blacked out by school administrators. The school later apologized.

索科洛夫斯基是一名词典编篡家，他说，人们可以从今年4月发生的事情以及相关报导中发现女权主义的影子，俄亥俄州一名中学学生身穿印有“女权主义”的T恤出现在学校的宣传照上，稍后人们发现“女权主义”被学校管理人员用技术方式抹掉了。随后，学校对此表示了道歉。

Reports on Caitlyn Jenner, Amy Schumer and Hillary Clinton all included discussion of feminism, as did reviews of the film "Mad Max: Fury Road" and chatter about previews of "Star Wars: The Force Awakens."

关于凯特琳·詹纳，艾米·舒默以及希拉里·克林顿的所有报导都涵盖有女权主义的讨论，人们对电影《疯狂的麦克斯：狂暴之路》的评论，以及对《星球大战：原力唤醒》预告的讨论也是如此。

In addition, Emma Watson's 2014 UN speech made the news again twice this year; first for inspiring Nobel Peace Prize winner Malala Yousafzai to call herself a feminist in a viral video, and again when it was revealed that Watson was asked not to use the word at all in the speech, Sokolowski noted.

另外，艾玛·沃特森2014年联合国的演讲在今年制造了有关女权主义的两大新闻，第一条是在一个病毒视频中鼓励诺贝尔和平奖获得者马拉拉·尤沙夫赛自称为女权主义者，第二条新闻则是有人揭露沃特森被要求在演讲时不可使用女权主义这个词语，索科洛夫斯基说道。

The word socialism has Bernie Sanders to thank for its popularity.

“社会主义”这个词的流行要感谢伯尼·桑德斯。

"The big spikes have been associated with the fact that we have a presidential candidate who identifies as a Democratic Socialist," Sokolowski said. "We saw that even though socialism was in the Top 10 of the most looked-up words in the whole history of the site, it increased in a spike beginning in late July when Bernie Sanders had a multicity rally that was organized through social media and attracted about 100,000 people in 3,000 communities or more around the country."

“我们有个被视为民主主义者的总统候选人，'社会主义'这个词的潜在影响与此密切相关，”索科洛夫斯基说道。“我们注意到，'社会主义'即使是在韦氏网站的整个查询史中，也能入选十大高查询频率词汇，而在7月底，伯尼·桑德斯通过社交媒体组织开展的多城市集会，吸引了全国超过3000个社区10万人参加，在这之后，'社会主义'提高了其影响力。"

In October, lookups for socialism spiked again during the first Democratic debate featuring Sanders and Clinton.

10月，自桑德斯和克林顿第一场民主讨论系列活动展开以来，“社会主义”再次上了热搜榜。

John Morse, president and publisher of Merriam-Webster, said socialism led the ism charge after a strong showing in 2012, but the company decided to go with the broader suffix instead as word of the year "because it was hard not see a bigger story staring us in the face, which was the profusion of ism words all over the most frequently looked-up list."

韦氏公司的董事长、出版商约翰·莫尔斯说，“社会主义”在2012年的一番强劲展示后引起了人们对“主义”的关注，但是公司决定使用更具广泛意义的后缀而不是这个词作为年度词汇，“因为很难不去注意我们手中的数据，在单词查询榜上有许许多多的以‘主义’为后缀的词语。”

Other ism words on the move at Merriam-Webster.com this year were professionalism, masochism, federalism, pragmatism, existentialism, hedonism and Marxism.

今年，韦氏大词典官方网站上的其他“主义”词汇有专业主义，受虐主义，联邦主义，实用主义，存在主义，英雄主义以及马克思主义。

Other words that sent people to the site in high numbers include marriage, hypocrite, respect, inspiration and minion. The company does not release raw numbers of lookups.

其他的能将网友送进这个网址，出现次数较多的词汇有婚姻，伪君子，尊敬，激励和仆从。韦氏公司并没有公布原始搜索数据。

"Inspiration still kind of baffles us," Morse said. "I can't really tell you what it is in the world of 2015 that is so much different from '14 that inspiration has moved up."

“我们对‘激励’这个词仍然感到困惑，”莫尔斯说，“我无法确切地告诉你‘激励’这个词查询频率上升的原因，也无法说明2015年这个的含义为何与14年的大不相同。”

The company began picking a word of the year in 2003. It went with "culture" in 2014.

韦氏公司于2013年开始选取年度词汇。2014年的年度词汇是“文化”。

This year's word of the year at Dictionary.com is identity. The folks at Oxford Dictionaries went with a pictograph, an emoji called the "Face with Tears of Joy."

《字典在线》的2015年年度词汇是“身份认同”。《牛津字典》的年度词汇则是一个表情符号——“笑哭了”。