[ti:'Complicit' Is Dictionary.com's Word of the Year]
[by:www.21voa.com]
[00:00.00]更多听力请访问21VOA.COM
[00:01.80]Every year, language researchers and dictionary publishers
[00:07.52]choose a "Word of the Year."
[00:10.12]The word often reflects the news or social media trends during the year.
[00:16.92]The American Dialect Society started the practice in 1991.
[00:23.68]This year, Dictionary.com selected the word "complicit" as its word of the year.
[00:31.60]The online dictionary site chooses its Word of the Year
[00:36.20]based on the number of people who look up the word's meaning.
[00:41.76]Overall, there were 300 percent more people
[00:45.96]looking up the word "complicit" in 2017 than there were in 2016.
[00:53.76]Before you run to look up the word, too,
[00:56.72]we will let you know that Dictionary.com says complicit means
[01:02.08]"choosing to be involved in an illegal or questionable act, especially with others."
[01:10.40]Jane Solomon is an editor at Dictionary.com.
[01:15.90]She told The Associated Press that there were many discussions in 2017
[01:22.56]about people in power and the people around them
[01:26.80]who stayed silent about crimes they may have seen.
[01:31.44]"This year a conversation that keeps on surfacing
[01:35.08]is what exactly it means to be complicit," she said.
[01:39.88]"Complicit has sprung up in conversations about those who speak out
[01:46.48]against powerful figures in institutions, and those who stay silent."
[01:53.88]Interest in "complicit" began with a satire video on Saturday Night Live,
[02:00.08]a weekly television comedy.
[02:03.44]The video shows a fake commercial for a perfume designed by Ivanka Trump,
[02:10.16]a daughter of the United States President Donald Trump.
[02:14.60]The name of the perfume is "Complicit."
[02:19.12]A voice in the video explains,
[02:21.96]"She's beautiful, she's powerful, she's complicit."
[02:28.24]The satire tries to connect Ms. Trump with accusations
[02:32.68]that people in her father's election campaign broke laws.
[02:38.36]About a month later, Ivanka Trump appeared on a morning news television program
[02:44.56]and said, "I don't know what it means to be complicit."
[02:49.36]Since she did not explain, more people looked up the word.
[02:54.76]On October 24, Arizona Republican Senator Jeff Flake announced from the Senate floor
[03:02.92]that he would not try to win another term in the Senate.
[03:07.92]He criticized President Trump and asked other members of his party
[03:12.60]not to silently support the president.
[03:17.12]"I have children and grandchildren to answer to,
[03:20.72]and so, Mr. President, I will not be complicit," Flake said.
[03:26.60]Solomon says that another reason for the increase in look-ups for "complicit"
[03:33.48]is the accusations of sexual harassment against movie producer Harvey Weinstein.
[03:42.16]Some of Weinstein's associates say that they knew about the accusations years earlier,
[03:48.64]but were afraid to say anything about it publicly.
[03:52.54]Keep your eyes open for more "Word of the Year" awards
[03:57.12]coming up in December and January.
[04:00.40]We will help you to add those words to your vocabulary in English, too.
[04:06.20]I'm Jill Robbins. 更多听力请访问21VOA.COM