Those of my generation must surely remember the lyrics of the Bee Gees song Words released in 1968. This was possibly the most tumultuous single year in modern history marked by historical achievements, shocking assassinations, a much-hated Vietnam War and a spirit of rebellion that swept through countries all over the world.
Since then, the world has continued to evolve. Words are still our best tools to express our feelings, beliefs, likes and dislikes. Language never stops developing. Online dictionaries have to be updated on a real-time basis as new words and terms replace old ones that are no longer in use. Old words often take on new meanings.
Let us look at some of the ways the English language has evolved in 2021. The Merriam-Webster online dictionary has just announced its ‘word of the year’. This word is, not surprisingly, ‘vaccine’. The compilers of the Oxford Dictionary have chosen a similar word of the year: ‘vax’. Linguists argue that this controversial word is a symbol of hope and health. But for some others, it is a political weapon to suppress individual rights.
Marrian-Webster’s runner-up word is ‘insurrection’. Online searches for this word on this dictionary increased by 61,000 per cent on January 7, the day after the siege of the US Capitol by former president Trump’s diehard supporters. They believed that their idol was robbed of a second term in office.
‘NFT’ or non-fungible token is the Collins Dictionary word of the year. Collins defines NFT as a “unique digital certificate, registered in a blockchain, that is used to record the ownership of an asset such as an artwork or a collectable”. Contrary to the expectations of some self-appointed experts, blockchain is still largely a concept that may, or may not, take off anytime soon.
Social media has created a new lexicon that only avid practitioners of this form of communication understand. The new terms that have taken off in 2021 include TBH, an abbreviation for ‘to be honest’. Another new word that is ugly slang is ‘amirite’, for ‘am I right?’.
Some politicians who see themselves as visionaries of a new economic model promote ‘digital nomad’ economic activities. A ‘digital nomad’ is someone who performs their occupation entirely over the internet while travelling. Such a person has no permanent fixed home address. Is this more political ‘blah, blah, blah’?
A relatively new term, but which will probably remain with us for long, is ‘super-spreader’ – an event or location where many people contract the same contagious disease. The meaning of this term might mutate to refer to any venue where quaint beliefs are shared by a like-minded group of easily converted individuals.
Political correctness has gone too far, not just in written communication but even in the language of popular comedy
As is to be expected, the language of politics has also evolved in 2021. The state of partisan politics today is more pronounced than it has been for decades. ‘Whataboutism’ is an expression that can be defined as “the act or practice of responding to an accusation of wrongdoing by claiming that an offence committed by another is similar or even worse”.
Many linguists get a cold sweat when political correctness vigilantes try to impose changes in the way we speak and write. It is terrible enough for online language-style applications to advise you to use the word ‘challenge’ instead of ‘problem’. Some eurocrats have just taken linguistic interference to a new level.
So now Brussels does not want us to use ‘lady’ and ‘sir’. Instead we must use the generic term ‘colleagues’ to refer to ladies and gentlemen. They also want us to ditch words like ‘Christmas’, lest we offend not Christians.
An EU Commission internal document on the politically correct guidelines advises users: “Do not use nouns or pronouns that are related to the gender of the subject and maintain a balance between genders in the organisation of each panel”. Luckily these “clumsy” guidelines, as defined by Liberal Dutch MEP Sophie in’t Veld, were quickly withdrawn. I wonder how much taxpayers’ money was wasted on this absurd initiative.
Political correctness has gone too far, not just in written communication but even in the language of popular comedy. For instance, the British comedies created in the 1970s and 1980s contain valuable information on how society then embraced gender, political and racial discrimination.
Today, to spend some free time watching comedies like In Sickness and in Health and Rising Damp, one has to resort to YouTube or buy the CDs of these comedies on Amazon.
Why have we lost the art of laughing at ourselves?