VOA慢速英语2013 THIS IS AMERICA - How to Help an Endangered Language

 

THIS IS AMERICA - How to Help an Endangered Language

BARBARA KLEIN: Welcome to THIS IS AMERICA in VOA Special English. I'm Barbara Klein.

BOB DOUGHTY¹: And I'm Bob Doughty. This week on our program, we look at efforts to protect threatened languages. And, later, we hear some songs about baseball.

(MUSIC)

BARBARA KLEIN: Eleven of the world's languages have at least one hundred million native speakers. The biggest are Mandarin² Chinese, English, Spanish, Arabic and Hindi. Next come Portuguese³, Bengali, Russian, Japanese, French and German. The United Nations says these eleven languages are the mother tongues of half the world's population.

Alfred "Bud" Lane works with linguist⁴ Gregory Anderson to record words for a talking dictionary But the world has close to seven thousand languages. Linguists⁵ predict that as many as half of these may be at risk of disappearing by the end of this century. That would mean another language dies every two weeks.

BOB DOUGHTY: Members of the Siletz Indian tribe in the northwestern state of Oregon take pride in their language. Their language, they say, "is as old as time itself."?But today very few people can speak it fluently. In fact, you can count the number of fluent speakers on one hand. Bud Lane is one of them.

BUD LANE: "We had linguists that had come in and done assessments⁶ of our people and our language and they labeled it -- I'll never forget this term -- 'moribund,' meaning it was headed for the ash heap of history."

The Siletz tribal⁷ council did not want to let that happen. So Bud Lane asked for help from experts. Several National Geographic⁸ Fellows helped him record fourteen thousand words and phrases in his native tongue.

TALKING DICTIONARY: "Let's dance out in front: ch'ee-naa-svt-nit-dash."

Some Siletz words describe basket making, a traditional tribal art.

TALKING DICTIONARY: "Baby basket: guy-yu." "Baby basket laces: guy-yuu mvtlh-wvsh."

More than ten thousand entries can be found in the Siletz Online Talking Dictionary, first launched in two thousand seven. The website, siletz.swarthmore.edu, is hosted by Swarthmore College in Pennsylvania.

David Harrison is a linguistics⁹ professor there. Professor Harrison has also posted talking dictionaries for seven other highly endangered languages from around the world. He says technology can spread the influence of major languages but also help save endangered ones.

DAVID HARRISON: "This is what I like to call the flip¹⁰ side of globalization, or the positive value of globalization.?We hear a lot about how globalization exerts negative pressures on small cultures to assimilate."

BARBARA KLEIN: Smartphone apps, YouTube videos and Facebook pages have all become digital tools for language activists¹¹ and experts.

Mr. Harrison and a researcher in Oregon have mapped areas of endangered languages.?One is the Pacific Northwest in the United States. Others include the upper Amazon basin, Siberia and northern Australia.

In Canada's far north, the Inuit people are struggling to preserve their native language, Inuktitut. Part of the effort involves Microsoft. The company is translating terms in its Windows operating system and Office software into Inuktitut. Gavin Nesbitt is the project leader.

GAVIN NESBITT: "Instead of 'file,' you'll see ini. Instead of 'home,' it will say pigiarvik. Instead of 'save,' it says 'jaggajairli' and stuff like that."

He says the programming group had to invent new words to include all the terms in some Windows and Word document menus.?But he says the effort is worth it.

GAVIN NESBITT: "So many people will spend their entire day sitting in front of a computer. If you're sitting in front of your computer in English all day, that just reinforces English. If you're now using Inuktitut, it is reinforcing [that] this is your language."

Microsoft has also worked with language activists in New Zealand, Spain and Wales to translate its software into Maori, Basque, Catalan and Welsh.

BOB DOUGHTY: In Oregon, Siletz language teacher Bud Lane says technology alone cannot save endangered languages.

BUD LANE: "Nothing takes the place of speakers speaking to other speakers and to people who are learning. But this bridges a gap that was just sorely needed in our community and in our tribe."

He points to one sign of progress: young members of the tribe are now texting each other in Siletz.

(MUSIC)

BARBARA KLEIN: The twenty-twelve Major League Baseball season is in, yes, full swing. The sport has long been a hit with songwriters. In fact, baseball has been celebrated¹² in song almost since the first pitch was thrown out. "The Baseball Polka" was written in the late eighteen fifties.

Over the years, Irving Berlin and Bruce Springsteen have written songs about baseball. Singers as different as Frank Sinatra and Meat Loaf have sung about the game.

(MUSIC)

BOB DOUGHTY: Mandolin player and singer Sam Bush is a huge fan of his favorite team, the Saint Louis Cardinals¹⁴. His album "King of My World" includes a song he wrote called "The Wizard of Oz." The song is about Ozzie Smith, a former Cardinal¹³ great who played shortstop and did backflips on the field.

(MUSIC)

BARBARA KLEIN: Ozzie Smith is in the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, New York. Bob Dylan wrote a song about another Hall of Famer: Jim "Catfish¹⁵" Hunter. Catfish Hunter was one the best baseball pitchers¹⁶ ever, and one of the most popular. His fifteen-year career included five World Series championships with the Oakland Athletics¹⁷ and the New York Yankees.

He once pitched a perfect game, not allowing a single opposing player to reach base. He also pitched five seasons in a row with twenty victories. But Catfish Hunter is also remembered for another reason.

On December thirty-first, nineteen seventy-four, he signed a contract with the Yankees worth almost four million dollars. That might not sound like very much with today's highly paid star athletes. But the contract set a record. It made Catfish Hunter the first multi-millionaire player in baseball -- the "million-dollar-man" as Bob Dylan called him. The contract was for five years but he retired¹⁸ early.

Catfish Hunter died in nineteen ninety-nine. If you ever visit the Baseball Hall of Fame, you might see Bob Dylan's signed album featuring the song "Catfish."

(MUSIC)

BARBARA KLEIN: Singer-songwriter Chuck Brodsky likes to include baseball songs on his albums. One song tells the story of a real-life player on the Brooklyn Dodgers¹⁹, before they moved from their New York home to Los Angeles. Moe Berg lived a double life: baseball player and spy for the United States before and during World War Two. Here is "Moe Berg: The Song."

(MUSIC)

BOB DOUGHTY: One baseball song is in a league by itself. People may not know all the words, but that never stopped anyone from singing along with "Take Me Out to the Ballgame." A few years ago, Sam Bush had a chance to play it during the seventh inning stretch at a Cardinals game. The seventh inning stretch is a time for fans to get out of their seats to stretch their arms and legs after sitting for most of the game.

Sam Bush says he will never forget hearing thousands of fans singing along as he played his version of the song on his mandolin.

(MUSIC:)

Jack²⁰ Norworth wrote "Take Me Out to the Ballgame" in nineteen eight. One day he was riding a New York City subway train and saw an advertisement for a baseball game. That gave him the idea for the most famous baseball song ever written. Not bad for someone who had never even been to a major league game.

(MUSIC)

BARBARA KLEIN: Our program was produced by Brianna Blake with reporting by Tom Banse and Katherine Cole. I'm Barbara Klein.

BOB DOUGHTY: And I'm Bob Doughty. Read, listen and learn English with texts and MP3s of our programs at www.voanews.cn. Join us again next week for THIS IS AMERICA in VOA Special English. 

1 doughty   

adj.勇猛的，坚强的

参考例句：

• Most of successful men have the characteristics of contumacy and doughty.绝大多数成功人士都有共同的特质：脾气倔强，性格刚强。
• The doughty old man battled his illness with fierce determination.坚强的老人用巨大毅力与疾病作斗争。

2 Mandarin   

n.中国官话，国语，满清官吏；adj.华丽辞藻的

参考例句：

• Just over one billion people speak Mandarin as their native tongue.大约有十亿以上的人口以华语为母语。
• Mandarin will be the new official language of the European Union.普通话会变成欧盟新的官方语言。

3 Portuguese   

n.葡萄牙人；葡萄牙语

参考例句：

• They styled their house in the Portuguese manner.他们仿照葡萄牙的风格设计自己的房子。
• Her family is Portuguese in origin.她的家族是葡萄牙血统。

4 linguist   

n.语言学家；精通数种外国语言者

参考例句：

• I used to be a linguist till I become a writer.过去我是个语言学家，后来成了作家。
• Professor Cui has a high reputation as a linguist.崔教授作为语言学家名声很高。

5 linguists   

n.通晓数国语言的人( linguist的名词复数 )；语言学家

参考例句：

• The linguists went to study tribal languages in the field. 语言学家们去实地研究部落语言了。 来自辞典例句
• The linguists' main interest has been to analyze and describe languages. 语言学家的主要兴趣一直在于分析并描述语言。 来自辞典例句

6 assessments   

n.评估( assessment的名词复数 )；评价；（应偿付金额的）估定；（为征税对财产所作的）估价

参考例句：

• He was shrewd in his personal assessments. 他总能对人作出精明的评价。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Surveys show about two-thirds use such assessments, while half employ personality tests. 调查表明，约有三分之二的公司采用了这种测评；而一半的公司则采用工作人员个人品质测试。 来自百科语句

7 tribal   

adj.部族的，种族的

参考例句：

• He became skilled in several tribal lingoes.他精通几种部族的语言。
• The country was torn apart by fierce tribal hostilities.那个国家被部落间的激烈冲突弄得四分五裂。

8 geographic   

adj.地理学的，地理的

参考例句：

• The city's success owes much to its geographic position. 这座城市的成功很大程度上归功于它的地理位置。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Environmental problems pay no heed to these geographic lines. 环境问题并不理会这些地理界限。 来自英汉非文学 - 环境法 - 环境法

9 linguistics   

n.语言学

参考例句：

• She plans to take a course in applied linguistics.她打算学习应用语言学课程。
• Linguistics is a scientific study of the property of language.语言学是指对语言的性质所作的系统研究。

10 flip   

vt.快速翻动；轻抛；轻拍；n.轻抛；adj.轻浮的

参考例句：

• I had a quick flip through the book and it looked very interesting.我很快翻阅了一下那本书，看来似乎很有趣。
• Let's flip a coin to see who pays the bill.咱们来抛硬币决定谁付钱。

11 activists   

n.（政治活动的）积极分子，活动家( activist的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• His research work was attacked by animal rights activists . 他的研究受到了动物权益维护者的抨击。
• Party activists with lower middle class pedigrees are numerous. 党的激进分子中有很多出身于中产阶级下层。 来自《简明英汉词典》

12 celebrated   

adj.有名的，声誉卓著的

参考例句：

• He was soon one of the most celebrated young painters in England.不久他就成了英格兰最负盛名的年轻画家之一。
• The celebrated violinist was mobbed by the audience.观众团团围住了这位著名的小提琴演奏家。

13 cardinal   

n.(天主教的)红衣主教；adj.首要的，基本的

参考例句：

• This is a matter of cardinal significance.这是非常重要的事。
• The Cardinal coloured with vexation. 红衣主教感到恼火，脸涨得通红。

14 cardinals   

红衣主教( cardinal的名词复数 )； 红衣凤头鸟（见于北美，雄鸟为鲜红色）； 基数

参考例句：

• cardinals in scarlet robes 身披红袍的枢机主教
• A conclave of cardinals was held to elect the new Pope. 红衣主教团举行了秘密会议来选举新教皇。

15 catfish   

n.鲶鱼

参考例句：

• Huge catfish are skinned and dressed by hand.用手剥去巨鲇的皮并剖洗干净。
• We gigged for catfish off the pier.我们在码头以鱼叉叉鲶鱼。

16 pitchers   

大水罐( pitcher的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Over the next five years, he became one of the greatest pitchers in baseball. 在接下来的5年时间里，他成为了最了不起的棒球投手之一。
• Why he probably won't: Pitchers on also-rans can win the award. 为什麽不是他得奖：投手在失败的球队可以赢得赛扬奖。

17 athletics   

n.运动，体育，田径运动

参考例句：

• When I was at school I was always hopeless at athletics.我上学的时候体育十分糟糕。
• Our team tied with theirs in athletics.在田径比赛中，我们队与他们队旗鼓相当。

18 retired   

adj.隐退的，退休的，退役的

参考例句：

• The old man retired to the country for rest.这位老人下乡休息去了。
• Many retired people take up gardening as a hobby.许多退休的人都以从事园艺为嗜好。

19 dodgers   

n.躲闪者，欺瞒者( dodger的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• a crackdown on fare dodgers on trains 对火车逃票者的严厉打击
• But Twain, Howells, and James were jeeringly described by Mencken as "draft-dodgers". 不过吐温、豪威尔斯和詹姆斯都是被门肯讥诮地叫做“逃避兵役的人。” 来自辞典例句

20 jack   

n.插座，千斤顶，男人；v.抬起，提醒，扛举；n.（Jake）杰克

参考例句：

• I am looking for the headphone jack.我正在找寻头戴式耳机插孔。
• He lifted the car with a jack to change the flat tyre.他用千斤顶把车顶起来换下瘪轮胎。