VOA标准英语2012--Office Cubicle Dwellers Build 'Walls' for Privacy

（单词翻译）

Office Cubicle¹ Dwellers² Build 'Walls' for Privacy

Office mazes³ in which just about everybody below the rank of vice⁴ president works in large open spaces, divided by partitions into “cubicles,” are the standard workplace setting for millions of Americans.

These “cubicle farms” are ridiculed⁵ by cartoonists and often loathed⁶ by their inhabitants as symbols of conformity⁷ and all-too-public work spaces in which one cannot help but overhear every word of a loud or chattering⁹ neighbor.

But as the New York Times recently reported, dwellers in these office “bullpens” are building walls to gain some privacy.

There are two kinds: Makeshift physical ones, by stacking file cabinets atop each other around their cubes, or lining¹⁰ up plants, pictures of kids, and anything else they can think of to separate themselves from their office neighbors.

And technological¹¹ walls. Just about all day long, some cubicle dwellers listen to soothing¹² mood music or white noise through headsets, just to block out the chatter⁸. And a few workplaces are piping in what’s called “pink noise.”

This is what the Times calls “a soft whooshing¹³ emitted over loudspeakers that sounds like a ventilation system but is specially¹⁴ formulated¹⁵ to match the frequencies of human voices.” 

This “whooshing” doesn’t entirely¹⁶ drown out chatty colleagues. But it muddles¹⁷ their conversations and mellows¹⁸ out distractions¹⁹.

The term “pink noise” derives²⁰ from the color when the sound displays as visible light on frequency spectrums. Other sound frequencies show up as white, red, brown, and gray.

Entrepreneurs in one New York office told the Times that the close proximity²¹ of workers to one another in cubicle farms enhances communication, idea-sharing, and office efficiency. 

But they admitted to occasionally “retreating to a bathroom or a broom closet for private chats.