英文字彙與字源Note week17

Ø   Henpecker (怕老婆)

→ To dominate or harass (someone, usually a man) with persistent nagging.

Ø  Ethnic group

→ Asian， Hispanic ，white (caucasion) ，white(Afro-american)

An ethnic group or ethnicity is a category of people who identify with each other based on common ancestral, social, cultural or national experience. Unlike most other social groups, ethnicity is primarily an inherited status. Membership of an ethnic group tends to be defined by a shared cultural heritage, ancestry, origin myth, history, homeland, language and/or dialect, symbolic systems such as religion, mythology and ritual, cuisine, dressing style, art, and physical appearance.

   Caucasion：related to a racial group having light-colored skin

               Afro-American

Ø   單調瑣碎

Trivial → not very important, serious, or valuable

Tedious → boring and continuing for too long

Ø  Harriet Tubman (摩西奶奶)

Harriet Tubman (born Araminta Ross c. 1822[1] – March 10, 1913) was an African-American abolitionist, humanitarian, and, during the American Civil War, a Union spy. Born into slavery, Tubman escaped and subsequently made some thirteen missions to rescue approximately seventy enslaved family and friends, using the network of antislavery activists and safe houses known as the Underground Railroad. She later helped abolitionist John Brown recruit men for his raid on Harpers Ferry, and in the post-war era was an active participant in the struggle for women's suffrage.

In 1849, Tubman escaped to Philadelphia, then immediately returned to Maryland to rescue her family. Slowly, one group at a time, she brought relatives with her out of the state, and eventually guided dozens of other slaves to freedom. Traveling by night and in extreme secrecy, Tubman (or "Moses", as she was called) "never lost a passenger". Her actions made slave owners anxious and angry, and they posted rewards for her capture. When a far-reaching United States Fugitive Slave Law was passed in 1850, she helped guide fugitives further north into Canada, and helped newly freed slaves find work.

When the US Civil War began, Tubman worked for the Union Army, first as a cook and nurse, and then as an armed scout and spy. The first woman to lead an armed expedition in the war, she guided the raid at Combahee Ferry, which liberated more than seven hundred slaves. After the war, she retired to the family home on property she had purchased in 1859 in Auburn, New York, where she cared for her aging parents. She was active in the women's suffrage movement until illness overtook her and she had to be admitted to a home for elderly African-Americans that she had helped to establish years earlier. After she died in 1913, she became an icon of American courage and freedom.

Checkmate → in chess, an attack that your opponent’s king cannot escape from, so that you win the game (將軍) 

•  syllable

Ø   Re-：back，again

1.          Reject → to not agree to an offer, proposal, or request

2.          Repair → to fix something that is broken or damaged

l   Impair → to make something less good or effective, especially by causing damage that affects the way something works

Ø   Com-： with together

Complement (v) → to combine well with something, often something that has different qualities

Thanks for your complements (n.)