托福听力练习对照文本第七十五篇

　　We've probably all wondered how a new word gets into the dictionary.

　　我们可能都想知道一个新词是如何进入词典中的。

　　Take the word "doofus," for example, spelled d-o-o-f-u-s, meaning a stupid or incompetent person.

　　用单词“doofus”来举个例子，拼写是d-o-o-f-u-s，意思是愚蠢的或无能的人。

　　This word, which has been around since the late 1960's in a slang sense, made it into the Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary only in 1993.

　　这个单词，自二十世纪六十年代以来是以俚语的感觉存在的，到1993年才把它收入韦伯大学词典。

　　Why did it take so long? Well, first of all, dictionary editors like to wait at least three years to be sure a word is going to last, especially a slang word.

　　为什么花这么长时间?好，第一，词典编辑们喜欢等上至少三年来确定一个单词将会延续，尤其是一个俚语单词。

　　They don't want to put in a new word prematurely and then have to take it out in the next edition.

　　他们不愿意过早放入一个新词，然后不得不在下一版把它拿出来。

　　But even for words that aren't slang, getting into the dictionary isn't easy.

　　但是即使是非俚语单词，进入词典也并不容易。

　　New words have to pass a lot of editorial tests, including how difficult or easy they are to look up.

　　新单词必须通过许多编辑测试，包括查找他们的难易程度。

　　There's also a limit to how thick a dictionary can be or how small its type can get before people feel they don't want to use it.

　　还有一个限制，在人们感觉他们不想使用它之前，词典能达到的厚度或者它的类型能做到多小。

　　Some words have to come out before others can go in.

　　有些单词在其他的(单词)能放的进来之前必须得(弄)出来。

　　The Collegiate Dictionary adds about ten thousand words to every edition, but it takes out only a few hundred, so choices have to be made very carefully.

　　每一版大学词典增加大约一万单词，但是只去掉几百个，所以选择必须做的非常谨慎。