Soon it will be time for the Oxford English Dictionary to choose its word or phrase of the year and I’ve been wondering which one they’ll select for 2020. This alarming and baffling year has not only seen the creation of lots of new words, but also old words being used in new ways. Upcycled, you might say. I think that the lexicographers will be spoilt for choice when they start to consider this year’s options. So I’ve decided to give them the benefit of my advice.
I think coronavirus is too obvious a choice. I’m hoping for something a bit more imaginative. Apparently, the word has been used for decades by scientists and medics, but I don’t think most people had heard of it before January of this year. Unlike pandemic, which is a very old word, but perhaps too strongly associated with past plagues and flu outbreaks to sum up this year.
I can’t avoid the word lockdown, much as I’d like to. I’m not sure I can face all those Zoom calls again.
Then, of course, we have social distancing. I don’t think any of us had social distanced until a few months ago and I think we’d all be grateful never to social distance again. Although voluntary social distancing might be something altogether different. For instance, hiding in the garden at a party when it’s really too early for you to leave, but you’ve had enough and are thinking fondly of your bed. Or ducking into a shop to hide when you see that dreary person from work walking in your direction. Not that I’ve ever done those things and I don’t know anyone who has.
Bubble is a much friendlier term all round, something that used to be associated with fun and laughter. However, now that the government’s appropriated the term for its own use, referring to it as a support bubble with a long list of do’s and don’ts attached, all the fun’s gone out of it. Besides, I’m sure the Oxford English Dictionary would never choose such a frivolous word.
Which brings me to self-isolating : the opposite of a bubble and it sounds like it. I think it involves sitting by yourself at home, watching television, eating up the mouldering contents of your kitchen cupboards and fridge, and then finally being forced to release scraps of food from the back of your freezer with an axe, hoping you don’t come across the mummified remains of Otzi the Iceman along the way.
If you don’t self-isolate you might turn into a super spreader. Now at first glance that seems like it might be quite appealing. You could go round spreading infectious laughter or even be a top sandwich maker (I’m resisting the urge to say a ‘world-beating’ sandwich maker – no, I guess I’m not), with remarkable butter-spreading abilities. It turns out that this is in fact not something to aspire to, so you must self-isolate (see the above paragraph).
Now that I’ve spent at least an hour thinking about it, I am nominating WhatsApp as the word of 2020 because all those jolly messages, jokes, cartoons and videos, whizzing from one phone to the next, made me laugh every day. Just like a cheerful super spreader.
Excellent blog as usual.
I’m afraid my nominations are far too political for the Oxford English Dictionary to take up.
‘Barnard Castle’ (meaning, by law I should be 250 miles away)
‘Eye Test’ (meaning – how one can troll the entire population with a limited and specific lie)
‘Limited and specific way’ (meaning – we’re above the law, sod the rest of you)
‘Protective ring’ (meaning – open to anyone with a deadly infection when used in reference to care homes)
‘World beating’ (meaning – we can’t organise a piss up in a brewery)
Great suggestions – I think if the comedian Mark Steel were choosing the word or phrase of the year you might be in with a chance.
Yes, an excellent blog.
Another to add to the OED……staycation! It annoys me to hear people say they are going on a ‘staycation’ & yet, quite a clever use of word, since we are not ‘vay…….cating’ abroad/far afield, we’re ‘stay…..cating!’
You’re right – you can’t go and stay at the same time. The Clash knew a thing or two.
I’m surprised ‘zooming’ (which surely became a verb even quicker than googling did?) is not one of your candidates (although obliquely referenced). Interesting to note that the Urban Dictionary definition of zooming is ‘the euphoric, exhilarating feeling experienced after the ingestion of conventional analgesic medication’, while ‘zoom’ (in my ancient Collins English Dictionary) is ‘to make or cause a continuous buzzing or humming sound’.
Thinking about the many Zoom calls experienced over the past months, often with a glass of wine in hand, in conjunction with a poor internet connection, perhaps a combination of these two definitions would be perfect?
I think the OED needs our combined expertise.