美國(guó)習(xí)慣用語(yǔ)：979 damn with faint praise

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我很尊重我奶奶，不過(guò)坦白說(shuō)，她有時(shí)候真讓我沒(méi)辦法。上星期她來(lái)我家之前，我特地把家里打掃得干干凈凈，還去買了幾個(gè)沙發(fā)坐墊，把客廳裝飾的更加溫馨。可他對(duì)我煞費(fèi)苦心地裝飾只說(shuō)了句：還湊合吧! 真氣死我了! 這也讓我想到一個(gè)習(xí)慣用語(yǔ)，那就是: damn with faint praise.

Damn, 作為動(dòng)詞，是批評(píng)的意思，而faint praise, 在這里是指無(wú)力的贊揚(yáng)。 Damn with faint praise, 作為一個(gè)詞組，意思是名褒實(shí)貶，用輕微的贊揚(yáng)進(jìn)行貶低。

我奶奶就是這樣，對(duì)于我全部的努力，她就說(shuō)了一句湊合， she damned me with faint praise even though I've tried my best to impress her. 雖然我盡了全力，可她還是名褒實(shí)貶地忽略了我的努力。下面的例子里談的是父子關(guān)系，我們來(lái)聽聽看:

例句-1：Is it any wonder that my dad and I aren't that close? No matter what I achieve, it always seems it isn't good enough. He doesn't actually say so directly. But the way he damns me with faint praise, I always feel like I'm not meeting his expectations. Why can't he compliment me once in a while?

這段話是說(shuō)：我跟我爸爸的關(guān)系不是很好，這也沒(méi)什么好奇怪的。不管我取得了什么成就，對(duì)他來(lái)說(shuō)好像始終不夠。他并不會(huì)直接這么說(shuō)。但是他從來(lái)都只是蜻蜓點(diǎn)水地贊揚(yáng)，讓我覺(jué)得我永遠(yuǎn)達(dá)不到他的期望。為什么他就不能夸獎(jiǎng)我一次呢?

對(duì)啊! 有這樣的家長(zhǎng)真的很讓人難受。有些家長(zhǎng)認(rèn)為如果表?yè)P(yáng)孩子就是對(duì)他們的溺愛，其實(shí)不是這樣。誰(shuí)都需要表?yè)P(yáng)和肯定，不是嗎?

在工作中也一樣，如果有個(gè)不愛表?yè)P(yáng)人的領(lǐng)導(dǎo)，底下人的士氣肯定也不高。Instead of damning the employees with faint praise, supervisors should encourage the staff when they do a good job.

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Damn with faint praise, 名褒實(shí)貶，用輕微的贊揚(yáng)進(jìn)行貶低。對(duì)于電影評(píng)論這個(gè)職業(yè)，或許這是一個(gè)有用的性格特征? 我們來(lái)聽聽看下面這個(gè)例子:

例句-2：The movie director had received many positive reviews for her latest work. One critic, however, didn't seem to care for it much. It's not that he gave it an openly bad review. Instead, he wrote that he was pleasantly surprised that the film was shorter than the other films. It was easy to see that he was damning the director with faint praise.

這段話是說(shuō): 這名電影導(dǎo)演的最新作品獲得了很多正面評(píng)價(jià)。不過(guò)有一名影評(píng)人似乎并不怎么看好他的新片子。他倒也沒(méi)有公開說(shuō)這部電影不好，不過(guò)他說(shuō)，他很高興地發(fā)現(xiàn)，這部電影比這個(gè)導(dǎo)演的其他電影要短。很顯然，他對(duì)這部電影是名褒實(shí)貶。

與其收到這種評(píng)論，倒還不如別人直接批評(píng)我! 我記得我聽過(guò)一句話: If you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all. 如果你沒(méi)有好話要說(shuō)，那就閉嘴。我覺(jué)得這句話說(shuō)的特別對(duì)。每個(gè)人都希望得到別人的肯定，誰(shuí)愿意得到這種蒼白的表?yè)P(yáng)呢?