英国人的英语最难懂:母语人士请学会说通用英语

If native speakers of English are not to become international corporate pariahs, they will need to learn how to speak global English – in other words, to communicate with non-native speakers.

如果英语母语人士不想被国际商业界所遗弃，他们需要去学习如何讲通用英语——换言之，就是和非母语人士沟通。

Resentment at the complexity of native speakers' English is widespread in international business. During a study carried out at Kone Elevators of Finland, one Finnish manager blurted out: “The British are the worst . . . It is much more difficult to understand their English than that of other nationalities. When we non-native speakers of English talk, it is much easier to understand. We have the same limited vocabulary.”

在国际商界，针对母语人士英语复杂性的不满普遍存在。在芬兰通力电梯进行的一项调查中，一位芬兰经理人脱口而出：“英国人最差劲了……他们讲的英语是所有国家中最难懂的。而我们这些非英语母语人士所说的话，要容易理解得多。我们都拥有同样有限的词汇量。”

How can native speakers of English make themselves more comprehensible and more likeable? The most obvious way is to learn someone else's language. The great benefit of learning other languages is that you have some idea of what non-native speakers are up against. However, news this week that fewer than half of English schoolchildren are learning a foreign language suggests that this is not going to be a profitable route for many.

英语母语人士怎样才能使自己更容易为人理解和喜爱呢？最明显的方法，就是学习其他人的语言。学习其它语言的一大好处就是你可以对其它非母语人士的问题有所了解。然而，有消息称，只有不到半数的英国学童在学习一门外语，说明对很多人来说，以上建议并不是好方法。

So what should native English-speakers do to make themselves better understood? First, slow down, but not to the point where members of your audience think you are patronising them. Second, avoid idiomatic and metaphorical expressions: that's the way the cookie crumbles, people in glass houses, and the like.

那么英语母语人士应该怎样做，使自己能够更好地被别人所理解呢？首先，放慢语速，但是不要慢到使你的听众觉得你是在迁就他们。第二，避免使用成语和比喻的表达方式：例如“饼干就是那么碎的”（that's the way the cookie crumbles，意指无可避免）、“玻璃屋中人”（people in glass houses，意指自身有问题和身处险境的人）等表达方式。

Jokes are a difficult area. You will not forget the silence that follows one that is found baffling. On the other hand, when jokes work, they can be a huge success with a non-native speaking audience. If you have learnt other languages, you will know that very few achievements are as satisfying as understanding your first foreign joke. Try a few out with your non-native speaking audience; you will soon learn which ones are worth repeating.

笑话是一个很难理解的领域。一个让人难以理解的笑话会带来一片沉默，这会使你难以忘怀。而另一方面，当笑话起作用时，它们会为你在英语非母语人中带来巨大的成功。如果你学过其它语言，你会知道，听懂自己的第一个外国笑话，会带来一种无可比拟的成就感。试着给非母语听众讲几个笑话后，你会很快明白哪些是值得重复的。

It is often unnecessary to avoid longer words such as “association” and “nationality”, which are common to the Romance languages and will be widely understood in Europe and Latin America.

通常没有必要去避免较长的单词，例如“association”（协会、联合） 和 “nationality”（国家、民族），这些词在拉丁语系中很常见，在欧洲和拉丁美洲都能被广泛理解。

Listen to verbal responses for signs of whether you have been understood or not. Make sure your non-native speaking colleagues have the chance to talk; they will often be paraphrasing your words in an attempt to satisfy themselves that they have grasped what you said.

从人们的反应中找寻自己是否被人理解的迹象。让非母语同事有机会说话，他们常常会重复你说过的话，以此肯定自己已经理解了你表达的意思。

Always remember that the greatest friend of the non-native speaker is repetition. Find more than one way of getting your point across and summarise frequently.

切记，非英语母语人士最好的朋友就是重复。不要只用一种说法来表达自己的意思，同时要经常进行总结。