1、UNIT2文化有时候被称为我们的心智程序，我们“头脑的软件”。Culture is sometimes referred to as our mental programming,our “software of the mind. ”但是，我们可以进一步引申这个用电脑所做的类比，把文化看作是支持运行的操作环境。But we can take that computer analogy further and say that culture is the operating environment that enabl
2、es software programs to run. 文化就像电脑使用的DOS或者Unix或者“视窗”（Windows）等操作系统一样，使我们能在各种各样的实际应用中处理信息。Culture is like DOS or Unix or Windows:it is what enables us to process information in various specific application. 用“视窗”这个比喻来描述文化似乎也很有吸引力。The metaphor of windows seems to
3、be very appealing to describe culture:文化就是我们心灵的视窗，透过它我们审视生活的方方面面。culture is a mental set of windows through which all of life is viewed. 一个社会中不同个体的视窗是不大一样的，但都有着一些重要的共同特征。 It varies from individual to individual within a society, but it shares important character
4、istics with menbers of a society. 文化就好像是鱼畅游于其中的水一般，人们想当然地把文化看成是客观存在的事实，因而很少去研究它。Culture is like the water fish swim in---a reality that is taken for granted and rarely examined. 文化存在于我们所呼吸的空气之中，文化对于我们了解我们自身之为何物是必不可少的，就正如生命离不开空气一样。It is in the air we breathe and i
5、s as necessary to our understanding of who we are as air is to our physical life. 文化是特定群体的共有财产，而不单是个体的特征。Culture is the property of a community of people, not simply a characteristic of individuals. 社会按照文化设定的程序运作，这种程序来自于相似的生活体验以及对这种生活体验之含义的相似阐释。Societies are prog
6、rammed by culture, and that programming comes from similar life experiences and similar interpretations of what those experiences mean. UNIT4我们说语言总是模糊的，指的是我们所说所写的东西总不能完全表达我们的意图。When we say that language is always ambiguous, what we mean is that we can never fully
7、 control the meanings of the things we say and write.我们通过说话和写作所传达的意思不仅仅由词语和句子本身决定，听众和读者的理解也起到了一定的作用。 The meanings we exchange by speaking and by writing are not given in the words and sentences alone but are also constructed partly out of what our listeners and o
8、ur readers interpret them to mean. 换言之，是交际双方共同创造了语言所表达的意思。To put this quite another way, meaning in language is jointly constructed by the participants in comm
