By 謝忠理 on Thursday, 13 April 2023
Category: 托福口說

BBC 6 分鐘英語—How culture affects sadness 文化如何影響悲傷

人們隨著成長的文化不同,而產生了對於悲傷情緒的不同表達方式。一起來聽聽 BBC 6 分鐘英語對這個話題的討論。

How culture affects sadness 文化如何影響悲傷

BBC 6 分鐘英語在 2023 年 04 月 13 日播出的節目 中討論的是文化如何影響悲傷。

文化如何影響你感受和表達悲傷的方式?BBC 6 分鐘英語的主持人尼爾和薩姆將調查人們表達悲傷的方式是如何受其文化影響的。同時和往常一樣,節目主持人也會教導聽眾一些相關詞彙與表達方式。

本周的問題

哪種顏色與悲傷有關?它是:
a) 黃色?
b) 藍色? 或者
c) 棕色?

詞彙

(to be) down in the dumps 頹廢
感到悲慘和壓抑

(to be) fed up 厭煩
感到不開心、無聊或疲倦,特別是對你已經經歷了很長時間的事情感到不開心。

melancholy 憂鬱
強烈而深思熟慮的悲傷

grief 悲痛
強烈的悲傷感,特別是由某人的死亡引起的悲傷感

repressed 壓抑
不能表現出自己的真實感受和情緒

stiff upper lip 僵硬的上唇
當你不高興時,就算很難,也壓抑著不表現出你的感受。

中英文稿謄本

BBC 6 minute English – How culture affects sadness

點此看英文原稿

Sam
Hello. This is 6 Minute English from BBC Learning English. I’m Sam.

Neil
And I’m Neil. When Helen Russell was three years old, her new-born baby sister died suddenly. Looking back at that sad time, Helen remembers making a big decision – she wanted to be happy. She became a bestselling author and wrote a book called, The Atlas of Happiness. She got married, and even moved to the famously happy city of Copenhagen in Denmark.

Sam
But the sadness Helen felt didn’t disappear, and the longer she lived abroad, the more she wondered whether her feelings were somehow connected to being born in England, into a culture where, traditionally, expressing your emotions was discouraged.

Neil
In this programme, we’ll be investigating how the way people express sadness is influenced by their culture, and, as usual, we’ll be learning some new, useful vocabulary as well.

Sam
But first I have a question for you, Neil. In English there are many idioms which describe being sad, including down in the dumps, meaning that you feel miserable and depressed. Also, emotions are often associated with colours, for example you might go red with anger, or turn green with envy. But which colour is associated with sadness? Is it:
a) yellow?
b) blue? or,
c) brown?

Neil
I think the answer is blue.

Sam
OK, Neil. We’ll find out the later in the programme. Around the world, cultures express emotions very differently. In Spain, flamenco performers express their emotions with colourful displays of song and dance, whereas in Japan, crying is considered weak and shameful. To discover more about how British people express their feelings, Helen Russell interviewed, Thomas Dixon, a professor at the Centre for the History of Emotion, for BBC World Service programme, The Documentary:

Professor Thomas Dixon
The word sad, as you will know, Helen, literally means sated or full. So, it’s earliest use is in English, it means being literally fed up, being full of something sad or sated means heavy and full. And then of course we have this huge vocabulary of melancholy, sorrow, grief, depression and many, many other terms, and they all mean slightly different things.

Neil
Professor Dixon explains that the original meaning of the word sad was ‘full’ or fed up – a phrase which today means being unhappy, bored or tired of something which has been going on a long time. For example: everyone is fed up of Covid.

Sam
But fed up is just one of many words to describe feelings of sadness, each with a slightly different meaning. One of them is melancholy, a kind of intense and thoughtful sadness. Another is grief - a strong sadness often caused by the death of someone you love.

Neil
In Irish culture, melancholy is expressed artistically in poems or songs. And in other cultures, India for example, grief can be expressed by professional mourners who are paid to cry by the family of the person who has died. In England, however, big public displays of emotion are uncommon.

Sam
But according to Professor Dixon that wasn’t always the case. Here he explains to BBC World Service programme, The Documentary, how it was only quite recently, during the time of Queen Victoria and the British Empire, that the English got a reputation for being repressed - unable to show their true feelings and emotions.

Professor Thomas Dixon
By and large it's a Victorian, and then Edwardian, and 20th century characterization. As you can imagine, it fits with the era of empire, of white British men going around the world conquering it, and having a stiff upper lip and ruling over the people… in other parts of the world, and believing themselves, the white Europeans, to be superior… and one sign of that superiority, and Darwin writes: Englishmen rarely caught cry except under the pressure of the acutest grief.

Neil
Professor Dixon says the Victorians who ruled the empire had a stiff upper lip. These men believed they were better than everyone else, and that to cry was a sign of weakness. When we cry, our top lip starts to wobble and so this gave rise to the idiom a stiff upper lip, meaning to not show your feelings when you are upset, even though it is difficult not to.

Sam
Fortunately, most Brits are less repressed nowadays, but it’s still hard for some people, especially men, to express their feelings. Sometimes drinking alcohol gives people the courage to say what they are feeling, but this is not so healthy and can even increase feelings of depression.

Neil
It’s talking to someone about your feelings that can really help, and keep away the blues… and in saying that I think I’ve answered your question, Sam.

Sam
I asked Neil which colour is often associated with feeling sad.

Neil
And I said it was blue…

Sam
Which was… the correct answer, and it gives us another idiom about sadness – feeling blue. OK, let’s recap the vocabulary we’ve learned from this programme about the emotion of sadness, or in other words, feeling down in the dumps.

Neil
If you are fed up of something, you’re unhappy, bored, or tired of it, especially if it’s been happening a long time.

Sam
Melancholy is a type of intense and thoughtful sadness; and grief is a strong sadness usually caused by someone’s death

Neil
The adjective repressed means unable to show your true feelings and emotions.

Sam
And finally, the uniquely British idiom, to keep a stiff upper lip, means not to show your feelings when you’re upset, even though it is difficult not to. Hiding you feelings or bottling them up is definitely won’t make you happy, but making friends and learning something new might, so remember to join us again soon, here at 6 Minute English. Bye for now!

Neil
Bye!

廣播原稿中文翻譯有兩個目的。首先是幫助聽力有困難的讀者能夠快速了解原文的意思。而更重要的原因是,提供給練習英語口語表達的讀者訓練的素材。

由於每個人的知識範疇各不相同,因此碰到超出自己專長的領域,常常會啞口無言,無話可說。這對練習英語表達是一項非常難以克服的障礙。所以參考 6 分鐘英語的對白稿,既可以讓自我練習英語對話時有貼切適當的素材,同時也能順便學些道地的表達方式,實是一舉數得。

使用上,可以在聽完一、兩次原始廣播之後,試著一邊看中文謄本,一邊流利、正確地用英語說出文中的內容。多次練習之後,未來自然能夠在碰到同樣主題時與人侃侃而談。

BBC 6 minute English – How culture affects sadness

點此看中文翻譯

薩姆
你好。這裡是 BBC 學習英語的 6 分鐘英語。我是薩姆。

尼爾
我是尼爾。當海倫.拉塞爾三歲的時候,她剛出生的小妹妹突然去世。回顧那段悲傷的時光,海倫記得自己做了一個重大的決定—她想變得快樂。她成為一名暢銷書作家,並寫了一本書,名為《幸福地圖》。她結婚了,甚至搬到了丹麥著名的幸福城市哥本哈根。

薩姆
但是,海倫感到的悲傷並沒有消失,她在國外生活的時間越長,她就越想知道她的感受是否與出生在英國有關,在那裡,傳統上不鼓勵表達自己的情感。

尼爾
在這個節目中,我們將研究人們表達悲傷的方式是如何受其文化影響的,而且,像往常一樣,我們還將學習一些新的、有用的詞彙。

薩姆
但首先我有個問題要問你,尼爾。在英語中,有許多描述悲傷的成語,包括 down in the dumps,意思是你感到悲慘和沮喪。另外,情緒往往與顏色有關,例如,你可能因憤怒而變紅,或因嫉妒而變綠。但是哪種顏色與悲傷有關呢?它是:
a) 黃色?
b) 藍色?或者、
c) 棕色?

尼爾
我認為答案是藍色。

薩姆
好的,尼爾。我們將在節目的後面找出答案。在世界各地,各種文化對情感的表達方式非常不同。在西班牙,佛萊明哥表演者用豐富多彩的歌曲和舞蹈來表達他們的情感,而在日本,哭泣被認為是軟弱和可恥的。為了進一步瞭解英國人如何表達他們的情感,海倫.拉塞爾為 BBC 世界服務節目《紀錄片》採訪了情感史中心的教授托馬斯.迪克森:

托馬斯.狄克遜教授
海倫,你會知道,悲傷這個詞的字面意思是吃飽了。所以,它最早的用法是在英語中,它的意思是字面意義上的厭倦,充滿了悲傷或飽滿的東西,意味著沉重和充滿。當然,我們還有這個大量的詞彙,如憂鬱、悲傷、悲痛、抑鬱和許多其他術語,它們的意思都略有不同。

尼爾
狄克遜教授解釋說,悲傷這個詞的原始含義是「充滿」或厭倦—這個短語在今天意味著對已經持續了很長時間的事情感到不高興、無聊或厭倦。例如:每個人都對新冠肺炎感到厭倦了。

薩姆
受夠了只是描述悲傷情緒的眾多詞彙之一,每個詞彙的含義都略有不同。其中一個是憂鬱,一種強烈的、深思熟慮的悲傷。另一個是悲傷—一種通常由你所愛的人的死亡引起的強烈的悲傷。

尼爾
在愛爾蘭文化中,憂鬱是通過詩歌或歌曲來藝術地表達的。而在其他文化中,例如印度,悲傷可以通過專業的哀悼者來表達,這些哀悼者是由死亡者的家人付費給專門的哀悼者來哭泣的。然而,在英國,大張旗鼓地公開表達情感是不常見的。

薩姆
但據狄克遜教授說,情況並非總是如此。在這裡,他向 BBC 世界服務節目《紀錄片》解釋說,直到最近,在維多利亞女王和大英帝國時期,英國人才有了壓抑的名聲—無法展現他們的真實情感和情緒。

托馬斯.狄克遜教授

整體來說,這是一個維多利亞時代,然後是愛德華時代,以及 20 世紀的特徵描述。你可以想像,它符合帝國時代,英國白人到世界各地去征服它,並有一個僵硬的上唇和統治人民……在世界其他地方,並認為自己,歐洲白人,是優越的……和這種優越感的一個標誌,達爾文寫道:英國人除了在最尖銳的悲痛壓力下,很少被人看到在哭。

尼爾
狄克遜教授說,統治帝國的維多利亞人有一個僵硬的上唇。這些人認為他們比其他人都好,而哭泣是軟弱的表現。當我們哭泣時,我們的上唇開始搖晃,因此這就產生了僵硬的上唇這個成語,意思是當你不高興時不要表現出你的感情,儘管不表現出來很難。

薩姆
幸運的是,現在大多數英國人都不那麼壓抑了,但對一些人來說,尤其是男人,仍然很難表達自己的感情。有時喝酒會讓人們有勇氣說出他們的感受,但這並不那麼健康,甚至會增加抑鬱的感覺。

尼爾
和別人談論你的感受,才能真正幫助你,遠離憂鬱……說到這裡,我想我已經回答了你的問題,薩姆。

薩姆
我問尼爾,哪種顏色經常與悲傷的感覺有關?

尼爾
我說是藍色…

薩姆
這是……正確的答案,它給我們提供了另一個關於悲傷的成語—藍色感覺。好的,讓我們回顧一下我們在這個節目中所學到的關於悲傷情緒的詞彙,或者換句話說,就是感到沮喪的情緒

尼爾
如果你對某件事情感到厭煩,你就會不高興、厭煩或厭倦,特別是如果它已經發生了很長時間。

薩姆
憂鬱是一種強烈的、深思熟慮的悲傷;而悲痛是一種強烈的悲傷,通常是由某人的死亡引起的。

尼爾
形容詞壓抑的意思是無法表現出你的真實感受和情緒。

薩姆
最後,英國特有的成語,保持僵硬的上唇,是指當你不高興的時候不要表現出你的感受,儘管不表現出來很困難。隱藏自己的感情或把它們裝進瓶子裡肯定不會讓你快樂,但交朋友和學習新東西可能會讓你快樂,所以記得不久後要再加入我們,在 6 分鐘英語網站這裡。先說再見了!

尼爾
再見!

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