TED演讲:学习新语言的四个理由(2)
I think there are a lot of reasons, but I first want to address the one that you’re probably most likely to have heard of,
我觉得理由很多，但是我首先想要弄清一个概念，可能大家也都听过，
because actually it’s more dangerous than you might think.
但它可能比你想象的还要重要。
And that is the idea that a language channels your thoughts,
这个观点是语言能塑造你的思维，
that the vocabulary and the grammar of different languages gives everybody a different kind of acid trip, so to speak.
不同语言的词汇和语法结构给了每个人不同的思维方式，类似于此。
That is a marvelously enticing idea, but it’s kind of fraught.
这是个挺诱人的观点，但却有点误人子弟。
So it’s not that it’s untrue completely.
这个说法也不全错。
So for example, in French and Spanish the word for table is, for some reason, marked as feminine.
比如说，法语和西班牙语中“桌子”这个单词，由于某些原因，都是阴性的。
So, “la table,” “la mesa,” you just have to deal with it.
比如“la table”、“la mesa”，你知道就够了。
It has been shown that if you are a speaker of one of those languages and you happen to be asked how you would imagine a table talking,
研究表明，如果这些语言是你的母语，那么当你被问到要想象一张桌子突然开口说话，
then much more often than could possibly be an accident,
那么大多数情况下，不排除意外，
a French or a Spanish speaker says that the table would talk with a high and feminine voice.
一位说法语或西班牙语的人会说桌子说话的声音是女性的高音。
So if you’re French or Spanish, to you, a table is kind of a girl, as opposed to if you are an English speaker.
所以如果你是法国或西班牙人，你会把桌子看成女孩，而说英语的人的看法恰恰相反。
It’s hard not to love data like that,
我们都很喜欢这种观察结果，
and many people will tell you that that means that there’s a worldview that you have if you speak one of those languages.
而且很多人会告诉你这意味着当你说话时，你继承了那种语言的世界观。
But you have to watch out, because imagine if somebody put us under the microscope,
但是你要谨慎些，想象一下有人把我们放在显微镜下，
the us being those of us who speak English natively. What is the worldview from English?
我们这些母语是英语的人。那么英语的世界观是什么？
英语正迅速成为世界通用语言，同步翻译技术也在逐年提高。那么为什么还要学习一门外语呢？美国哥伦比亚大学教授、语言学家约翰·麦克沃特分享了学习一门不熟悉的语言的四个好处。