时髦英语口语词汇讲解第3期:Alcopops 会响的瓶子!

Alcopops
含酒精的果汁

One of the big questions always with a language is: “how do new words come into being?”.
有关语言的一个重要问题是：新的词汇到底是怎样形成的？

Well, you can borrow them from other languages of course; a lot of English words are like that.
显然，我们可以从其它语言中借用；许多英语词汇就是这样来的。

But one of the lesser-known ways of making new words is to form a blend- and a blend is when you run two words together to make a third word.
但是还有一种不是很常见的造词方法--混合法，也就是在两个词中各取一部分来形成第三个词。

And people have done it since the beginning of English actually.
这个方法自从英语形成以来就在为人们所用。

To take a recent example: alcopops - carbonated fruit flavoured drinks containing alcohol - a very controversial thing this was when they first came in a few years ago, because it was obviously being aimed at children, and people were very concerned that children would now have some alcohol introduced into them that they weren't expecting.
拿最近刚出现的新词alcopops来说吧（alcopops是一种含酒精的水果味碳酸饮料）--这种东西几年前刚出现时引起了很大的争议，因为它所针对的（消费）人群显然是未成年人，所以人们很担忧，他们可不希望孩子们从此沾上酒精这种东西。

But it's the word I want to talk about today - a very interesting word indeed!
但是今天我想跟大家聊的是这个单词本身--一个确实非常有趣的词--Alco-pops。

Alco is obviously the first part of the word, shortened version of “alcohol”. Alco-pops . And pops is the second part of the word.
很显然前半部分Alco是（酒精）alcohol的缩略版。pops 是这个单词后半部分。

Pop you might not know so much about. It has quite a long-standing usage.
也许你对pop（汽水；流行音乐）这个词并不是很了解。但是人们使用它却是由来已久。

It's basically the word for lemonade once upon a time.
它曾经一度被用来表示柠檬汁。

Pop bottles - because of the sound that's made when a cork is drawn out of an effervescing drink - that sort of sound!
会嘭嘭作响的瓶子（饮料）--因为从充满气泡的瓶子上把瓶盖揭开时会发出“嘭”的一声-嘭-就像这样；

- and pops suddenly became a very quick sound symbolic way of expressing that kind of notion; so the two words have come together: alcohol and pop …and becomes alco-pops.
所以pops突然就成为了用来表达这种意思（砰砰作响的瓶子）的拟声词。而alcohol 和 pop也就形成了我们此处的alco-pops（含酒精的水果汁--当然开瓶时也是会响的）。

There are lots of words like this in English.
在英语中有很多像这样的词。

Brunch is another one - for a mixture of breakfast and lunch, and you can actually have quite a fun game making these blends up yourself.
Brunch（早中餐）就是另外一个例子--它是由breakfast（早餐）和lunch（午餐）各取一半得来的。你会发现实际上在创造这中混合词的时候是很好玩的。

For instance, if you decide that you want to invent a cross between a helicopter and a bicycle ,shall we say?
如果有这么一种东西，既有直升机的功能又有自行车的功能，我们会把它命名为什么呢？

Well, make a blend about it. You could call it a “helicycle” for instance, or maybe a “bicopter”.
不妨来个混搭。你可以称之为“飞行自行车”（elicycle）或者“自行车飞机”（bicopter）。