Dueling Banjosとは 意味・読み方・使い方

名詞

dueling banjos pl ‎(複数形 only)

1. A contest of skill in which two people try to top each other's offerings, especially one involving musical ability.
   • 1990, John F. Witte & ‎William H. Clune, Choice and Control in American Education - Volume 2, ISBN 1850008183, page 217:

     The current discussion of choice in education has been driven by this dueling banjos mentality in which scholars and other intellectual entrepreneurs compete for public and intellectual attention by describing the conditions they want to create.

   • 1998, James Schefter, All Corvettes Are Red, ISBN 0671685015, page 311:

     Their tools were computers and when three or four engineers surrounded a car and plugged in, the scene wasn't dueling banjos. It was dueling laptops.

   • 2007, Walt Harrington, The Beholder's Eye, ISBN 0802199623, page 111:

     The nurse's fingers are pressing dental dough into my lower incisors, and she and the doctor are playing dueling banjos with funny stories about their kids, when in walks another dentist, dropping by to say hello.

   • 2014, Ted Lundrigan, Grouse and Lesser Gods, ISBN 1608930793:

     Stick to music that has lots of harmony, and if you ever meet your mirror image, don't try to out-pick him and don't take him grouse hunting. It becomes dueling banjos.

2. Something typical of a stereotypic hillbilly; Something characterized by lack of education, poverty, inbreeding or lack of sophistication.
   • 1998, David Colin Crass, The Southern Colonial Backcountry, ISBN 1572330198, page 162:

     The name "Appalachia" evokes a host of popular images and stereotypes: feuds, individualism, moonshine, subsistence farming, quilting bees, illiteracy, and dueling banjos, to name just a few.

   • 2000, J. Allen Myers, Spectre: A Collection of Poems and Short Stories, ISBN 0595101763, page 66:

     My family at times seem to think they are aristocrats, at other times I swear I can hear the muffled sound of dueling banjos.

   • 2003, Dan Imhoff, Farming with the Wild: Enhancing Biodiversity on Farms and Ranches.:

     “Corn and soybeans are the dueling banjos of conventional agriculture that amount to little more than subsidized erosion,” says Thicke, laughing at his own critique.

   • 2014, Pamela Fagan Hutchins, Hot Flashes and Half Ironmans, ISBN 1939889057:

     Anyway, Eric kept humming some dueling banjos song and talking about people who marry their first cousins.