As you watched the 2014 FIFA World Cup over the few weeks， you heard a lot of people call the sport “football”.

If youre American， however， theres a good chance you call it “soccer”. And despite what British fans may tell you， theres a good reason you call it that. They should know—“soccer” is a British word.

The word “soccer” dates back to the 19th-century birth of modern football. It has a more precise meaning than the broader term “football”， points out University of Michigan professor Stefan Szymanski in a new paper.

2014年觀看世界杯的時候，你聽到很多人管足球叫“football”。

但如果你是美國人，很可能你管它叫“soccer”。不管英國球迷怎么說，你這么叫其實很有道理。那些英國球迷得要知道，“soccer”其實是個英國詞。

“soccer”這個詞可以追溯到19世紀現(xiàn)代足球剛剛誕生的時候。密歇根大學(xué)的教授斯蒂芬·西曼斯基在最新發(fā)布的研究中指出，“soccer”的詞義更為精準，而“football”的詞義更寬泛。

People have been playing football-like sports for centuries， from the ancient Chinese cuju to the Mayan game pok ta pok， which used a rubber ball. Yet football as its played in the World Cup was born more recently in Britain.

“Football” originally meant an array of ball games played on foot rather than horseback. At that time football didnt necessarily refer to kicking and some types of football had long involved use of the hands. In 1871， a group of clubs met in London to form the Rugby Football Union， and from then on the two versions of football were distinguished as Rugby Football and Association Football. The latter is a mouthful， especially compared to “rugby”. So it clearly needed a nickname.

從中國古代的蹴鞠到瑪雅的橡膠球“波塔波”，人們玩類似足球的運動已經(jīng)有幾個世紀的歷史了。然而在世界杯上踢的足球卻是英國人在近代發(fā)明的。

“football”一詞最初是指在地上而非馬背上進行的球類運動。在那時，足球并不一定要靠踢的，一些足球長期以來都用手玩。1871年，一些俱樂部在倫敦組建了橄欖球聯(lián)盟，隨后兩種不同版本的足球被分別稱為橄欖球和英式足球以示區(qū)別。和前者比起來，后者的名字很拗口，所以后者顯然需要一個昵稱。

But how did “association” become “soccer”？ For one， it was common at the time in England to form slang by adding -er， like “rugger” from “Rugby”. Plus， as the Online Etymology Dictionary points out， “those who did it perhaps shied away from making a name out of the first three letters of Association.”

但“association”是如何演變成“soccer”的？其一是，在當時的英國通過添加-er后綴組成俚語很平常，例如橄欖球運動員“rugger”就演變自橄欖球“Rugby”。另外，根據(jù)《在線詞源詞典》所指出的：“引導(dǎo)單詞變化的人，可能是為了回避單純地取源單詞‘a(chǎn)ssociation的前三個字母?！?/p>

The popularity of football in North America required another name for association football， so Americans used the British nickname “soccer”. The word “soccer” wasnt used widely in publications until World War II. It then peaked in popularity among the British from 1960 to 1980， when soccer and football were used almost interchangeably.

Although its unclear why “soccer” grew more common in Britain after World War II， it may have been due to the popularity of US soldiers stationed there.

In the 1980s we started to hear the argument that soccer was an American word. It is hard to think of any explanation for the decline of “soccer” in England other than the rising popularity of the word soccer in the US.

在北美，由于橄欖球的盛行，人們需要用另一個名字來稱呼英式足球，于是人們選擇了它的英國昵稱“soccer”?！皊occer”一詞在第二次世界大戰(zhàn)前并未在出版物中廣泛使用。從1960年到1980年，soccer在英國的使用率達到高峰，幾乎可以和football一詞互換使用。

雖然我們尚不清楚為何二戰(zhàn)后“soccer”一詞在英國變得更常見，但這可能是因為駐英美軍的普及。

在20世紀80年代，我們開始聽到一些說法認為soccer一詞是美語。除了soccer一詞在美國用得越來越多，我們很難想出任何能解釋為什么英國人不再用它的原因。