Millions share new Chinese character

看BBC如何介绍duang

Millions share new Chinese character

The character "duang" is so new that it does not even exist in the Chinese dictionary. But it has already spread like wildfire online in China, appearing more than 8 million times on China's micro-blogging site Weibo, where it spawned a top-trending hashtag that drew 312,000 discussions among 15,000 users. On China's biggest online search engine Baidu, it has been looked up almost 600,000 times. It's been noticed in the West too, with Foreign Policy seeing it as a "break the internet" viral meme - like a certain Kim Kardashian image, or a certain multicoloured dress.

最近大热的"duang"是一个在汉语字典中并不存在的新词,不过这个字甫一出现就以燎原之势在中国的网络上迅速传播开来.这个字在中国的社交网站微博中出现了八亿多次.有15000名用户使用了它,并引发了31.2万次讨论.在中国最大的在线搜索网站百度,这个字的搜索量达60万余次,该现象同样引发了西方媒体的关注,《外交政策》杂志将其称作"引爆互联网"的病毒式传播事件,与之前金·卡戴珊的美臀照和著名的"白金黑蓝之争"的裙装同等待遇.

But what does it mean?

可是这个字到底是什么意思？

"Everyone's duang-ing and I still don't know what it means! Looks like it's back to school for me," said Weibo user Weileiweito.

"每个人都在"duang",可我连duang什么意思都不知道,这让我仿佛又重回了校园时代."微博用户Weileiweito说.

Another user asked: "Have you duang-ed today? My mind is full of duang duang duang."

而另一位用户发问"今天你"duang"了吗？"我现在满脑都是"duang,duang duang."

"To duang or not to duang, that is the question," wrote user BaiKut automan.

"Duang还是不duang,这是一个问题,"BaiKut如是说.

"Duang" seems to be an example of onomatopoeia, a word that phonetically imitates a sound. It all seems to have started with Hong Kong action star Jackie Chan, who in 2004 was featured in a shampoo commercial where he said famously defended his sleek, black hair using the rhythmical-sounding "duang". The word resurfaced again recently after Chan posted it on his Weibo page. Thousands of users then began to flood Chan's Weibo page with comments, coining the word in reference to his infamous shampoo appearance.

Duang是一个拟声词,用来形容一种声音,来源于香港影星成龙在2004年时拍的一则洗发水广告,他用了duang来形容乌黑亮丽富有动感的头发,而最近成龙在微博上再度使用了duang这一词汇,引得千万网友纷纷访问其微博页面,在该条微博下面评论,并造了这个字来指代他拍的那个洗发水广告.

The word appears to have many different meanings, and there's no perfect translation, but you could use it as an adjective to give emphasis to the word that follows it. A kitten might be "duang cute", for example. Or you might be "very duang confused" by this blog.

duang这个字好像有很多种意思,到目前为止并没有一个确切对应的英文翻译,不过,你可以把它当做形容词用,用来强调跟在它后面的那个词,比如你可以说一只小猫是"duang萌",看到这里,你也许是"非常duang糊涂"了.

For readers of Chinese characters, the Jackie Chan theme is also apparent from the quirky way in which the word is written: a combination of Chan's Mandarin names.

而duang对应的汉字是什么呢？这个字以一种非常离奇的方式被造出来,将"成龙"这两个字组在一起就成了duang.