學過英語的小夥伴們對於26個英文字母應該都是了如指掌的啦,所以,直接上問題:
你知道字母W 是怎麼讀的嗎?
W
'dblju:
在維基百科中對於W 的解釋有一條:W is the 23rd letter of English alphabet.W 是英語字母表中的第23個字母。
在歷史上,W 曾經寫作 uu 組合。見下圖:
A 1693 book printing that uses the"double u" alongside the modern letter.
Poor w is so infamous and unknown that many barely know either its name or its shape, not those who aspire to being Latinists, as they have no need of it, nor do the Germans, not even the schoolmasters, know what to do with it or how to call it; some call it we, […… others] call it uu, [……] the Swabians call it auwawau…
從Valentin Ickelshamer的這段闡述我們可以看出,16世紀W剛引入英語語言的時候,人們對它有三種不同的讀法:
we;2. uu;3. auwawau
所以現代英語中的字母W['dblju:]到底應該怎樣讀呢?
音:達不溜['db--lju:]?
音:達伯優['dbl--ju:]?
很多國人的讀法是接近於第一種,那麼答案顯而易見,按照其歷史淵源顯而易見應該是後者啦!所以很多人對這個字母的讀音是有誤的呢。如在網絡上查這個字母,仔細聽發音就可以辨別出來了。
W--"Double U" is the only English letter name with more than one syllable.
W是英文字母裡邊唯一一個發音超過一個音節的字母。
Some speakers therefore shorten the name "double u" into "dub" only; for example, University of Wisconsin, University of Washington, University of Wyoming, University of Waterloo, University of the Western Cape and University of Western Australia are all known colloquially as "U Dub".
還有一些人把W開始的大學單詞縮讀為 Dub,比如例舉的這幾個大學:威斯康星大學、華盛頓大學、懷俄明大學、滑鐵盧大學等等都被簡稱作 U Dub~