生活中，商務(wù)英語是最常使用的。不少同學(xué)認(rèn)為能說幾個(gè)商務(wù)術(shù)語肯定很拉風(fēng)，但是很多術(shù)語或行話只是以訛傳訛，不僅是陳詞濫調(diào)而且根本就是錯(cuò)誤的!

　　Oh, English, the beautiful bastard of European language, the tongue of kings, merchants, scientists and poets. Ever-flexible and always-developing, English is constantly being expanded: usually by its most-common users. Shakespeare invented almost 2,000 words, from “arouse” to “zany.”

　　噢，英文，歐洲語言中美麗的混蛋，國(guó)王、商人、科學(xué)家、詩(shī)人的語言。靈活多變、不斷發(fā)展。英語一直在擴(kuò)充：通常是最經(jīng)常使用這門語言的人干的好事兒。莎士比亞創(chuàng)造了大約2000個(gè)單詞，從“引起”到“滑稽的”。

　　Before that, Chaucer added some of English’s most common expressions – “absent,” “accident,” “box,” and so on. (Equally important, he also gave us “veal,” “vulgar,” and “laxative.”) And, now, in our century, Gerald (that guy who sits across from you in the office and manages Accounts Payable) gives us treasure after treasure, from “incentivize” to “granularity” to “disintermediate.”

　　在他之前，喬叟創(chuàng)造了英文中最普遍的表達(dá)——“事故”，“盒子”等等。(同樣值得一提的是，“小牛肉”、“粗俗的”和“通便藥”也是他發(fā)明的。)在我們現(xiàn)在這個(gè)時(shí)代，杰拉德(在辦公室坐你對(duì)面處理應(yīng)付賬款的那位老兄)給了我們一堆又一堆單詞，從“刺激”到“高數(shù)據(jù)粒度”再到“作非居間化投資”。

　　“Special Purpose” English has always had a place in society: doctors and nurses need a set of words to describe medicine, illnesses, and surgical tools; pilots need an entirely unique vocabulary to talk about the atmosphere, airplane engineering, and safety issues, and… other professionals need language for stuff that, let’s be honest, we don’t really care that much about. But Business English has always tied with Political English for the most pretentiouscliches and most meaningless double-talk.

　　“特殊目的”英語在社會(huì)中總占有一席之地。醫(yī)生和護(hù)士需要大量詞匯來描述藥物、疾病、手術(shù)工具;飛行員需要獨(dú)一無二的詞匯來談?wù)摯髿?，飛機(jī)制造和安全問題，以及其他職業(yè)需要的語言。但坦白的說，我們并不關(guān)心那些詞匯。但是商務(wù)英語總是和政治英語聯(lián)系起來產(chǎn)生最自命不凡的陳詞濫調(diào)和最無意義的空話。

　　It’s gotten so bad, in fact, that many business journals are even starting to complain about it. Forbes Magazine, The Wall Street Journal, even the BBC have all recently published their own indexes of most-hated business jargon. Naturally, Voxy’s here to help with some of our own… and remember, no matter what your manager “thinks” is okay, DON’T let these come out of your mouth!

　　這種情況愈加惡化，以至于已經(jīng)有雜志開始抱怨了》《福布斯》、《華爾街日?qǐng)?bào)》甚至BBC最近都發(fā)布了他們各自的最反感商務(wù)術(shù)語指數(shù)。所以，Voxy網(wǎng)站也挑選了一些令人反感的商務(wù)術(shù)語，記住，無論你的老板是否認(rèn)為這些詞沒問題，不要從嘴巴里冒出這些詞!

　　1) “Action item” – because the words “job,” “task,” or “duty” are just way too long and complex, right?

　　1)“指定任務(wù)”——難道是因?yàn)?ldquo;工作”、“任務(wù)”、“職責(zé)”這幾個(gè)詞又長(zhǎng)又復(fù)雜才創(chuàng)造了這個(gè)詞?

　　2) “Advise” – Not a bad word, just way overused. Here’s a hint: if you’re not giving an opinion about someone else’s decision, you’re not “advising.” Are you “saying,” “telling,” “informing,” “helping,” “notifying,” “specifying,” and so on? Maybe, sure. But what you’re not doing is “advising.”

　　2)“建議”——不是個(gè)糟糕的詞，只是太頻繁使用了。給個(gè)提示：如果你不是在針對(duì)他人的決定發(fā)表自己的看法，你就不是在“建議”。你是不是只是在“說”、“告訴”、“通知”、“幫助”、“通報(bào)”、“詳述”等等呢?

　　3) “Bandwidth” – Again, fine in one context, godawful in all others. Are we talking about data transfer speeds? Great! Are we talking about ability, capacity, capability, time, money, or people? …not so good.

　　3)“帶寬”——同樣也是在一定情境下沒問題，但其他情況就糟透了。我們是在說數(shù)據(jù)傳送的速度嗎?那么用這個(gè)詞很好。如果是在說能力、才能、時(shí)間、錢、或人呢?……這個(gè)詞可不怎么樣。

　　4) “Bottleneck” – One more of this breed, with a far simpler rule: if it’s not traffic, don’t say bottleneck. If it’s not a noun, don’t say bottleneck. If it’s a verb that means to “slow,” “hinder,” “impede,” or “obstruct,” then DON’T. SAY. BOTTLENECK.

　　4)“瓶頸”——又是這一類的詞，用法更簡(jiǎn)單：如果不是談?wù)摻煌?，不要用這個(gè)詞。如果不是名詞，不要用這個(gè)詞。如果是動(dòng)詞，且表示“減緩”、“阻礙”、“阻塞”，那么直接使用這些詞就好了，不要用“瓶頸”。

　　5) “Empower” – Nelson Mandela empowers. Your iPhone does not. “Enhance” or “enable”? Sure.

　　5)“使……掌握自主權(quán)”——尼爾森·曼德拉讓人們擁有自主權(quán)，你的蘋果手機(jī)可不能。你想說的是“提高”或者“使能夠”吧!

　　6) “Impact” – Fortunately, this one at least has an actual reason for its recent popularity. Unfortunately, that reason is “too many executives can’t be bothered to learn the difference between ‘affect’ and ‘effect,’ and neither could their second-grade English teachers.”

　　6)“沖擊”——幸運(yùn)的是這個(gè)詞如此流行是有正當(dāng)原因的。不幸的是這個(gè)原因就是太多管理人員不愿意學(xué)習(xí)一下“affect”和“effect”的區(qū)別，他們的2年級(jí)英語老師也一樣。

　　7) “Leverage” – Again, let’s all be thankful someone found a shorter, more convenient way to say the word “use.”

　　7)“充分利用”——再次，我們謝謝某人發(fā)現(xiàn)了一個(gè)更短、更方便的詞——“使用”。

　　8) “Preplan” – What’s the opposite? “Postplan”? “Duringplan”? By its nature, planning is “pre” – if it’s not happening before, it’s not a plan: it’s a reaction.

　　8)“預(yù)計(jì)劃”——反義詞是什么呢?“后計(jì)劃”?“中計(jì)劃”?計(jì)劃本身就有提前的意思——如果計(jì)劃不是預(yù)先發(fā)生的話，就不叫計(jì)劃了，叫反應(yīng)。

　　9) “Robust” – Yet another normal, innocent word turned into a monster by corporate “repurposing.” This used to just mean “hearty,” “rugged,” or “vigorous” – not exactly words you’d think to apply to, say, a database software suite, right? And yet these days, 99% of the time this word is used to talk about programs that magically don’t crash every time you open them. There are even rumors that it’s spawned the terms “robustify,” “robusticity,” and even “robustification.” Pray they’re not true.

　　9)”穩(wěn)健的”——又是一個(gè)正常、無辜的詞因?yàn)楦淖冇猛咀兂闪岁愒~濫調(diào)。這個(gè)詞只表示“熱情友好”或“粗獷”或“強(qiáng)有力的”——而不是像你所想的那樣用來形容數(shù)據(jù)庫(kù)套裝軟件。然而現(xiàn)金，99%的情況下，這個(gè)單詞被用來形容軟件不會(huì)每次打開時(shí)都崩潰。甚至還有謠言說這個(gè)詞衍生出了動(dòng)詞“使……強(qiáng)健”和名詞“穩(wěn)健”及“穩(wěn)健化”。

　　10) “Solution” – Perhaps the biggest victim of them all, this word used to mean… SOMETHING. Now? It doesn’t.

　　10)“解決方案”——這個(gè)詞可能是最大的受害者了，這個(gè)詞過去曾用來表示“某事”，現(xiàn)在早就不用了。