20190119 uphill

1. 这是个什么词？

词：uphill

英英释义：something that is very difficult to do and needs a lot of effort and determination

例句：Whenever the Chinese national football team plays a European team, it is going to be an uphill struggle.

2. 为什么选这个词？

“uphill”可以作副词和形容词，我们今天来学习它的形容词意思。“uphill”作形容词本意是“上坡的”，可以引申为“艰难的、费力的”。当我们说一项任务非常艰难的时候，除了使用 difficult, hard, tough, demanding 等之外，还可以使用 uphill 来替换，让表达更加贴切、形象。

uphill 经常修饰 struggle, battle, task, climb, fight 等词。我们通过几个例句来掌握它。当两个球队、两个竞争对手实力、体量等差距悬殊时，往往就可以使用 uphill。比如中国男足和欧洲球队比赛时胜率很小，就可以说：

Whenever the Chinese national football team plays a European team, it is going to be an uphill battle.

阿里巴巴这个电商巨头的头部效应明显，新的电商玩家很难胜出，但拼多多终究还是成功了。就可以这么说：

Alibaba has been widely regarded as an e-commerce giant. Although it seemed like an uphill task for Pinduoduo to stand out, it dealt tactfully with the hard realities and went public merely three years after its launch.

今年 10 月《经济学人》在一篇文章中分析了诺贝尔奖自成立以来获奖人数的男女比例差距过大，文章摘要是这样写的：

Gender parity in science is an uphill struggle.

最后，我们来顺便掌握 uphill 的反义词 downhill。当我们想表达某某事情易如反掌的时候，就可以用它，一般的习惯表达是：be all downhill (from here) 或者 be downhill all the way (from here)。比如：

We have got the toughest part done, and it will be downhill all the way from here.

3. 怎样学会使用这个词？

1）翻译下面的句子：

要在两个月之内把雅思从 6 分提到 8 分对任何人来说都是一件非常难的事情.

It is an uphill task for anyone to improve IELTS from Band 6 to Band 8 within 2 months.

（参考翻译：To improve IELTS from Band 6 to Band 8 within two months is an uphill struggle/task to anyone.）

2）结合自己的生活、学习、工作、兴趣等，想象在什么语境下会用到这个表达。先简要描述这个场景，再造句。

例子： 想要一周完成这门课程会是一项艰巨的任务

场景 ： It is an uphill task to complete this course whthin one week.