Exciting linguistic developments of 2013


The American Dialect Society's
2013 Words of the Year (PDF) (voted on earlier this week — "because" won, because Internet) had some fascinating entries.

I liked "Most Productive" (such as "-(el)fie: (from selfie) type of self-portrait (drelfie 'drunk selfie,' twofie 'selfie with two people')" and "Most Euphemistic" (" least untruthful: involving the smallest necessary lie (used by intelligence director James Clapper)").


MOST EUPHEMISTIC

demised: laid off from employment (used by the bank HSBC)
least untruthful: involving the smallest necessary lie (used by intelligence director James Clapper)
slimdown: reinterpretation of "shutdown" used on Fox News site

"MOST PRODUCTIVE (new category)
-coin: (from bitcoin) type of cryptocurrency (peercoin, namecoin, dogecoin)
-(el)fie: (from selfie) type of self-portrait (drelfie 'drunk selfie,' twofie 'selfie with two people')
-shaming: (from slut-shaming) type of public humiliation (fat-shaming, pet-shaming)
-splaining: (from mansplaining) type of condescending explanation (whitesplaining, journosplaining)
-spo: (from thinspo) type of photo or video montage intended to inspire viewers to lose weight or stay fit (fitspo, sportspo)

American Dialect Society
2013 Words of the Year

(via Beyond the Beyond)

(Image: IMG_0438, a Creative Commons Attribution (2.0) image from medilldc's photostream)