朗文英语听说教程二听力原文Word格式.docx

1、uses names. A persons name can tell us a bit about a persons family. Today,well begin by looking at first names and how people choose names for theirchildren. And then well talk about family names, and look at the differentcategories of family names. Although the scope of the lecture today isEnglish

2、-language names, we can use the same approach, you know, to look atnames from any culture.Lets take a brief look at first, or given names. There are several ways parentschoose the first name for their child.The first way is by family history. Parents may choose a name because it ispassed from genera

3、tion to generation; for example, the first born son might benamed after his father or grandfather. Although family names are also passedto daughters, it is usually as a middle name. Adding junior or the secondfor example, William Parker the seconds only done with boys, not with girlsnames.The second

4、 way parents choose a name is after a family member or friend whohas died recently, or after someone they admire, like a well-known leader ora famous musician. Although most English first names mean something, forexample, Richard means powerful and “Ann means grace, nowadaysmeaning is not the main r

5、eason people select their babys name.The third way is to provide a push for the child. Parents want to choose aname that sounds very successful. A strong name might help them in thebusiness world, for example. Or they might choose a name that works foreither gender, like Taylor or Terry. So, given t

6、hese three methods, what is themost common way parents choose a name? Many parents choose a namesimply because they like it, or because its fashionable or classic. Fashions innames change just as they do in clothes. One hundred years ago, many namescame from the Bible names such as Daniel, and Anna,

7、 and Hannah andMatthew. Then fifty years ago, Biblical names went out of fashion. Nowadays,names from the Bible are becoming popular again.Similarly, parents often choose classic names, names that were popular in1900, 1950, and are still popular now. Classic names for boys include Thomas,David, Robe

8、rt, and Michael. And for girls: Anna, Elizabeth, Emily, andKatherine, just to name a few. Theyre classic. They never go out of style.s look at the origin of last names, also called family names or surnames.Researchers have studied thousands of last names, and theyve divided theminto four categories.

9、 The categories are: place names, patronymics, addednames, and occupational names. A recent survey showed that of the 7,000most popular names in the United States today, 43 percent were place names,32 percent were patronymics, 15 percent were occupational names, and 9percent were added names.The fir

10、st category is place names. Place names usually identified where aperson lived or worked. Someone named John Hill lived near a hill, forexample, and the Rivers family lived near a river. If you hear the name EmmaBridges, what image do you see? Do you see a family that lives near a bridge?If you do,

11、you get the idea.The second category is patronymics. Thats P-A-T-R-O-N-Y-M-I-C-S. Apatronymic is the fathers name, plus an ending like S-E-N or S-O-N. Theending means that a child, a boy, is the son of his father. The names Robertson,Petersen, and Wilson are patronymics. Robertson is son of Robert,

12、Petersen isson of Peter, and so on.The third category is added names. Linguists sometimes call this categorynicknames, but when most of us hear the word nickname, we think of aspecial name a friend or a parent might use. The word nickname is actuallyan old English word that means an additional name,

13、 an added name. So Illuse the term added name. This category of last names is fun because thenames usually described a person. Reed, Baldwin, and Biggs are examples.Reed was from red for red hair. Baldwin was someone who was bald,someone who had little or no hair. And Biggs.STUDENT 2: Someone big? Y

14、eah, someone big, right. Now, if we look around the room, wecould probably come up with some new last names, like, uh. Curly or Strong.Now, the fourth category is occupational names. The origin of the familyname was the persons occupation. The most common examples ofoccupational names still used today are Baker （someone who bakes bread）.Tailor （someone who sews clothes）. Miller （someone who makes flour forbread）, and Smith. . . . Now, Smith is actually the most common name in thewestern English-speaking world. The name comes