小词 | 英文中的牙齿

一小段, 几个词.

阅读原文查看全文,附笔记.

[The Economist - Out brothers, out!]

奔跑吧，兄弟👬

Independent unions are banned in China, Labour organizations have to be affiliated with the state-controlled All-China Federation of Trade Unions, whose constitution describes the working class as “the leading class of China” but which usually sides with management. In recent years, officials have stepped up efforts to unionize workforces, especially in privately run factories where they fear a lack of unions might encourage independent ones to grow. But official unions have largely refrained from baring any teeth.

[side] 做动词, to support or argue against person or group in a quarrel, fight etc.

[step up] to increase the amount of an activity or the speed of a process in order to improve a situation.

文章后面又重复使用了这个词组:

He believes workers are likely to step up pressure on the official unions to represent them better

[step up to the plate] to agree to help someone or to be responsible for doing something.

[tooth] 这个词的用法

1. Something has teeth: used in order to say that an organization or law has enough power to make people obey it.

2. show your teeth: to let someone see your anger or strength, in order to warn them not to start an argument or fight.

3. grit your teeth: to deal with a difficult or unpleasant situation in a determined way

4. gnash your teeth: to be very angry and upset (注意g不发音)

5. be armed to the teeth - 武装到牙齿

6. cut your teeth (on something): if a young person cuts his or her teeth on a particular piece or type of work, that is the first work that they do, from which they learn to do their job.

长新牙就是cut teeth. 例如 Billy is cranky because he’s cutting teeth. 这里的cut指的是 “To have a new tooth grow through the gums”.

7. Like pulling teeth: something that is like pulling teeth is extremely difficult to obtain, especially if trying to extract information from someone.

8. by the skin of my teeth: If you do something "by the skin of your teeth" it means that you did it by a narrow margin – so you just managed to do it, or almost failed.

“By the skin of my teeth”就是出自《圣经》中的《约伯记》。犹太人约伯在受到上帝的百般非难之后说道: “My bone cleaveth to my skin, and to my flesh, and I am escaped with the skin of my teeth”（直译：我的皮肉贴着骨头，我同牙齿的皮肤一起逃了出来。）

例如:

I woke up late and had to run to the train station. There's only one train an hour. I ran all the way there and made it by the skin of my teeth, just as the doors were closing.

牙齿怎么会有皮肤呢？古人的用意我们已经无从查考，今天的一种理解是：“the skin of the teeth”指的是牙齿表层的牙釉质。可怜的约伯用了一个形象的比喻：他的逃生空间就像是牙釉质那样薄薄的一层. 自此以后，“by the skin of one's teeth”就被用来表示涉险逃生的意思。类似的英文还有 a narrow escape; a near miss; close call; close shave; Thornton Wilder有部作品The Skin of Our Teeth，被翻译成「九死一生」

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