英语听力小短文走遍全世界24: Young ladies' New Language 新女性，新语言（双语+mp3下载）
摘要：本文介绍了日本新时代女性的语言特点，并且简要分析了其中的原因。同为儒家文化圈，发生在日本女性身上的变化也很值得中国人的关注。
The use of deferential（敬重的）language is symbolic of the Confucian ideal of the woman, which domiantes conservative gender norms in Japan. This ideal presents a woman who withdraws quietly to the background, subordinating her life and needs to those of her family and its male head. She is a dutiful daughter, wife, and mother, master of the domestic arts.
敬语的使用是儒家理想妇女的标志，它统治着日本保守的性别准则。这种理想表现为妇女安静地退居幕后，将自己的生活和需要屈从于家庭和男性主人的需要。她是有义务的女儿，是妻子和母亲、家务艺术的大师。
The typical refined Japanese woman excels in modesty and delicacy; she "treads softly（谨言慎行） in the world," elevating feminine beauty and grace to an art form.
典型的优雅日本妇女在谦逊和精巧上非常优秀，她们“谨言慎行”，把妇女的美丽与优雅提升到了艺术的层面。
Nowadays, it is commonly observed that young women are not conforming to the feminine linguistic（语言的） ideal. They are using fewer of the very deferential "women's" forms, and even using the few strong forms that are known as "men's." This, of course, attracts considerable attention and has led to an outcry in the Japanese media against the defeminization of women's language.
现在，年轻妇女不再遵从妇女语言的理想已经是普遍现象了。她们更少使用非常恭顺的女性用语，甚至使用少量强硬的男性用语。当然，这吸引了广泛的注意，并引起了日本媒体对妇女语言的非女性化倾向的疾呼。
The facat that young Japanese women are using less deferential language is a sure sign of change — of social change and of linguistic change. But it is most certainly not a sign of the "masculization" of girls. In some instances, it may be a sign that girls are making the same claim to authority as boys and men, but that is very different from saying that they are trying to be "masculine."
年轻日本女性使用越来越少的敬语毫无疑问是社会变化和语言变化的标志。但是几乎可以肯定的是，它不是女孩子男性化的标志。在某些例子中，这是女性要求得到和男性一样的权威的标志，但是这和说她们尝试男性化大不相同。
Katsue Reynolds has argued that girls nowadays are using more assertive language in order to be able to compete with boys in schools and out. Social change also brings not simply different positions for women and girls, but different relations to life stages, and adolescent girls are participating in new subcultural forms. Thus what may, to an older speaker, seem like "masculine" speech may seem to an adolescent like "liberated" or "hip" speech.
胜家·雷诺兹认为女性现在使用更为肯定的语言是为了在学校和社会中和男性进行竞争。同样，社会变化带给妇女的不单是不同的社会位置，还包括生命阶段的不同关系，少女还参与到崭新的亚文化形式中去。所以这些对于年长者来说看似“男性化”用语，对青少年来说就像是解放宣言。
1. symbolic adj. 象征的；符号的
eg: But how do you find a fossil of a symbolic thought?
但你如何找到一块象征性思维的化石呢？
短语：
symbolic logic 符号逻辑
symbolic expression 符号表达式
symbolic language 象征性的语言
symbolic code 符号代码
symbolic name 符号名称
2. conservative adj. 保守的
eg：People tend to be more liberal when they're young and more conservative as they get older.
人们在年轻时常常更开放，年纪越大就越保守。
短语：
conservative partyn 保守党
conservative estimate 审慎估计
conservative government 保守政权
3. subordinating adj. 从属的
eg: Individual rights are the means of subordinating society to moral law.
个人权利是使社会服从道德法则的手段。
短语：
subordinating conjunctions 从属连词
subordinating relation 从属关系
subordinating conjunction 从属连词
subordinating words 运用从属连接语词
subordinating language 从属连词
4. domestic adj. 国内的；家庭的
eg: The film turns about a domestic tragedy.
这部影片主要讲述一个家庭悲剧。
短语：
domestic market 国内市场
gross domestic product (gdp) 国内生产总值
gross domestic product (GDP) 国内生产总值
domestic trade 国内贸易
5. feminine adj. 女性的
eg: There are few feminine members of the committee.
该委员会的女性成员极少。
短语：
feminine beauty 女性美
feminine signs 阴性星座
6. deferential adj. 恭敬的；惯于顺从的
eg: He is deferential to his superiors.
他对他的长官是恭敬的。
短语：
deferential to 尊重......
deferential treatment 礼遇
佳句采摘：
Nowadays, it is commonly observed that young women are not conforming to the feminine linguistic（语言的）ideal.
现在，年轻妇女不再遵从妇女语言的理想已经是普遍现象了。