阅读理解 A linguist, an expert on languages, is always listening, never off-duty．I invited a group of friends round to my house, telling them that I was going to record their speech．I said I was interested in their regional accents, and that it would take just a few minutes．Thus, one evening, three people came to my house and were shown into my front room．In front of each chair there was a microphone at head height, connected to a recorder in the middle of the floor．They sat down, rather nervously, and I explained that all I wanted was for them to count from one to twenty．Then we could relax and have a drink． I turned on the recorder and each in turn counted from one to twenty in their best accents．When it was over, I turned the recorder off and brought round the drinks．I joined them in talking and joking freely．Then I left them for a telephone call which lasted some time．The rest of the evening seemed to be spent in total relaxation． Or at least that is how it would appear, for, of course, the microphones were not connected to the recorder in the middle of the room at all but to another one in the bedroom．My friends, having seen the recorder before them turned off, paid no more attention to the microphones a few inches from their mouths, thus giving excellent sound quality． I should add, perhaps, that I did tell my friends what had happened to them, after the recording was over, and asked them whether it should be destroyed．None of them wanted to-but for some years after that, it always seemed that when it came to buying drinks, it was I who paid for them．Linguistic research can be a very expensive business． |
