发布时间 : 星期一 文章川大2012年硕士研究生入学考试试题（翻译硕士英语）更新完毕开始阅读8d420dc16137ee06eff91851
of a common tongue a language that would cross national barriers, one simple enough to be universally learned by travelers, businessmen, government representatives, scholars, and even by children in school. Of course, this isn’t a new idea. Just as everyone is against sin, so everyone is for a common language that would further communication between nations. What with one thing and another—our natural state of drift as human beings, our rivalries, resentments, and jealousies as nations—we have up until now failed to take any action. I propose that we stop just talking about it, as Mark Twain said of the weather, and do something about it. We must make the concerted, massive effort it takes to reach agreement on the adoption of a single, common auxiliary tongue.
Let’s take a quick look at the realities of the problem. One of the main barriers to the adoption of the common language is the fact that there is Babel even among the possible languages we can choose. A number of different simplified languages vie for the spot of the language, and their respective advocates defend and attack with the fervor of political campaigners. Basic English, for example, with its vocabulary of only 850 words with which virtually anything can be expressed, has many advocates. But the Soviet Union and many nations of Asia and South America object to it. Why English? They ask. Why not Basic Russian, Basic Spanish, even Basic Latin?
In addition to the “basics” of languages now in use, there is
another type—the so-called “constructed languages,” of which some six hundred have made their appearance since the end of the
nineteenth century, most of them almost immediate failures. The two best-known survivors among them are, of course, Esperanto and Interlingua.
Esperanto was published in 1887 by a Russian-Polish physician names Zamenhof, who had worked on it for ten years. He gave it to the world not under his own name but under the pseudonym Doktoro Esperanto, meaning “Doctor Hopeful.” Esperanto is based on regularity and ease of grammar, with a vocabulary from Roman-Germanic roots. By the end of the century Esperanto had taken hold in western Europe.
Interlingua made its appearance much later—in 1951. A group of linguists from many nations took nearly thirty years to perfect it. Essentially, Interlingua is Latin stripped of its difficulties. Its introducer, Dr. Alexander Gode, refers to it as “a kind of twentieth century kitchen Latin.” Indeed, Interlingua can be read by most college-trained people almost at sight.
I do not by any means consider myself an authority on the relative merits of the various proposed common languages, but Dr. Mario Pei, of Columbia University in New York City, has written a fine book on the subject called One Language for the World. In this book Dr. Pei says he believes that it makes little difference which language or what kind of language becomes the international language, as long as agreement can be reached among the people of the world on any one. For my own part, it seems to me that the main requirement of an international language is that it be easily learned. Thus it should have the simplest possible spelling and grammar and pronunciation, and the smallest possible vocabulary. An adult should be able to master such a language within three months if he gives several hours a day to the study of it.
What can be done concretely to achieve the goal of a working common language? I believe that the UNESCO arm of the United Nations should call a meeting of leading linguists from each of its member nations. (This would include most of the major populated areas of the world.) As Dr. Pei recommends, the purpose of the conference would be to select an already existing language agreeable to a preponderance of the nations represented. Such an agreement won’t come without determined effort: it may take more than one conference to reach agreement; it may take many more. The important thing is that some positive action be taken.
Such a conference should be called without further delay; we are sorely in need of this first step. Only with an international
language in use, with the proceedings of the UN published in it, with children in schools all over the world learning it as their second language, can we close the gap between the “one world” so recently established in terms of travel time and the one world we hope for in terms of human understanding and co-operations.
Because I believe strongly that without the closing of this gap
international accord is only a vain hope, I’ve taken it upon myself to try to implement this proposal. Since it is most unlikely that either UNESCO or the nations involved have funds to finance the linguists’ conference, I think that one of the great philanthropic foundations, such as the Ford, Carnegie, or Rockefeller Foundation, should undertake to make it possible.
I have already approached one of these foundations for such a grant--and been turned down. I shall approach the others in turn, and if I am turned down by all, I shall look for other ways to make this conference possible.
It is the responsibility of all Americans to do whatever they can in their own communities to make this goal of one language for one world a reality for our children.
4. What is “Babel”? And what does “Babel” refer to respectively in the following few phrases: “the tower of Babel” (para.1), “our contemporary Babel” (para.1), “Babel barrier”(para.3), “diplomatic Babel” (para.3) “there is Babel” (para.6)?
5. According to the author, what are the things that really matter for the success of an international language? Do you agree?
III. Writing (30’)
Write an article (not a poem, short story or play) of about 400 words in response to the following news report.. Be sure to give your article a title.
Company in Hubei says no to rich kids
BEIJING, Nov. 3 (Xinhuanet) --A cultural media company in central China's Hubei Province has recently triggered a heated discussion about the company's recruitment requirements among college graduates who are looking for a job, according to reports Tuesday.
The company, at a campus recruitment event of Wuhan University of Science and Technology, clearly stated that graduates who are leaders of student unions are preferred, while those that are in the rich second generation (R2G) will be excluded from applying for any job within the company.
\they do not make any efforts, they have a bright future inherited from their parents. And maybe because of this, some companies are prejudiced against them,\\those who are not capable enough to be hired or for those who have poor qualities,\family we are born into, so it is not fair to judge people in accordance with the background of their family.\
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employees,\has told us that many R2G cannot bear hard work and are hard to cooperate with.\
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people also persuaded us to list this stipulation,\\
opportunities. They should not use a small number of people to define the entire group,\Scientific Socialism Research Institute.
\What this company did is a typical example of social exclusion,\added Liu.