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This is 6 Minute English from BBC Learning English dot com.
这里是bbclearningenglish.com英语六分钟节目。
Rob: Hello, I’m Rob. Welcome to 6 Minute English. I’ve got Finn with me today. Hello Finn.
大家好，我是罗伯。欢迎收听英语六分钟。今天和我一起的是费恩，你好，费恩。
Finn: Hi Rob, how’s it going?
你好罗伯，最近怎么样？
Rob: All right. You might notice it’s a bit noisier than usual – that’s because we’re in our open-plan office.
挺好的。你或许已经注意到了，今天比往常要吵闹一些--那是因为我们在开放式办公室。
Finn:
Yes, it’s a big room full of desks with no walls between them and, as I
look around, I can see maybe about 50 colleagues working very hard at
their computers!
是的，这这间大屋里布满了桌子，人和人之间没有挡板，并且，我四处看了下，大约有50名同事正在自己的电脑前努力工作着！
Rob: And today we’re talking about open-plan offices – and learning some language related to office life.
今天我们要谈论的就是开放式办公室--学习一些与办公生活相关的语言。
Finn: That’s right. Rob, shall we just go back into the studio where it’s a bit quieter?
是的。罗伯我们能不能去演播室，那里更安静些。
Rob: Good idea. Let’s go. Right, come in here.
好主意。走吧。好的，进来吧。
Finn: That’s better. That’s good, isn’t it?
好多了。很好，不是吗？
Rob: Lovely.
很好
Finn: Rob – a question? You know a lot about sound, don’t you?
罗伯--问你个问题？你对声音很了解，是吧？
Rob: Well, a bit.
一点点。
Finn:
What do we call a kind of noise that contains the full range of sounds
that humans can hear? Is it… a) white noise b) green noise c) pink noise
有一种噪音包含了所有人类可以听到的声音，你知道叫什么吗？选项有a) 白色噪音b）绿色噪音c）粉色噪音
Rob: Good question. I’m only familiar with the term ’white noise’, so I’ll go for a) white noise.
好问题。我只对“白色噪音”这个词比较熟悉，我选a）白色噪音。
Finn: Well, we’ll see if you’re right at the end of the programme. So shall we continue talking about offices?
好的，我们会在节目的最后来看看你回答的是否正确。我们继续来讨论办公室的话题怎样？
Rob:
Yes, millions of people like us work in open-plan offices these days,
but they’re not new. Do you remember Henry Ford, the American
industrialist from the late 19th Century and early 20th Century?
这些天，数以百万计的人像我们一样在开放式办公室工作，但这不是最近才有的。你还记得亨利·福特吗，19世纪末二十世纪初的美国实业家？
Finn: Yes, he owned factories and he made the famous Ford cars.
是的，他拥有很多工厂，生产了著名的福特汽车。
Rob: He’s also one of the main names in the story of open-plan offices.
他也是开放式办公室故事中的主要人物之一。
Finn: Yes, Henry Ford was really concerned with efficiency, wasn’t he?
是的，亨利·福特非常注重效率，不是吗？
Rob: Yes. Efficiency is one of main reasons for open-plan offices – they increase communication and collaboration among staff.
不是的。效率是出现开放式办公室的主要原因之一，这种办公室增加了员工间的交流和协作。
Finn:
Now, a company’s staff – its employees – work together for the same
goals – they collaborate, exchanging information and ideas. This can be
nice, but there can be too many of us in a small space!
现在，一家公司的工作人员--它的员工--为了一些共同的目标而一起工作。他们协作，交流信息和想法。这很好，但在一个小房间里,人太多了！
Rob:
Franklin Becker, social psychologist at Cornell University in the US,
thinks the reason open-plan offices have become acceptable and popular,
or as he says – the reason they have taken root – is different. What
reason does he give?
美国康奈尔大学的社会心理学家富兰克林·贝克尔认为开放式办公室已经变得很普遍并容易让人接受，或者像他说的--开放式办公室出现的原因是不同的。他给出的原因是什么呢？
The
fundamental reason why open plan has taken root has nothing to do
really with communication or collaboration or even flexibility. It has
to do with the fact that you can reduce the amount of space per person
in an open-plan versus any kind of a closed cellular office.
出现开放式办公室的根本原因与沟通或合作甚至灵活性无关。与任何形式的分格式办公室相比，实际上开放式办公室可以减少每个人的空间。
Finn:
Well, it’s all about saving space and money. He says it takes less
space per person in an open-plan office than it does in a cellular
office – that’s an office which is made up of lots of small, closed
rooms.
好吧，都是为了节省空间和金钱。他说在开放式办公室每个人所占的空间比分格式的要小。分格式办公室是由很多小的密闭房间组成的。
Rob: In those offices, the space for each individual – per person - is limited. Which is why open-plan offices have taken root.
在这些办公室里，每个人的空间是有限的。这就是为什么出现了开放式办公室。
Finn: So some very good reasons for open-plan offices. But what about the noise?
所以出现开放式办公室有一些很好的原因。但是噪音怎么办呢？
Rob:
The noise! Yes! Although open-plan offices can save a company money,
they have hidden costs. Sound expert Julian Treasure explains what they
are. He uses a very important word for business. Which word is it?
噪音！是的！尽管开放式办公室给公司节省了钱，但他们有一些隐藏的成本。声音专家朱利安·特雷热给出了解释。他使用了一个非常重要商业词汇。是什么呢？
Nobody
can understand two people talking at the same time. We have bandwidth
for about 1.6 people talking. Now that’s key when we are talking about
open-plan offices because if I’m trying to do work it requires me to
listen to a voice in my head to organise symbols, to organise a flow of
words and put them on paper, for example. And if you’re talking at the
same time, then you’re taking up one of my 1.6. I’m left with 0.6 in my
head. That doesn’t work very well - it reduces my productivity
dramatically.
没人能够同时听两个人说话。我们的听觉宽度大约为1.6个人。这是我们谈论开放式办公室的关键，因为比如说我正在努力工作呢，这时让我听一个声音来组织符号，组成一串话，并写在纸上。如果这时你也在说话，你就占据了我带宽的1.6分之一。我的脑中就只剩下0.6。这使我不能好好工作--大大降低了我的工作效率。
Finn:
The word, right at the end there, was productivity. Workers in
open-plan offices get distracted when others speak, and their ability to
produce work – their productivity - is reduced.
那个词，就在话的末尾，就是工作效率。当其他人说话的时候，在开放式办公室工作的人会分散注意力，然后他们的工作效率就会下降。
Rob: The expert says we can concentrate on 1.6 voices saying different things at the same time. That’s not even two people!
专家说我们可以集中精力听1.6个声音同时说不同的事。这甚至都不到两个人！
Finn:
No, not really.He says one voice is in your own head, to organise the
flow, the movement, of words and ideas when you think and write.
是的。他说当你在思考和书写的时候，你脑海里有一个声音来组织词语的排序。
Rob: And the other is… well, people like you on the phone all the time!
另一个，好吧，声音就是像你这样的人一直在打电话！
Finn: Oh, come on Rob. I suppose I do speak on the phone quite a lot but I didn’t know I was disturbing your work.
得了吧罗伯，我的确是打过很多电话但我不知道我打扰到你工作了。
Rob: You are.
是的，你打扰到了。
Finn: Oh, sorry. Shall we go back to the question I asked earlier?
哦，很抱歉。我们回到我之前问你的问题上？
Rob: Okay.
好的。
Finn:
I asked you about the colour of noise that contains the full range of
sounds that humans can hear. Was it white, green or pink noise?
我问你什么颜色的噪声包含所有人类可以听到的声音？是白色的，绿色的还是粉色的呢？
Rob: Yes. And I went for white noise.
是的，我选的是白色的噪音。
Finn: The answer is, in fact, pink noise. That’s the name scientists give noise…
答案是，实际上是粉色的噪音。那是科学家给噪音起的名字。
Rob: Interesting colour.
有趣的颜色
Finn: the full range of audio frequencies or sounds that humans can hear.
人类能够听到的音频频率或声音的完整范围。
Rob: Okay. Well, it’s almost time to go but could you remind us of some of the English words we heard today?
好的。时间差不多了，你能帮助大家回顾一下今天听到的英语单词吗？
Finn: Of course. We heard:
当然。我们听到了：
open-plan office
开放式办公室
industrialist
实业家
collaboration
协作
staff
员工
to take root
生根
per person
每个人
flow
流动
productivity
工作效率
Rob: Thanks Finn. Well that’s it for this programme. Please join us soon again for 6 Minute English from BBC Learning English.
谢谢费恩。今天的英语六分钟节目到这里就结束了。请记得收听我们下期的节目。
Both: Bye.
再见。
That was 6 Minute English from BBC Learning English dot com.
以上是bbclearningenglish.com英语六分钟节目。
