mixer

Danielle Steelの小説2冊目 'Five Days in Paris' を読み始めました。
主人公のPeter Haskellがパリのドゴール空港に着いたところから小説は始まり、その後の主人公の背景を説明する記述から引用します。

Peter didn't want to marry Kate Donovan. He didn't even know who she was when they met, when she was nineteen and he was twenty, at the University of Michigan. At first, she was just a prettey blond sophomore he met at a mixer, but after two date, he was crazy about her.

"mixer" は日本でいう合コンでしょうか？　辞書を見ます。
・Oxford English Dictionary: A social gathering where people can make new acquaintances.
‘Tourists visit from all over the world to participate in the week's activities, which include concerts, parades, puppet shows, and social mixers that stir from dusk until dawn.’

・Collins Dictionary: a social gathering, as a dance, for getting people acquainted with one another

・Cambridge English Dictionary: a party or dance that has been organized so that people in a group can get to know each other: The school always holds a mixer on the second week of the term.
"mixer" は合コンでとは限らないが、合コンも "mixer" の一種ですね。