| 词组 | ambivalent, ambiguous |
| 释义 | ambivalent, ambiguous Ambivalent is a much newer word than ambiguous; while the latter has been in the language since the 16th century, ambivalent is not attested until 1916, and its earliest citations are from translations of Jung and Freud. Its first use in English, then, was as a technical term in psychology, but it seems to have found itself a niche in popular usage fairly quickly as a descriptive word for a state in which one holds simultaneous contradictory feelings or in which one wavers between two polar opposites. Ambiguous had earlier been used for analogous situations; consequently, the words sometimes are used in similar contexts. • My attitude toward the plan ... will be called by some of my friends ambiguous, or perhaps—since the word is now in fashion—"ambivalent." —Albert Guérard, Education of a Humanist, 1949 • Keats confused, confounded two centuries By ambivalent, ambiguous Mating of truth with beauty—Richard Eberhart, Accent, Spring 1947 • ... her frustrating and ambiguous role—acknowledged neither as wife nor as mistress —William L. Shirer, The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, 1960 • In all matters Blum's ambivalent position was motivated by a desire to preserve unity —Joel Colton, Yale Rev., March 1954 Both ambivalent and ambiguous may connote duality: • To adopt the Committee's own ambivalent phrasing, that may or may not be the result — Wall Street Jour., 1 Apr. 1955 • But, like the bearded lady of the fair ground, it wears an ambiguous appearance —Iain Colquhoun, New Republic, 18 Oct. 1954 But they are seldom really confused, because ambiguous tends to stress uncertainty and is usually applied to external things while ambivalent tends to stress duality and is usually applied to internal things: • English fleets and armies forced the ambiguous benefits of modern civilization on the reluctant Chinese —D. W. Brogan, The English People, 1943 • ... in the matter of Miss Thompson's ambiguous femininity —Diana Trilling, N. Y. Times Book Rev., 22 Apr. 1973 • ... the complaint is commonplace that spoken language is too ambiguous and conceptually fuzzy — Nehemiah Jordan, Themes in Speculative Phychol-ogy, 1968 • ... only partially excavated but illuminating for the new light they throw on the ambiguous world of the Maya —Katharine Kuh, Saturday Rev., 28 June 1969 • His intensely ambivalent attitude to his father—of admiration for his positive qualities and bitter hatred for his insensitivity and brutality —Anne Fremantle, Commonweal, 6 Dec. 1946 • He has Thackeray's fruitfully ambivalent attitude toward his own class —Clifton Fadiman, Holiday, October 1954 • He spoke of the number of people ... who had urged him to withdraw from the festival, and of his own ambivalent feelings —Eric F. Goldman, Harper's, January 1969 Ambivalent may be followed by the prepositions toward(s) and about: • In an era when Americans were not yet ambivalent about the fruits of science —Harriet Zuckerman, Trans-Action, March 1968 • ... if its author had been a little less ambivalent about its potential audience —Times Literary Supp., 9 Dec. 1965 • ... I'm a trifle ambivalent toward "Room Service" —John McCarten, New Yorker, 18 Apr. 1953 • American woman, ambivalent towards fighting — Margaret Mead, And Keep Your Powder Dry, 1942 The handful of commentators who object to ambivalent used other than in its original narrow sense are out-of-date. The extended uses are well established. See also equivocal, ambiguous, ambivalent. |
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