阅读量:
听过Onomatopoeia这个词么?读音是【ˌɒnə(ʊ)matəˈpiːə】【ˌɑnəˌmædəˈpiə】或者【ˌɑnəˌmɑdəˈpiə】意思是“拟声词”。
英语中的onomatopoeia与中文中的拟声词恐怕不太一样:
以照相机拍照时的拟声词为例,中文说“咔嚓”,英语里不是“ka-cha”(当然,我的一些朋友也能明白“ka-cha”的意思),而是click-click。
再比如汽车喇叭的拟声词,在中文里可能是“嘀嘀”(那个“xx出行”就是用的这个拟声词)或者“嘟嘟”,而在英语里不是“dee-dee”或者“doo-doo”,而是“honk-honk”或者“beep-beep”。
在我们的英语口语描述中,如果需要说到这些拟声词,让我们的口语表达更生动,我们可能需要知道下面这些英语的拟声词说法,并且把这些说法融入我们的口语描述中:
Well, the car going after mine semes to be in a hurry, as it goeshonk-honk all the way. But since there’s only one lane in the direction we were going, neither of us could switch lanes. And at a traffic light, the driver finally had chance to go ahead of me, and the car goes vroom-vroom, overtaking mine within about a second as the light turned green.
The best part of the tour was probably on the train. The tourist train was the old steam-powered train for a purpose, and it goeschugga-chugga, chugga-chugga, and the sound just reminds my father—and many other tourists his age—of the old times. And every time when the train goes choo-choo, my father—the old man—was apparently excited.
Well, I used to be a morning person. And every weekday morning, when my phone alarm goes beep-beep, I could get up immediately. And the beep-beep sound was exciting even on weekends. But I’ve changed in the recent years, and I prefer the late start in the morning.
The beep-beep of our mobile phone can be either stressful or exciting, depending on whose message we are receiving. When a message pops up and it is from your boss, you may get stressed. When a message pops up and it is from a person you have a crush on, you may get a bit nervous but mostly excited.
Recent years have seen the exciting upgrade of China’s retail business, and the delivery service has made life so easy. This is how it work: our fingers go tap-tap-tap, and an order is placed via those grocery shopping apps, and what we do is simple: we just wait for the knock-knock of the door or the ding-dong—if the door has a bell. Then, things will arrive within an average time of 30 minutes. Thanks to the delivery service, life has become so effortless.
Well, the clock in the examination room goes tick-tock, tick-tock. And in such a quiet room, the tick-tock sound becomes so loud and so stressful. My thoughts kept being interrupted by the tick-tock, tick-tock, tick-tock, tick-tock, and it just wouldn’t stop. Now, as I’m describing that to you, you know how annoying that was. That was just terrible.
数一数,以上提及了几种英语中的拟声词?5种?6种?9种?12种?
你知道上面这些拟声词中,有些其实还是动词么?