- 1髒話
An expletive is a rude word you throw out when you are angry, hurt, or shocked — the kind some people bleep on TV. Shit is a clear example; weaker ones like damn sit in the same box. News writing used to print “expletive deleted” when a public person swore, and that is how many English speakers first met the word. Though actually, an older, quieter meaning is a word that fills a hole in a sentence without adding much meaning (the there in there is a cat). Swear words got pulled into that name because they often fill the sentence the same way: they let the feeling out more than they tell you a fact. In ordinary talk, though, if someone says expletive, they almost always mean the rude word.
組成From Late Latin explētīvus (“serving to fill out”), from Latin explētus, from expleō (“fill out”), from ex (“out, completely”) + pleō (“fill”).
原始詞典資料6 筆記錄
以下是外部詞典記錄的用法，摘錄並精簡格式，我們還沒有寫成教學內容。上面的說明才是我們自己寫的；有些用法可能上面已經講過了。
expletiveadj/ɪkˈspliːtɪv/
- 1
Serving to fill up, merely for effect, otherwise redundant.
- No one entered more fully than Shakespeare into the character of this species of poetry, which admits of no expletive imagery, no merely ornamental line.
- deprecating being taken for ſerious, or to be underſtood that he meaneth any thing by them; but only that he uſeth them as expletive phraſes ... to plump his ſpeech, and fill up ſentences.
- 2
Marked by expletives (phrase-fillers).
expletivenoun/ɪkˈspliːtɪv/
- 1
A profane, vulgar term, notably a curse or obscene oath.
- If we don't take advantage of any [expletive] in any way, then it's our loss.
- 2
human-scienceslinguisticssciencesA word without meaning added to fill a syntactic position.
- 3
human-scienceslinguisticssciencesA word that adds to the strength of a phrase without affecting its meaning (such as fucking in "there's no fucking way he's gonna get away with it").
- 4
An obscene or otherwise offensive interjection (such as shit, fuck, or damn it).
摘錄自 英文維基詞典 English Wiktionary，已精簡格式；依 CC BY-SA 4.0 授權使用，改動後的內容同樣以此授權提供。