每代人身上都深深打上了时代的烙印,了解他们有助于理解美国社会演变的轨迹……几乎所有的印欧文化,最初记载时间的单位既不是年也不是世纪,而是“代”(generation),古希腊神话、旧约全书都是用家族渊源来记载人类早期的历史。“代”在那时多是与“家”相关联的,父母生的兄弟姐妹,即相同辈份的人叫一代。这种“代”实质上是“家族代”,与中国的“辈”相同。现代英语中“家谱”(genealogy)一词,也是由这个词产生的。现代史学家的“代”用来指同一特定时期出生的 Every generation has been deeply imprinted with the times to understand that they help to understand the trajectory of the evolution of American society ... Almost all of Indo-European cultures, the first unit of record time is neither the year nor the century, but the “generation” (generation), ancient Greek mythology, the Old Testament books all use the family origins to record the early history of mankind. At that time, “generation” was mostly associated with “family”. Parents and brothers and sisters, that is, people of the same generation, called generation. This “generation” is essentially “family generation” and is the same as “generation” in China. The word “genealogy” in modern English is also derived from this term. The “generation” of modern historians is used to refer to the birth of a particular period