(46)The English language is being destroyed by a "deadly virus of management-speak" which has infected the mouths and minds of p

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问题     (46)The English language is being destroyed by a "deadly virus of management-speak" which has infected the mouths and minds of politicians like Tony Blair and George W. Bush, a leading UK journalist said recently.
    The British Prime Minister and his ally the U.S. President are mangling the language, destroying its meaning by avoiding the use of verbs, twisting nouns into verbs, and endlessly repeating phrases until they become "zombified".
    "It’s deeply depressing," says John Humphrys, one of Britain’s leading political journalists and the author of a new book "Lost for Words". Humphys’ book laments the growth of "clichéd, dumbed-down, inflated and bogus management-speak" which he says now passes for English.
    (47)In particular he criticizes political leaders for being sucked into using meaningless phrases and unimaginative words to disguise policies or protect themselves from responsibility.
    Humphrys has been a journalist for 45 years and in his current post as a presenter on BBC radio’s news and current affairs program "Today," he regularly interviews world leaders.
    "The whole essence of a good lively democracy is that one has good lively argument," he told reporters in an interview. "But this kind of language kills real debate."
    (48)"And nobody is prepared to stand up and say: ’what does that mean?’ Because the assumption is made that if you don’t know what it means then there is something wrong with you."
    (49)Humphrys says the original wrongdoers in the destruction of English are "business leaders who are trying to sell their own particular theories and have invented their own ridiculous phrases and vocabulary to accompany those theories."
    But for him the more sinister development is that such language has taken root in political discourse.
    Humphrys picks on Bush—who once famously used the word "misunderestimate"—and pokes fun at him as someone who "often speaks as though English were his second language."
    (50)He also labels the U.S. leader a "master of the language of political manipulation" and accuses him of sweeping aside all the nuances of notions like freedom, truth and democracy. And instead he fires the words out like "dum-dum bullets."
    Blair, too, is singled out as a king of language corruption.
    Humphrys notes Blair’s apparent fear of verbs and mocks in his speeches, which are peppered with verbless phrases like "new challenges, new ideas," or "for our young people, a brighter future" and "the age of achievement, at home and abroad."
    By using this technique, Humphrys says, Blair is simply evading responsibility.


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答案没有人愿意站起来问:‘那到底是什么意思?’因为大家都已认定,如果你不明白那是什么意思,那就是你出问题了。

解析 本句是复合句,句子主干结构是nobody is prepared。句中because the assumption is made…是原因状语从句;that if you don’t know what it means…是assumption的同位语从句,其中if you don’t know what it means为该从句中的条件状语从句。翻译时应注意同位语从句的译法,将其转化为宾语从句翻译出来。此外,应注意被动语态的翻译,句中the assumption is made译成"大家都已认定"。
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