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November 24, 2022
Oxford Word of the Year for 2022 will be the People's Choice.
Oxford, November 22, 2022 — “The Oxford Word of the Year has reflected the year’s mood, ethos, and social landscape for almost two decades. In 2022, the world gradually reopened. For most countries, this has meant reuniting with friends and family, gathering for events, and returning to offices and workplaces,” Oxford University Press (OUP) stated.
“2022 characterizes reunion, reconnection, activism, and social and political change. Therefore, in recognition of that, we are opening up this year’s Oxford Word of the Year for everyone, everywhere, to have their say on what word best reflects their experience of 2022,” OUP added.
Oxford unveiled this news in an exclusive virtual press event chaired by English lexicographer and broadcaster Susie Dent. The panelists included:
Ben Zimmer - American linguist, lexicographer, and language columnist
Katherine Martin - Product Director, Oxford English Dictionary, Oxford University Press
Fiona McPherson - Senior Editor, Oxford English Dictionary, Oxford University Press
Jonathan Dent - Senior Editor, Oxford English Dictionary, Oxford University Press
The panel discussed why, in a year underpinned by change, OUP had adopted a different approach to choosing its Word of the Year for 2022.
Oxford University Press also revealed the three candidates chosen by their language experts after carrying out their annual duties of researching and reviewing this year’s lexicon. The finalist words put to a public vote include:
• Metaverse n.
A (hypothetical) virtual reality environment in which users interact with one another’s avatars and their surroundings in an immersive way, sometimes posited as a potential extension of or replacement for the internet, World Wide Web, social media, etc.
• IStandWith
It is a hashtag used on social media to express solidarity with a specified cause, group, person, etc.
• Goblin Mode n.
Slang. A type of behavior that is unapologetically self-indulgent, lazy, careless, or greedy, typically in a way that rejects social norms or expectations, frequently in goblin mode or goes goblin mode.
All three words experienced substantial spikes in usage and captured significant concerns, concepts, and states faced this year.
During the Oxford Word of the Year event, Susie Dent praised the fresh approach to this year’s process:
“I’m so excited by this because this is true democracy. English is a democracy; no guiding authority tells us what we can say, what we can’t say, what is correct and what is incorrect. It feels like Word of the Year will reflect that authentic approach. I love it.”
Jonathan Dent also outlined the “evidence-based” process of researching possible candidates for the Oxford Word of the Year.
“Wherever possible, we use corpuses,” Jonathan highlighted.
“These are large bodies of tagged electronic text - the words are all grammatically tagged, and we can analyze the sentences. So it allows us to explore on quite a large scale - linguistic patterns and trends, which words co-occur quite frequently, development of existing words or words moving into different realms.
“For the monitoring and lexicography of current English, we have access to a 19-billion-word corpus, which is updated monthly with new content from around the world. It is our main resource when thinking about Word of the Year; it allows us to see fluctuations and increases in usage in the past twelve months.”
Additionally, Jonathan indicated the reasoning behind metaverse’s inclusion as an Oxford Word of the Year candidate.
“Up until this year, it’s been a relatively low-frequency word in our corpus, but we’ve seen it quadruple in the past year.
“I think as well as reflecting the extent to which social media and the internet increasingly mediate our experience of the world and communication, it also perhaps represents ongoing questions about ownership and regulation on new technologies - especially those by which we communicate.”
For the second candidate, #IStandWith, Fiona McPherson mentioned its usage online to express support.
“By using #IStandWith, people can at least show solidarity for something that may be happening hundreds or thousands of miles away.
“I think this says something quite characteristic about 2022 in that it shows how we’ve come together in solidarity after a difficult number of years. There are still difficulties and horrors in the world, so it’s a way of us coming together and showing solidarity and perhaps expressing how we feel about something.”
Ben Zimmer also gave his thoughts on Goblin Mode as the third Oxford Word of the Year candidate:
“I think Goblin Mode speaks to the times and the zeitgeist, and it is undoubtedly a 2022 expression!
“People are looking at social norms in new ways. It allows people to ditch social norms and embrace new ones.”
“Over the next two weeks, we’ll share insights into the grammatical and linguistic behavior of the words across our social media channels, asking the public to cast their vote and answer the question: Are you #Teammetaverse, #TeamGoblinMode, or #TeamIStandWith?” Oxford University said.
Voting is now open across Oxford University Press’s social media accounts (Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn) and website.
Evidenced by the experts at Oxford and chosen by English speakers everywhere, Oxford University Press will monitor the conversation closely and reveal the winner of the Oxford Word of the Year 2022 on December 5, 2022.
Oxford University Press (OUP) is one of the world’s largest university presses with a broad global presence. It prints in many countries, in more than 40 languages, and in various formats - print and digital. As a result, OUP products cover a vast academic and educational spectrum. For example, the Oxford English Dictionary, published by Oxford University Press, is the principal historical dictionary of the English language.
Oxford University Press (OUP) is a department of the prestigious “University of Oxford.”
Source: Oxford University Press
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Edited & Posted by the Editor | 12:13 PM | Link to this Post
