雙語美文欣賞《真正有意義的生活》
我們學(xué)習(xí)英語時,不要忘記,要多讀英語美文,接下來,小編給大家準(zhǔn)備了雙語美文欣賞《真正有意義的生活》,歡迎大家參考與借鑒。
雙語美文欣賞《真正有意義的生活》
What will matter?
什么才重要?
Ready or not, some day it will all come to an end. There will be no more sunrises, no days, no hours or minutes. All the things you collected, whether treasured or forgotten, will pass to someone else.
無論是否準(zhǔn)備好,總有一天它都會走到盡頭。 那里沒有日出,沒有白天,沒有小時和分鐘。 你收集的所有東西,不管你珍惜或忘記與否,它們都將流入他人手中。
Your wealth, fame and temporal power will shrivel to irrelevance. It will not matter what you owned or what you were owed.
不管是你得到的或是你欠別人的,可你的財產(chǎn)、名譽(yù)和權(quán)勢也都會變成和你毫不相干的東西。
Your grudges, resentments, frustrations, and jealousies will finally disappear.
你的怨恨、憤慨、挫折和妒忌最終也將消失。
So, too, your hopes, ambitions, plans, and to-do lists will all expire.The wins and losses that once seemed so important will fade away.
因此,你的希望、抱負(fù)、計劃以及行動日程表也將全部結(jié)束。 當(dāng)初看得比較重的成功得失也會消失。
It won't matter where you came from, or on what side of the tracks you lived.
你來自何方,住在窮人區(qū)還是富人區(qū)也都不重要了。
It won't matter whether you were beautiful or brilliant. Your gender, skin color, ethnicity will be irrelevant.
你昔日的漂亮與輝煌也都不重要了,你的性別、膚色、種族地位也將消失。
So what will matter? How will the value of your days be measured?
因此,什么重要呢? 怎么衡量你有生之年的價值呢?
What will matter is not what you bought, but what you built; not what you got, but what you gave.
重要的不是你買了什么,而是你創(chuàng)造了什么; 不是你得到了什么,而是你給予了什么。
What will matter is not your success, but your significance.
重要的不是你成功了,而是你生命的意義。
What will matter is not what you learned, but what you taught.
重要的不是你學(xué)到了什么,而是你傳授了什么。
What will matter is every act of integrity, compassion, courage and sacrifice that enriched, empowered or encouraged others to emulate your example.
重要的是每個行動之中都有正直和勇氣的氣概,偉大的同情心和犧牲精神,并且鼓勵他人遵從榜樣。
What will matter is not your competence, but your character.
重要的不是你的能力,而是你的性格。
What will matter is not how many people you knew, but how many will feel a lasting loss when you're gone.
重要的不是你認(rèn)識多少人,而是在你離開后,多少人會悵然若失。
What will matter is not your memories, but the memories of those who loved you.
重要的不是你的回憶,而是愛你的人對你的追思。
What will matter is how long you will be remembered, by whom and for what.
重要的是別人會記你多長時間,誰記著你,為什么記著你。
Living a life that matters doesn’ t happen by accident.
過有意義的生活不是一樁偶然。
It s not a matter of circumstance but of choice.
是因?yàn)槟氵x擇了它。
Choose to live a life that matters.
選擇有意義的人生吧!
擴(kuò)展:要學(xué)習(xí)一門外語,那就給自己造一個文化孤島吧
Are you trying to learn a new language in a foreign land? You might be better off if you stopped looking at that picture of your family and friends.
你是否正身處異國他鄉(xiāng),正在努力學(xué)習(xí)一門新的語言?如果你能放下那張家人和親友的照片不再看它,也許你的學(xué)習(xí)之旅或許能事半功倍。
When learning a new language, your brain is running a whole new neuropathway, creating new patterns and trying to fix those new pathways permanently in your gray matter. New research from Columbia University found that prompting someone who is learning a new language with images and reminders of their own culture could temporarily wreck everything that the brain was trying to build.
當(dāng)我們學(xué)習(xí)一門新語言的時候,我們的大腦里新的神經(jīng)通路就開始發(fā)揮作用,大腦會創(chuàng)造新的認(rèn)知模式,并使這種新的認(rèn)知模式與大腦灰質(zhì)構(gòu)建永久性的聯(lián)系。哥倫比亞大學(xué)的一項新研究證實(shí),當(dāng)人們用一個初學(xué)者本土文化的意象和物象來刺激他的二語習(xí)得時,大腦在二語習(xí)得過程中試圖架構(gòu)的模式和聯(lián)系可能被徹底摧毀。
When native Chinese students were asked to converse with a Caucasian avatar versus a Chinese avatar, their English skills were so different. Simply exposing students to a Chinese person affected their ability to speak English. Subjects who talked with the Chinese version felt more comfortable in their speech, but they produced 11% fewer words per minute. They actually became less fluent speakers.
研究人員讓來自中國的學(xué)生與一個金發(fā)碧眼的網(wǎng)絡(luò)虛擬形象對話,然后與一個黑發(fā)黑眼的中國人的網(wǎng)絡(luò)虛擬形象對話,結(jié)果學(xué)生們前后表現(xiàn)出的英語表達(dá)技能大不相同。讓學(xué)生們面對一個中國的對話對象確實(shí)會影響他們說英語的水平。與中國人的網(wǎng)絡(luò)虛擬形象對話時,學(xué)生們在對話中感到更加輕松自如,但是他們每分鐘使用的語匯少了11%。他們使用英語的流利程度真的降低了。
To make sure it wasn't just the avatar, researchers also showed people random images of China while the participants told a story. When pictures of their homeland appeared, fluency dropped 16% and volunteers were 85% more likely to use a literal translation, for example, calling pistachios "happy nuts". Because that's literally what the Chinese word for pistachio means.
為了確證上述實(shí)驗(yàn)現(xiàn)象不僅僅出現(xiàn)在學(xué)生們與網(wǎng)絡(luò)虛擬形象對話的過程中,研究者們還請學(xué)生們講述故事,并在此過程中向?qū)W生們展示隨機(jī)選出的中國人圖像。當(dāng)這些祖國同胞們的圖像出現(xiàn)的時候,學(xué)生們講述故事的流利程度降低了16%、使用牽強(qiáng)附會的中式英語的幾率多了85%。比如,他們會把開心果說成“快樂的堅果”。因?yàn)樵谥形闹虚_心果的意思直譯成英語就是這個意思。
The brain is constantly sucking in information and, let's be honest, it's lazy, so when the brain can do something it already knows how to do, it will. In this case the shortcut is reverting to its old patterns and neuropathways.
我們的大腦會持續(xù)不斷的吸收信息,而且,說實(shí)在的,我們的大腦很懶惰。所以,當(dāng)大腦察覺它可以用熟知的方式去完成一件事的時候,它就會選擇熟知的方式。如此一來,原本需要構(gòu)建的新認(rèn)知模式被認(rèn)知的捷徑取代,大腦又退返到使用舊的認(rèn)知模式和神經(jīng)通路。
Culture and communication are a large part of our everyday lives, and those are well-worn pathways, so they're really difficult to alter. This effect doesn't force only on language processing either. When the students were shown pictures of fish with one swimming ahead of the others, their cultural prompt would change how they look at the photo. With Chinese prompts, like photos of the Great Wall or Chinese Dragon, etc. saw more students thinking that the fish was being chased, whereas an American prompt, like pictures of Marilyn Monroe or Superman, saw those students believing that it was a leader fish... Why are our cultural symbols Marilyn Monroe and Superman?
文化和交流是我們每日生活的一大組成部分,正是這些在我們的大腦中構(gòu)建了我們再熟悉不過的思維通路,這些思維通路很難換道。已有思維通路的頑固作用不僅出現(xiàn)在語言習(xí)得這一個方面。當(dāng)研究者們向?qū)W生們展示一幅研究圖片時,文化原型會影響他們對圖片的理解方式。對一幅表現(xiàn)一條魚在前,一群魚在后的圖片。中國學(xué)生的認(rèn)知模式受到中國文化的文化原型影響,他們的文化原型體現(xiàn)在長城和中國龍等圖像中,在他們看來,研究圖片表現(xiàn)的是一條魚正在被一群魚追趕。而美國文化的文化原型則表現(xiàn)在瑪麗蓮·夢露或超人的形象上,因而美國學(xué)生會認(rèn)為研究圖片所表現(xiàn)的是一只魚帶領(lǐng)著一群魚。不過為什么美國人的文化原型象征會是瑪麗蓮·夢露和超人呢?……
The bottom line is: when attempting to learn a new culture it is far better to surround yourself with that culture than create an island of the old one amidst the new one. Part of this can be seen in highly multicultural cities with isolated ethnic areas. Folks in these isolated communities would not only see less exposure for the culture and the language of the surrounding city, but they learn fluency far more slowly.
底線是:如果你想學(xué)好一門新語言,就讓自己浸淫在這種新文化之中,讓自己置身于一個與原有的文化場域隔海相望的文化孤島。那些文化雜交性顯著,居民的種族身份相對集中的城市地區(qū)就能看出文化孤立的重要性。在這些城市地區(qū),居民接觸本地區(qū)之外的文化和語言的機(jī)會較少,不僅如此,他們掌握本地區(qū)之外的新語言的效率也相對很低。
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