“OK”将迎来175岁生日 全球最流行词语！

The word is “OK,” the most frequently spoken all-purpose expression on the planet — and it’s turning 175 years old on March 23.
“OK”是全球使用频率最高的、最通用的词语，今年3月23日，它就要175岁了。

The term was born during a 19th-century abbreviation craze and went on to international renown, with its own hand gesture, even.
“OK”诞生于19世纪的缩写潮中，后来跟它的手势一起红遍了全球。

And one New Yorker is carrying the linguistic torch. Henry Nass, a 64-year-old retired English tutor from the Upper West Side, has spent the last few weeks handing out cards championing “Global OK Day” in advance of the coming anniversary.
一个纽约人正在举着这个语言学上的耀眼火炬奔走宣传。在175周年纪念日来临之前，美国纽约市上西区64岁的退休英语教师亨利·纳斯已经连续几周在街头派发倡导 “国际OK日”的卡片。

“No matter where people are from they use the word ‘OK,’ but they don’t know where it comes from,” says Nass. “The problem is because it’s just, you know, OK.”
纳斯说：“世界各地的人都会说OK，但他们并不知道这个词语的来源，原因可能是这个词真的太普及了。”

The word is OK, perhaps, but its history is definitely better than average. Late etymologist Allen Walker Read traced the two-letter word to 1839, when editors at the Boston Morning Post signed off on articles as “all correct” with a winking “OK” or “oll korrect.”
“OK”这个词可能很普及，但是它的历史绝对不够普及。已故词源学家艾伦·沃克·里德曾认为OK的历史始于1839年。当时，《波士顿早报》的编辑们在签署文章时用简明的“OK”或“oll korrect”来表示“完全正确”(all correct)。

The word made it into print on March 23 of that year, during a weird inside-baseball tirade against a rival editor in Providence who had alleged, wrongly, that a band of Bostonians headed to New York would pass through the Rhode Island capital.
同一年的3月23日，OK第一次登上报纸，《波士顿早报》在一篇攻击普罗维顿斯的一个编辑对手的文章里使用了这个词语。这个编辑错误地断言一群前往纽约的波士顿人将会途经美国罗得岛州的首府（即普罗维顿斯）。

“We said not a word about our deputation passing ‘through the city’ of Providence,” the Morning Post reported. “O.K. — all correct.”
《波士顿早报》报道：“我们从来没说过我们代表团将会‘途经普罗维顿斯’O.K. ——完全正确。”