"I heard 'cheers' hundreds of times when I lived in London. It was strange to me at first but I got used to it and when I used it myself I felt I gave a 'less foreign' impression." Cheers真有那么神奇的魔力，能讓外鄉人覺得自己像個地道的英國人?

Cheers最為大家熟知的含義是“干杯”，它表達了人們喝酒碰杯時對彼此的祝福。而今天，我們要講的是cheers在英式英語里面的一個獨特含義，這個用法在英國相當普及，you could hear "cheers" all over the place, whether on the street, in pubs or at university among students...這時候，"cheers" is equivalent to "thank you" in response to a favour or assistance given。

原來"cheers"還有“謝謝”的意思。So any time you want to say thank you, you can just replace that with the word cheers in British English. 我們可以在大多數情況下把cheers這個詞當作thank you來使用，不過"cheers" meaning "thanks" is slang or colloquial，用cheers會不會顯得不正式呢?

In the UK formal situations are often quite informal anyway. It is quite informal but we can still use it formal situation--so with your boss, when talking to someone you don't know so well.

在英國，即使是在一個正式的場合，大家也都比較隨便，所以不論你是在和老板或是一個陌生人說話的時候，都可以使用cheers這個詞。

那么，cheers的這個含義是怎么產生的呢?Well, it has evolved over the years from when people used to say many years ago 'be of good cheer' or 'good cheer to you'. This would have been a greeting to wish someone well that has been shortened to cheers over time. 很多年前在英國，人們見面打招呼的時候會說good cheer to you或者be of good cheer。隨著時間的推移，起先的問候語英經過多年的演變直到今天人們用cheers來表示謝謝thank you。

既然"cheers"可以就是“謝謝”的意思，那么只要有thank的地方，就可以用cheers替換嗎?當然不是!It's always (almost) only used as a one word sentence, as in:

-- 'here's your spanner'

--'cheers' OR 'cheers for that'

但是，你就不能這么說：

-- 'cheers for getting my spanner' (你只可以說"thanks for getting my spanner")

再提供兩個cheers的用法實例：

對話實例1：

A: Did you get my email about the meeting?

B: Yes and I've replied and made sure that everyone knows about it.

A: Cheers.

對話實例2：

A: Two teas please.

B: Here you are.

A: Cheers.

"Cheers" is also commonly used in New Zealand for "thank you". 不過美式英語中"cheers"沒有“謝謝”的含義。If you say cheers for thanks, you'll probably get a funny look from most uncultured Americans. 但是，隨著近些年英國電影的影響和許多臺詞的編排(比如Harrison Ford和Brad Pitt主演的《與魔鬼同行》(The Devil's Own)中，扮演愛爾蘭人的Pitt就說了好幾次的cheers)，美國人也知道了cheers的這個特殊的英式英語含義。所以如果你在美國用 cheers表示感謝，人們也不會覺得太奇怪。

最后，除了"cheers"，不要忘了"cheers, bro"和"cheers mate"，它們在英國都比"thank you"和"thanks"的出現頻率高哦。注意，"cheers, bro" can be said to a friend (and not just your brother)。