demand(回答)
遅くなりましたが、minnesota君からの振りにお答え致します。内容はここでのdemandについてです。
Police arrest bank hostage-taker who demanded Noda resign
CRIME NOV. 23, 2012 - 06:35AM JST ( 1 )
Police on Friday stormed a bank and arrested a man who took five people hostage. The man had been demanding that Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda’s cabinet resign.
In a televised news conference, a police spokesman said the hostage-taker, identified as Koji Nagakubo, was arrested on suspicion of taking the five captive. Police enterered the building from the second floor at about 2:40 a.m., the spokesman said.
The hostages, including one released earlier, were all in protective custody safely, the spokesman said, while local media said one of them was slightly injured.
The 32-year-old man began the siege just after 2 p.m. Thursday afternoon at the Zoshi branch of the Toyokawa Shinkin Bank in central Aichi Prefecture.
Wielding a survival knife, he took four employees and a female customer captive and was demanding the Noda cabinet step down, as well as asking to speak to journalists, local media said.
About seven hours after the drama began, the man released one hostage. Television footage showed a woman walking away from the bank as night fell, escorted by a police officer and apparently handcuffed.
The hostage-taker had also asked for 10 days’ worth of food and water, cigarettes and a lighter, the Asahi Shimbun newspaper said.
Television footage showed a man who appeared to be a police officer carrying a megaphone and a plastic bag to a side door of the building. Shutters were down all over it but lights could be seen inside.
step downは文字通り、「降りる」という意味から「辞職[退陣]する」という意味(『ジーニアス英和辞典』第４版、大修館書店)があります。試訳すると、「野田内閣に退陣するよう要求した」となります。しかしここで気になるのはなぜdemandが使われているのかということです。「要求する」は他にもrequest, require, claimなどがありますが、demandはそうした動詞よりも「有無を言わさず要求する」の気持ちが強い単語です。
ふつうはdemand that S shouldか、demand to Vの形になりますが、ここではthatとshouldが省略され、いわゆるjournaleseの構文になっています。ちなみにこの省略されたshouldはemotional "should"としばしば称されます。
「要求する」と一言で言ってもニュアンスが少しずつ違うので「運用知」を意識しながら学習していきたいです。(EnDough)
