在情人節中 「Seeing and Being Seen」 💘

 

因為打算出一篇以情人節為主題的通訊，我在網上搜尋了一些與這節日相關的文章，看看能得到甚麼啟發。 這是我從紐約時報中看到，一篇名為「Love Letters」的文章(https://www.nytimes.com/2024/02/10/briefing/love-letters.html)。 文章一開始，作者便說到自己童年時和其他小朋友之間會有為各位「bestow a Valentine」的習慣，即會給班上的朋友送情人節卡或小禮物。因此班上的每個孩子都會收到一些由別人親手寫給他們的小禮物和卡片。 作者這樣形容那段童年經歷： It was an early exercise in seeing and being seen. 這是教會了我關於「看見/尊重別人」與「被別人看見/的尊重」的一個早期經歷 我覺得這句子是個不錯的範例，幫助我們加強對gerund (動名詞)和名詞組的了解。 「Gerund」是一種由動詞基本字形加字尾「-ing」的非限定動詞字形。例如動詞「see」的gerund字形就是「seeing」。* 作者在這句子中，描述那些給予和接受個性化禮物的行為是一種「exercise (鍛鍊)」，或者說是一種成長性的體驗，去學懂「seeing (看見)」或認可他人，以及同時「being seen (被別人看到) 」和得到別人認可。  名詞「exercise」被介詞組「in seeing and being seen」修飾，作為「exercise」的形容詞組。 介詞組是由一個介詞（例如「in」）加名詞組所組成的。 由於像「seeing」這樣的gerund扮演的是名詞角色，因此可以連接介詞來組成介詞組。「In seeing」就是由「in」和gerund「seeing」組成的介詞組。 「Being seen」同樣是gerund詞組，不過有被動語態。它包含了加入gerund字尾「ing」的輔助動詞「be」– 即「being」，以及主要動詞「see」的固定past participle字形「seen」。 「Being seen」是有被動語態的gerund詞組。（「Seeing」則是主動語態）（你可在這篇通訊重溫被動語態的gerund詞組組成方法） 由於「being seen」也是gerund名詞組，我們同樣可以加入「in」來組成介詞組「in being seen」。 作者想透過此句表達這經驗教她如何「see others」（主動實行「看見他人」的動作）和「be seen by others」（接受「被他人看見」的動作），她使用了兩個名詞組–包含具主動語態gerund「seeing」的介詞組「in seeing」，和包含具被動語態gerund「being seen」的介詞組「in being seen」來描述這個「exercise」： …an early exercise in seeing and in being seen.  「看見」和「被看見」的早期經歷 當兩個修飾語是平衡地修飾同一元素，我們可以用「and」來連接。 這裡，「and」連接了「in seeing」和「in being seen」。這兩個介詞組都用以修飾名詞「exercise」，則平衡地發揮相同的文法功能。 當我們用「and」連接有相同功能的平衡詞組時，通常會省略一些重複的部分（如有）。由於這兩個介詞組都包含同一介詞「in」，第二個重複的「in」也因此被省略了： …an early exercise in seeing and being seen.  你可以將「in seeing and being seen」視為一整個介詞組，因為它是整體地形容「exercise」的。 文章中還有另一句也包括了具gerund詞組的介詞組： Eventually, Valentine’s Day becomes a day for honoring one sweetheart, for celebrating a single relationship.   最終，情人節成為一個紀念一位摯愛、慶祝一段關係的日子 這裡的介詞組「for honoring one sweetheart」和「for celebrating a single relationship」都包含介詞「for」與gerund詞組；而兩個gerund詞組分別是由「honoring」和「celebrating」引出的。 兩個介詞組都修飾了名詞組「a day」。雖然我們慣常用「and」連接這些介詞組，但作者這次平衡地放置它們，並以逗號分隔。這只是一種寫作風格的選擇，文法上也是完全沒有問題的。 最後，無論你慶祝與否，我也祝願你度過一個有意義的情人節！ ______________ *  之前我也解釋過，英文中有兩種非限定動詞都包含「ing」字尾，分別是gerund（名詞字形），以及所謂的present participle字形。 我們在這篇通訊中討論的是gerund，而不是present participle。Gerund在子句中扮演著名詞的角色，而present participles則屬於限定動詞的一部分，或者當它獨立出現時，扮演修飾語角色。

“Seeing and Being Seen” on Valentine’s Day 💘 I was trying to come up with an idea for a Valentine-themed newsletter today, so I went on the internet in search of articles about the holiday, hoping to be inspired. I found this article by a New York Times writer from last year called “Love Letters” (https://www.nytimes.com/2024/02/10/briefing/love-letters.html). In the first part of the article, the author described the custom in her childhood when she and her friends would “bestow a Valentine” -- or, in other words, give a small Valentine’s Day card or gift -- to each of their friends in class. Because of this custom, every child in class would get little gifts and cards addressed to them personally.  This was how the author described this childhood experience:  It was an early exercise in seeing and being seen. 這是教會了我關於「看見/尊重別人」與「被別人看見/的尊重」的一個早期經歷 I thought that we could use this sentence to reinforce what we know about gerunds as noun phrases. “Gerunds” are non-finite verb forms that consist of the base form of a verb plus a regular “-ing” ending. For example, the gerund form of the verb “see” is “seeing.”* In this sentence, the author describes how her experience of giving and receiving personalized tokens of love was an “exercise” -- or a formative experience -- “in seeing” and acknowledging others, and also in “being seen” and acknowledged by others. The noun “exercise” is being modified by the prepositional phrase “in seeing and being seen.” This phrase is the adjective to “exercise.” Recall that a prepositional phrase is made up of a preposition, like “in,” plus a noun phrase. Since gerunds -- like “seeing” -- act as noun phrases, they can form prepositional phrases with prepositions. So, “in seeing” is a prepositional phrase with “in” and the gerund “seeing.” “Being seen” is also a gerund phrase, but it is in passive voice. It consists of the auxiliary verb “be” with the gerund “-ing” ending -- “being” -- plus the fixed past participle form of the main verb “see,” as in “seen.” Together, “being seen” is a gerund phrase in passive voice. (In contrast, “seeing” is in active voice.) (You can review how gerund phrases in passive voice are formed in this previous newsletter.)  Since “beings seen” is also a gerund noun phrase, “in” can also combine with it to form the phrase “in being seen.” In this sentence, because the author wants to express that this experience taught her how to both “see others” (do the action of seeing others), and to “be seen by others” (receive the action of others seeing her), she used two prepositional phrases, “in seeing,” with the active gerund “seeing,” and “in being seen,” with the passive gerund “being seen,” to describe the “exercise”:  …an early exercise in seeing and in being seen.  「看見」和「被看見」的早期經歷 When we have two parallel modifiers like this modifying the same thing, we can connect them into one phrase with the word “and.”  The word “and” connects the prepositional phrase “in seeing” and “in being seen” here. Both of these prepositional phrases modify the noun “exercise” -- they are both serving the same function in parallel.  When we connect parallel phrases serving the same function into one phrase with “and,” we often omit the parts that are repeated, if there are any. Since both of these connected prepositional phrases have the same preposition “in” here, the second, repeated “and” is omitted: …an early exercise in seeing and being seen.  You can think of “in seeing and being seen” as one phrase, since it modifies “exercise” as a whole.  From the same article, there is another sentence that contains a prepositional phrase with a gerund phrase. Let’s look at it also:  Eventually, Valentine’s Day becomes a day for honoring one sweetheart, for celebrating a single relationship.   最終，情人節成為了一個紀念一位摯愛、慶祝一段關係的日子 Here, the prepositional phrases “for honoring one sweetheart” and “for celebrating a single relationship” both consist of the preposition “for” with a gerund phrase. The gerund phrases start with the gerunds “honoring” and “celebrating” respectively. Both of these prepositional phrases modify the noun phrase “a day.” We would often also connect these two phrases serving the same function with “and,” but the author chooses to put them in parallel here, separated by a comma, for stylistic reasons. I hope you can spend a meaningful day on Valentine’s Day, however you choose to celebrate it. ______________ *  Again, as I have explained before, there are two separate non-finite verb forms in English that have the “-ing” ending -- the gerund form (a noun form) and the so-called present participle form.  We are talking about gerunds in this newsletter, and not present participles. Gerunds act as nouns in a clause, whereas present participles are either part of the finite verb of a clause or act as modifiers when they appear on their own.