[英语实用知识]Talking about Age【敏感年龄巧表达】如何开口...

[英语实用知识]Talking about Age【敏感年龄巧表达】

About forty-two million Americans are 65 years or older. Advertisers, politicians, and researchers often need to refer to this group, but finding a term that will not insult its members is not easy.
大约4200万美国人年龄在65岁及以上。广告人、政治家和研究员经常需要谈到该群体，但不会侮辱这一群体的专用术语不容易找到。

Various terms have been suggested with varying degrees of success. Elder, elderly, senior, and retiree are the most common.
已在使用的各种术语取得的效果不甚相同，最常见的有elder（前辈）、elderly（长辈）、senior（长者）和retiree（退休者）。

In Canada, the term elder has connotations of venerable age and wisdom; in the United States, however, people tend to associate elder with disapproving church elders or the word elderly.
在加拿大，elder一词有高龄智慧的含义；但是美国人倾向于把elder与反对教会长老或elderly一词联系在一起。

Even the word retiree is heavy with the connotations of age. These days, the American Association of Retired People (founded 1958) goes by its initials only: AARP.
甚至retiree一词也带有沉重的年龄含义。成立于1958年的美国退休人员协会现在只使用缩写AARP。

When politicians talk about "our seniors" in the same breath as "our children," mature adults understandably bristle.
当政治家像谈论“我们的孩子”一样谈论“我们的老人”时，成年人都会不自觉地起鸡皮疙瘩。

An article in The Senior Times says that the term "senior citizen" was coined in 1938 during a political campaign. Its use soars on the Ngram Viewer beginning in the 1940s. According to National Public Radio reporter Ina Jaffe, "senior citizen" is a term that "seems to annoy just about everyone."
《高级时代》的一篇文章称“老年公民”这一术语产生于1938年政治运动期间。20世纪40年代初期，该术语的使用在词频阅读器上一路飙升。据美国国家公共广播电台的播音员艾娜•贾菲称，“老年公民”这一术语“好像就是跟每个人过不去”。

Age is one of the realities of life that our culture prefers to deny. It´s unlikely that any term can be found to refer to old people that would not be offensive to someone because in our culture, old age itself is seen as offensive.
年龄是文化乐于拒绝的生命现实之一。可能不存在一个可以指代老年人却不会冒犯一个人的术语，因为文化中的老龄本身就是冒犯性的。

Perhaps the safest course is to refer to the intended age group in numeric terms:
可能用数字术语指代目标年龄群体是更安全的方式：
between the ages of 65 and 75 年龄在65岁到75岁之间
above the age of 65 65岁以上
septuagenarian 70岁到79岁的人
octogenarian 80岁到89岁的人
nonagenarian 90岁到99岁的人
centenarian 100岁的人

Colloquial synonyms for "old person" range from friendly to deliberately hurtful, for example:
“老人”的口语同义词从友好的到故意伤害的都有，比如：
old-timer 老前辈
oldster 上了年纪的人
codger 怪老头
dotard 老糊涂
crone 丑老太婆
coot 老傻瓜

年龄也是敏感词……

gates123 发表于 2015-8-18 11:49
年龄也是敏感词……

嗯哪