bikini
pronunciation
How to pronounce bikini in British English:
UK [bɪˈki:ni]
How to pronounce bikini in American English:
US [bɪˈkini]
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- Noun:
- a woman's abbreviated two-piece bathing suit
Word Origin
- bikini
- bikini: [20] For Frenchmen, the sight of the first minimal two-piece swimming costumes for women produced by fashion designers in 1947 was as explosive as the test detonation of an atom bomb by the USA at Bikini Atoll in the Marshall Islands, in the western Pacific Ocean, in July 1946. Hence their naming it the ‘Bikini’, the first record of which is in the August 1947 issue of Le Monde Illustré. English acquired the word in 1948. The monokini, essentially a braless bikini, first appeared in 1964, the inspiration for its name being the accidental resemblance of the element bi- in bikini to the prefix bi- ‘two’.
- bikini (n.)
- "low-waisted two-piece women's bathing suit," 1948, from French coinage, 1947, named for U.S. A-bomb test of June 1946 on Bikini, Marshall Islands atoll, locally Pikinni and said to derive from pik "surface" and ni "coconut," but this is uncertain. Various explanations for the swimsuit name have been suggested, none convincingly, the best being an analogy of the explosive force of the bomb and the impact of the bathing suit style on men's libidos (compare c. 1900 British slang assassin "an ornamental bow worn on the female breast," so called because it was very "killing").Bikini, ce mot cinglant comme l'explosion même ... correspondant au niveau du vêtement de plage à on anéantissement de la surface vêtue; à une minimisation extrême de la pudeur. [Le Monde, 1947] As a style of scanty briefs, from 1960. Variant trikini (1967), with separate bra cups held on by Velcro, falsely presumes a compound in bi-.
Example
- 1. Pamela anderson in a lettuce leaf bikini for peta .
- 2. Maria helena victer still remembers the first time she wore a bikini .
- 3. But when it comes to bikini parades , america leads the way .
- 4. On board each of the sunseeker boats , a model in a black bikini poses on the deck .
- 5. The last kind of cloud you want to see : bikini atoll h-bomb test explosion may 21 1956 .