Introduction

How does culture influence the way you feel and show sadness? Neil and Sam will be investigating how the way people express sadness is influenced by their culture, and, as usual, we’ll be learning some new, useful vocabulary as well.

This week's question

Which colour is associated with sadness? Is it:

a) yellow?

b) blue? or,

c) brown?

Listen to the programme to find out the answer. 

Vocabulary

(to be) down in the dumps
feel miserable and depressed

(to be) fed up
feel unhappy, bored, or tired, especially of something you have been experiencing for a long time

melancholy
intense and thoughtful sadness

grief
strong feeling of sadness, especially caused by someone’s death

repressed
unable to show your true feelings and emotions

stiff upper lip
not showing your feelings when you are upset, even though it is difficult not to

TRANSCRIPT

Note: This is not a word-for-word transcript.

Sam
Hello. This is 6 Minute English from BBC Learning English. I’m Sam.

Neil
And I’m Neil. When Helen Russell was three years old, her new-born baby sister died suddenly. Looking back at that sad time, Helen remembers making a big decision – she wanted to be happy. She became a bestselling author and wrote a book called, The Atlas of Happiness. She got married, and even moved to the famously happy city of Copenhagen in Denmark.

我是尼尔。当海伦·拉塞尔三岁时，她新生的妹妹突然去世了。回顾那段悲伤的时光，海伦记得她做了一个重要的决定——她想要快乐。她成为了一名畅销书作家，并写了一本书《幸福地图集》。她结婚了，甚至搬到了丹麦著名的快乐城市哥本哈根。

Sam
But the sadness Helen felt didn’t disappear, and the longer she lived abroad, the more she wondered whether her feelings were somehow connected to being born in England, into a culture where, traditionally, expressing your emotions was discouraged.

但海伦感到的悲伤并没有消失，她在国外生活的时间越长，她就越怀疑自己的感受是否与出生在英国有关，在英国，传统上，表达你的情感是气馁的。

Neil
In this programme, we’ll be investigating how the way people express sadness is influenced by their culture, and, as usual, we’ll be learning some new, useful vocabulary as well.

在这个节目中，我们将调查人们表达悲伤的方式是如何受到他们的文化的影响的，并且，像往常一样，我们也将学习一些新的、有用的词汇。

Sam
But first I have a question for you, Neil. In English there are many idioms which describe being sad, including down in the dumps, meaning that you feel miserable and depressed. Also, emotions are often associated with colours, for example you might go red with anger, or turn green with envy. But which colour is associated with sadness? Is it:

但首先我有个问题要问你，尼尔。在英语中有很多成语来描述悲伤，包括沮丧，这意味着你会感到痛苦和沮丧。此外，情绪通常与颜色有关，例如，你可能会因为愤怒而变红，或者因为嫉妒而变绿。但是哪一种颜色与悲伤有关呢？是：

a) yellow?
b) blue? or,
c) brown?

Neil
I think the answer is blue.

Sam
OK, Neil. We’ll find out the later in the programme. Around the world, cultures express emotions very differently. In Spain, flamenco performers express their emotions with colourful displays of song and dance, whereas in Japan, crying is considered weak and shameful. To discover more about how British people express their feelings, Helen Russell interviewed, Thomas Dixon, a professor at the Centre for the History of Emotion, for BBC World Service programme, The Documentary:

好的，尼尔。我们将在节目的后面找到答案。在世界各地，文化表达情感的方式都非常不同。在西班牙，弗拉门戈表演者用丰富多彩的歌曲和舞蹈来表达他们的情感，而在日本，哭泣则被认为是软弱和可耻的。为了了解更多英国人如何表达他们的感受，海伦·拉塞尔采访了BBC世界服务节目纪录片的情感史中心教授托马斯·迪克森：

Professor Thomas Dixon
The word sad, as you will know, Helen, literally means sated or full. So, it’s earliest use is in English, it means being literally fed up, being full of something sad or sated means heavy and full. And then of course we have this huge vocabulary of melancholy, sorrow, grief, depression and many, many other terms, and they all mean slightly different things.

悲伤这个词，你会知道，海伦，字面意思是饱或饱。所以，它最早的使用是在英语中，它的意思是厌倦了，充满悲伤或满足的东西意味着沉重和充实。当然，我们有大量的忧郁，悲伤，悲伤，抑郁和许多很多其他的词汇，它们都有略微不同的意思。

Neil
Professor Dixon explains that the original meaning of the word sad was ‘full’ or fed up（adj. 对…感到厌烦[不满] 的；烦透了，受够了） – a phrase which today means being unhappy, bored or tired of something which has been going on a long time. For example: everyone is fed up of Covid.

迪克森教授解释说，“悲伤”这个词的最初意思是“完整的”或厌倦了——今天的意思是对已经发生了很长时间的事情感到不开心、无聊或厌倦。例如：每个人都受够了新冠肺炎疫情。

Sam
But fed up is just one of many words to describe feelings of sadness, each with a slightly different meaning. One of them is melancholy（n. 忧郁；悲哀；愁思；闷闷不乐adj. 忧郁的；悲伤的；凄凉的；阴沉的）, a kind of intense and thoughtful sadness. Another is grief（n. 悲伤；悲痛；悲伤的事） - a strong sadness often caused by the death of someone you love.

但厌倦了它只是描述悲伤感的许多词中的一个，每个词的意思都略有不同。其中之一是忧郁，一种强烈的、沉思的悲伤。另一种是悲伤——一种强烈的悲伤，通常是由你所爱的人的死亡引起的。

Neil
In Irish culture, melancholy is expressed artistically in poems or songs. And in other cultures, India for example, grief can be expressed by professional mourners who are paid to cry by the family of the person who has died. In England, however, big public displays of emotion are uncommon.

在爱尔兰文化中，忧郁以诗歌或歌曲艺术地表达出来。在其他文化中，例如印度，悲伤可以由专业的哀悼者来表达，他们被遇难者的家人收买来哭泣。然而，在英国，公众的公开表现并不常见。

Sam
But according to Professor Dixon that wasn’t always the case. Here he explains to BBC World Service programme, The Documentary, how it was only quite recently, during the time of Queen Victoria and the British Empire, that the English got a reputation for being repressed - unable to show their true feelings and emotions.

但根据迪克森教授的说法，情况并非总是如此。在这里，他向英国广播公司的世界服务节目纪录片解释说，直到最近，在维多利亚女王和大英帝国时期，英国人还以被压抑而闻名——无法表达他们的真实的感情和情感。

Professor Thomas Dixon
By and large it's a Victorian, and then Edwardian, and 20th century characterization. As you can imagine, it fits with the era of empire, of white British men going around the world conquering it, and having a stiff upper lip and ruling over the people… in other parts of the world, and believing themselves, the white Europeans, to be superior… and one sign of that superiority, and Darwin writes: Englishmen rarely caught cry except under the pressure of the acutest grief.

总的来说，这是维多利亚时代的，然后是爱德华七世时期，20世纪的特征。你可以想象，这符合帝国的时代，英国白人征服世界，有着僵硬的上唇，统治人民……在世界其他地方，相信自己的欧洲白人优越……这是优越感的一个迹象，达尔文写道：除了在最严重的悲伤的压力下，英国人很少哭泣。

Neil
Professor Dixon says the Victorians who ruled the empire had a stiff upper lip 坚定不移， 泰然自若. These men believed they were better than everyone else, and that to cry was a sign of weakness. When we cry, our top lip starts to wobble and so this gave rise to the idiom a stiff upper lip, meaning to not show your feelings when you are upset, even though it is difficult not to.

迪克森教授说，统治帝国的维多利亚时代的人上唇僵硬。这些人认为他们比其他人都好，而哭是一种软弱的表现。当我们哭的时候，我们的上唇开始摆动，所以这就产生了一个僵硬的上唇，意思是当你沮丧的时候不要显示你的感受，即使很难不感到难过。

Sam
Fortunately, most Brits are less repressed nowadays, but it’s still hard for some people, especially men, to express their feelings. Sometimes drinking alcohol gives people the courage to say what they are feeling, but this is not so healthy and can even increase feelings of depression.

幸运的是，现在大多数英国人都不那么压抑了，但有些人，尤其是男性，仍然很难表达他们的感情。有时喝酒会让人们有勇气说出自己的感受，但这并不是那么健康，甚至会增加抑郁的感觉。

Neil
It’s talking to someone about your feelings that can really help, and keep away the blues… and in saying that I think I’ve answered your question, Sam.

这是在和别人谈论你的感受，这真的很有帮助，并且远离忧郁……我想我已经回答了你的问题了，山姆。

Sam
I asked Neil which colour is often associated with feeling sad.

我问尼尔，哪种颜色经常与感觉悲伤有关。

Neil
And I said it was blue…

Sam
Which was… the correct answer, and it gives us another idiom about sadness – feeling blue. OK, let’s recap the vocabulary we’ve learned from this programme about the emotion of sadness, or in other words, feeling down in the dumps.

这是……正确的答案，它给了我们另一个关于悲伤的成语——感觉是蓝色的。好吧，让我们回顾一下从这个节目中学到的关于悲伤情绪的词汇，换句话说，感觉沮丧。

Neil
If you are fed up of something, you’re unhappy, bored, or tired of it, especially if it’s been happening a long time.

如果你受够了某件事，你就会感到不快乐、无聊或厌倦了它，尤其是如果它已经发生了很长一段时间了。

Sam
Melancholy is a type of intense and thoughtful sadness; and grief is a strong sadness usually caused by someone’s death

忧郁是一种强烈而又深思熟虑的悲伤；而悲伤是一种强烈的悲伤，通常是由某人的死亡引起的

Neil
The adjective repressed means unable to show your true feelings and emotions.

形容词被压抑是指无法表达你的真实感受和情感。

Sam
And finally, the uniquely British idiom, to keep a stiff upper lip, means not to show your feelings when you’re upset, even though it is difficult not to. Hiding you feelings or bottling them up is definitely won’t make you happy, but making friends and learning something new might, so remember to join us again soon, here at 6 Minute English. Bye for now!

最后，独特的英国成语，保持僵硬的上唇，意味着在你沮丧的时候不表现你的感受，即使很难不表达。隐藏你的感觉或封闭它们绝对不会让你快乐，但结交朋友和学习一些新的可能，所以记住再次加入我们，这里6分钟英语。再见！

Neil
Bye!