核心畫面
You can picture handing something across to another person — except what you hand over is information: a fact, a story, a feeling, a warning. The core of 'tell' is making something known to someone, usually by speaking. From that one move, two big directions grow: pushing information OUT to a person (tell a story, tell someone to do something, warn, report), and, surprisingly, taking information IN — being able to tell (= know or work out) something from clues, or tell two things apart. The huge crowd of everyday phrases (I tell you, tell you what, you're telling me) are all this same act of 'making known,' worn smooth by daily speech into little signals that frame what you're about to say.
可以想成把一樣東西遞到另一個人手上——只不過你遞過去的是「訊息」:一個事實、一個故事、一種感受、一句警告。tell …更多收起
可以想成把一樣東西遞到另一個人手上——只不過你遞過去的是「訊息」:一個事實、一個故事、一種感受、一句警告。tell 的核心,就是「讓某人知道某件事」,通常是用說的。從這一個動作,長出兩個大方向:一是把訊息往外推給別人(說故事、叫某人做事、警告、告狀),二是反過來把訊息往內收——憑線索「看得出來、判斷得出」某件事,或「分辨」兩個東西的不同。而一大群日常口語片語(I tell you、tell you what、you're telling me)都是同一個「讓人知道」的動作,被天天講到磨得很順,變成替接下來的話定調的小信號。原始詞典資料20 筆記錄
以下是外部詞典記錄的用法，原文照列，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。
Tellname
- 1
A surname.
tellverb詞源 1/tɛl/
- 1
Mental senses related to determining, reckoning, or perceiving
- All told, there were over a dozen. Can you tell time on a clock? He had untold wealth.
- And in his lap a masse of coyne he told, And turned vpsidowne, to feede his eye A couetous desire with his huge threasury.
- 2
Mental senses related to determining, reckoning, or perceiving
- I can tell that you're thrilled.
- You can tell you've struck a nerve when even the crowd stops laughing.
- 3
Mental senses related to determining, reckoning, or perceiving
- An expert can tell an original from a forgery.
- Can you tell whether those flowers are real or silk, from this distance? No, there's no way to tell.
- 4
Social senses of communicating
- I want to tell a story; I want to tell you a story.
- “[…]Churchill, my dear fellow, we have such greedy sharks, and wolves in lamb's clothing. Oh, dear, there's so much to tell you, so many warnings to give you, but all that must be postponed for the moment.”
- 5
Social senses of communicating
- Finally, someone told him the truth. He seems to like to tell lies.
- I told him about everything I could think of; and what I couldn't think of he did. He asked about six questions during my yarn, but every question had a point to it. At the end he bowed and thanked me once more. As a thanker he was main-truck high; I never see anybody so polite.
- 6
Social senses of communicating
- Please tell me how to do it.
- Why didst thou not tell me that she was thy wife?
- 7
Social senses of communicating
- Tell him to go away.
- She said she hoped she had not distressed him by the course she had felt obliged to take, and he told her not to be a fool.
- 8
Social senses of communicating
另外 6 個記錄的用法
- 9
Social senses of communicating
- I saw you steal those sweets! I'm telling!
- 10
authorshipbroadcastingcommunicationsSocial senses of communicating
- Maria rewrote the section of her novel that talked about Meg and Sage's friendship to have less telling and more showing.
- 11
Abstract senses related to showing or revealing
- Cherry looks old, Mergenthaler told himself. His age is telling. Querulous — that's the word. He's become a whining, querulous old man absorbed with trivialities.
- 12
Abstract senses related to showing or revealing
- Time will tell what became of him.
- 13
Abstract senses related to showing or revealing
- Sir Gerald was moving slower; his wounds were beginning to tell.
- Vigorous writing is concise. A sentence should contain no unnecessary words, a paragraph no unnecessary sentences, for the same reason that a drawing should have no unnecessary lines and a machine no unnecessary parts. This requires not that the writer make all his sentences short, or that he avoid all detail and treat his subjects only in outline, but that every word tell.
- 14
Abstract senses related to showing or revealing
- Opinion ought [… to give] merited honour to every one, whatever opinion he may hold[…]keeping nothing back which tells, or can be supposed to tell, in their favour.
- For these reasons, I conclude that this factor tells in favour of Italy as the proper forum for the litigation between the parties.
tellnoun詞源 1/tɛl/
- 1
A reflexive, often habitual behavior, especially one occurring in a context that often features attempts at deception by persons under psychological stress (such as a poker game or police interrogation), that reveals information that the person exhibiting the behavior is attempting to withhold.
- 2
informalA giveaway; something that unintentionally reveals or hints at a secret.
- Those whose business it is to verify luxury bags insist, at least publicly, that there’s always a “tell” to a superfake.
- Republican Congressman Chris Smith of New Jersey said recently that “Israel is the only state in the world whose fundamental right to exist, within any borders at all, is openly denied by other states.” But Israel is the only nation with a “right to exist,” as the phrase is not commonly attached to any other country. And that’s the tell: This is not a legal concept, but a political one, available for broad interpretation and rhetorical weaponization.
- 3
archaicThat which is told; a tale or account.
- April 4, 1743, Horace Walpole, letter to Sir Horace Mann I am at the end of my tell.
- 4
A private message to an individual in a chat room; a whisper.
tellnoun詞源 2/tɛl/
- 1
archaeologyhistoryhuman-sciencesA hill or mound, originally and especially in the Middle East, over or consisting of the ruins of ancient settlements.
- Succoth is now associated with a large tell situated in the Jordan Valley, Deir Allah.
資料來源：英文維基詞典 English Wiktionary（CC BY-SA 4.0）。 原文照列，未經改寫。