為什麼“師範大學”會翻譯成“normal university”？

normal/'nɔːm(ə)l/

adj. 正常的；正規的，標準的

n. 常態；正常；標準

我們都知道normal是“正常的”的意思，normal university 不就是“正常的大學”嗎？這跟“師範”有什麼關係呢？

A normal school is a school created to train high school graduates to be teachers. Its purpose is to establish teaching standards or norms, hence its name.

師範學校是培養高中畢業生成為教師的學校。它的目的是建立教學標準或規範（norms），因此得名。

Most such schools are now called teachers' colleges; however, in some places the term normal school is still used.

現在，大多數這種學校被叫做“teachers' colleges”；然而，在某些地方，“normal school”這個名字仍在沿用。

Normal schools in the United States and Canada trained teachers for primary schools, while in continental Europe, the equivalent colleges educated teachers for primary, secondary and tertiary schools.

美國和加拿大的normal schools是一般是培訓小學教師的，而歐洲大陸的同等大學則為小學、中學和大學培訓教師。

In 1685, St. Jean-Baptiste de La Salle, founder of the Institute of the Brothers of the Christian Schools, founded what is generally considered the first normal school, the École Normale, in Reims, Champagne, France.

1685年，聖約翰·喇沙，天主教組織喇沙會的創辦人，在法國香檳區的蘭斯創立了被普遍認為是第一所師範學校的高等師範學校。

The term normal herein refers to the goal of these institutions to instill and reinforce particular norms within students.

這裡的“normal”一詞指的是這些機構立下的向學生灌輸和強化特定規範（norms）的目標。

Norms included historical behavioral norms of the time, as well as norms that reinforced targeted societal values, ideologies and dominant narratives in the form of curriculum.

規範包括當時的歷史行為規範，以及以課程形式強化社會價值觀、意識形態和主導敘事的規範。

Many comprehensive public or state-supported universities, such as the University of California, Los Angeles in the United States and Beijing Normal University in China, were established and operated as normal schools before expanding their faculties and organizing as research universities.

許多綜合性的公立或州立大學，如美國加州大學、洛杉磯大學和中國北京師範大學，在擴編師資和組建研究型大學之前，都是以師範學校的形式建立和運作的。

Some of these universities, particularly in Asia, retain the word Normal in their name to recognize their historical purpose. In Canada, most normal schools were eventually assimilated into a university as its faculty of education.

其中一些大學，尤其是亞洲的大學，在他們的名字中保留了“Normal”這個詞，以表明他們的歷史目的。在加拿大，大多數師範學校最終被合併為一所大學，作為其教育學院存在。

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