雙語：十個你不知道的有趣英語小知識

Did you know that enneacontakaienneagon is actually a word in the English language? In fact, the meaning of the word is just as bizarre as the word itself: it』s a shape with ninety-nine sides.

你知道嗎？enneacontakaienneagon 真的是一個英語單詞，而且它的意思就跟單詞本身一樣奇怪：這是一個九十九邊形。

Compared to other languages, English may seem simple, but that is probably because most people don』t realize it is full of crazy inventions, misinterpretations, mistakes, strange words, and needless words!

與其他語言相比，很多人認為英語很簡單，這可能是因為他們並不知道英語里其實充滿了瘋狂的、錯誤的和各種奇怪的、無用的單詞！

Let』s take a look at ten interesting facts about the English language:

來看看英語中都有哪些有趣的地方：

1.「I am」 is the shortest complete sentence in the English language.

「I am」 是英語中最短的完整句

2. A pangram sentence is one that contains every letter in the language.

Pangram Sentence（全字母短句）是指包括英語全部26個字母的短句。比如 The quick brown fox jumps over a lazy dog.

3. Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious (*breath*) is NOT the longest word in English.

Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious 並不是最長的英語單詞。

This extra long word (that approximately means 「fantastic」) was popularized by the movie Mary Poppins and was eventually added to the dictionary. What you probably didn』t know is that there is a word that is longer—yes longer—than this one. Pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis is a type of lung disease caused by inhaling ash and dust. Go ahead and try pronouncing that!

這個詞是迪士尼音樂電影《歡樂滿人間》中一首插曲的名字，與fantastic同義，最終也被收入詞典。你可能不相信，英語中還有比這更長的單詞：Pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis，一種由於吸入塵土導致的肺部疾病的名字。 試試看你能不能拼讀出來！

4. There are 「ghost words」 that mean nothing.

英語中居然也存在著沒有任何意義的「別字」。

Believe it or not, there are some words that appeared in the dictionary because of printing errors. The nonexistent word 「dord」 appeared in the dictionary for eight years in the mid-20th century. It became known as a 「ghost word.」

信不信由你，有些單詞出現在詞典中其實只是因為印刷錯誤。比如「dord」這個不存在的單詞竟然在20世紀中期在字典上保留了8年之久！它成為了「別字」的重要代表。

5. The shortest, oldest, and most commonly used word is 「I.

最短、最歷史悠久以及最常使用的單詞是「 I 」。

6. A new word is added to the dictionary every two hours.

每兩小時就會有一個新詞被添加進詞典中。

During the course of the year, almost 4,000 new words are added! So, the next time you try to catch the attention of the dissertation committee, try adding some new words to your project.

在這一年裡，已經有4000個新詞被收錄進詞典。如果你想要吸引論文委員會的注意，在論文里使用一些新詞可能是個不錯的選擇。

7. There』s a name for words that we repeat often.

那些我們經常重複的詞，它們是有名字的！

Words we always use even though they add no meaning or value to a sentence are called crutch words. For example, in the sentence 「Then I was like, OMG, then like, he went there, and like…」 it is pretty obvious that 「like」 is the crutch word. 「Actually,」 「honestly,」 and 「basically」 are also commonly used as crutch words.

我們在談話中經常用到的但對內容沒有任何作用的詞，叫做Crutch words（拐杖詞）。比如「Then I was like, OMG, then like, he went there, and like…」 中的like，還有「Actually」 「honestly」 「basically」，這些詞都可以叫做crutch words。

8. Swims will be swims even when turned upside down.

當你把SWIMS倒過來你會發現...它還是SWIMS！這樣的詞叫做ambigrams（對稱詞）

9. English is the language of the air.

英語是空中專用語。

This means that all pilots have to identify themselves and speak in English while flying, regardless of their origin.

意思是，所有的飛行員在飛行中需要確認彼此身份時都必須使用英語，無論他們來自哪裡。

10. Girl used to mean small boy or girl.

Girl可以用來指小孩子，男孩女孩都可以。

The word 「girl」 was not initially used to refer to a specific gender. It used to mean 「child」 or 「young person」 regardless of the gender.

」girl」一開始並不特指某種性別，過去都用這個詞來指代小孩或者年輕人。

編譯：陸婧宇