咸阳大学新视野大学英语综合教程3 课文及课文翻译

Work in

corporate

America

1 It

is

not

surprising

that

modern

children

tend

to

look

blank

and

dispirited

when informed that they will someday have to

The problem is that they cannot

visualize

what work is in corporate America.

2 Not so long ago, when a parent said he was off to work, the child knew

very well what was about to happen. His parent was going to make something or

fix something. The parent could take his

offspring

to his place of business

and let him watch while he repaired a

buggy

or built a table.

3 When

a

child

asked,

kind

of

work

do

you

do,

Daddy?

his

father

could

answer in terms that a child could come to

grips

with, such as

engines

4 Well, a few fathers still fix steam engines and build tables, but most

do not. Nowadays, most fathers sit in glass buildings doing things that are

absolutely

incomprehensible

to

children.

The

answers

they

give

when

asked,

kind

of

work

do you do, Daddy?

are likely to

be

utterly

mystifying

to a

child.

5

data processor

.

in

public relat ions

.

analyst

.

nonse nse to a child. How can he possibly

envision

anyone analyzing a system

or researching a market?

6 Even grown men who do market research have trouble visualizing what a

public relations man does with his day, and it is a safe bet that the average

systems analyst is as

baffled

about what a space

salesman

does at the shop as

the average space salesman is about the tools needed to analyze a system.

7 In

the

common

everyday

job,

nothing

is

made

any

more.

Things

are

now

made

by machines. Very little is repaired. The machines that make things make them

in such a fashion that they will quickly fall apart in such a way that repairs

will

be

prohibitively

expensive.

Thus

the

buyer

is

encouraged

to

throw

the

thing

away and buy a new one. In effect, the machines are making junk.

8 The

handful

of people

remotely

associated with these machines can, of

course,

tell

their

inquisitive

children

makes

junk

Most

of

the

workforce,

however, is too remote from junk production to sense any

contribution

to the

industry. What do these people do?

9 Consider

the

typical

12-story

glass

building

in

the

typical

American

city.

Nothing

is

being

made

in

this

building

and

nothing

is

being

repaired,

including

the building itself. Constructed as a piece of junk, the building will be

discarded

when

it

wears

out,

and

another

piece

of

junk

will

be

set

in

its

place.

10 Still, the building is filled with people who think of themselves as

working. At any given moment during the day perhaps one-third of them will be

talking into telephones. Most of these conversations will be about paper, for

paper is what occupies nearly everyone in this building.

11 Some jobs in the building require men to fill paper with words. There

are persons who type neatly on paper and persons who read paper and

jot

notes

in the

margins

. Some persons make copies of paper and other persons deliver

paper. There are persons who file paper and persons who unfile paper.

12 Some persons mail paper. Some persons telephone other persons and ask

that paper be sent to them. Others telephone to

ascertain

the

whereabouts

of

paper. Some persons

confer

about paper. In the

grandest

offices, men approve

of some paper and

disapprove

of other paper.

13 The

elevators

are

filled

throughout

the

day

with

young

men

carrying

paper

from

floor

to

floor

and

with

vital

men

carrying

paper

to

be

discussed

with

other

vital men.

14 What is a child to make of all this? His father may be so

eminent

that

he lunches with other men about paper. Suppose he brings his son to work to

give

the

boy

some

idea

of

what

work

is

all

about.

What

does

the

boy

see

happening?

15 His father calls for paper. He reads paper. Perhaps he

scowls

at paper.

Perhaps

he

makes an angry

red mark on paper. He telephones

another man

and says

they had better lunch over paper.

16 At lunch they talk about paper. Back at the office, the father orders

the paper retyped and reproduced in

quintuplicate

, and then sent to another

man for comparison with paper that was reproduced in

triplicate

last year.

17 Imagine his poor son afterwards

mulling

over the mysteries of work with

a friend, who asks him,

beats me,

observant

. Or if he is,

has to do with making junk, I think. Same as everybody else.