| 词组 | escalate |
| 释义 | escalate Escalate is a back-formation from the noun escalator. It was first used in the early 20th century with the literal sense, "to ride up on an escalator": • I dreamt I saw a Proctor 'escalating', Rushing up a quickly moving stair —The Granta, 10 Nov. 1922 (OED Supplement) But the figurative escalate that we now use appears to have developed from figurative uses of escalation and escalator that originated in the 1930s. Escalation was first used in reference to a provision in naval treaties allowing a country the right—the "right of escalation"— to increase the size and number of its warships in order to keep up with any increase made by the other country. Escalator was used in describing a provision in labor contracts—an "escalator clause"—allowing for increases in wages and prices to reflect increases in costs. When escalate began to be used figuratively, it was also in reference to military and financial matters: • ... a contractor performing on a lump sum, unit price, or escalated job —Jour, of Accountancy, May 1950 • The possibility of local wars 'escalating into all-out atomic wars'—Manchester Guardian, 12 Nov. 1959 (OED Supplement) Escalate became a common word in the 1960s, when it was used constantly in speaking of the increasing U.S. involvement in the war in Vietnam. As its range of applications expanded, it was inevitably criticized as a vogue word, but it fared better than many other back-formations; the usage panel of Heritage 1969, for example, found it acceptable by a large majority. Much of the criticism that has been directed at it has come from British sources. Several British commentators, including Howard 1978, have contended that it can be appropriately used only in describing increases that occur in successive stages, but our evidence suggests that these critics have misread the word's connotations. Escalate typically implies a continuing and usually undesirable increase or expansion, often with the added implication that each stage of the increase provokes even further increases: • ... the violence escalated to include gunfire and gang warfare —Newsweek, 6 Mar. 1967 • ... the problem escalates so rapidly that it gets out of hand before significant improvement is achieved —D. J. Rowe, Reviews of Modern Physics, January 1968 • The costs are already too high, and they escalate higher each year —Lewis Thomas, in The Contemporary Essay, ed. Donald Hall, 1984 • ... that the K.G.B, and the C.I.A. have escalated their secret operations... in an action-counteraction process that has overpopulated the world with secret agents —Harry Howe Ransom, N.Y. Times Book Rev., 4 Mar. 1984 Less often, escalate serves simply as a synonym of increase or grow: • His interest escalated as his knowledge and skill deepened —Margaret Carter, Living, July 1974 • The grin escalates into a chuckle, the chuckle to a chortle —Robert Palm, TV Guide, 21 Mar. 1986 |
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