Merriam-Webster

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Behold, Merriam-Webster's Word of the Year

It's 'slop,' often used in reference to AI-generated content

(Newser) - Creepy, zany, and demonstrably fake content is often called "slop." The word's proliferation online, in part thanks to the widespread availability of generative artificial intelligence, landed it Merriam-Webster's 2025 word of the year, the AP reports. "It's such an illustrative word," said Greg...

Merriam-Webster Just Made a Rare Move, With 5K New Words

'Dad bod,' 'rizz' just some of the newbies added in first Collegiate Dictionary revise in 22 years

(Newser) - Word nerd alert: Merriam-Webster announced Thursday that it has taken the rare step of fully revising and reimagining one of its most popular dictionaries with a fresh edition that adds more than 5,000 new words, including "petrichor," "teraflop," "dumbphone," and "ghost kitchen....

Merriam-Webster Is Out With Its Word of the Year

It's 'polarization'

(Newser) - We've had " brat ," " demure ," " brain rot ," and " manifest ," as words of the year chosen by dictionaries, but because we can surely agree that we don't all agree, Merriam-Webster is now out with its 2024 word of the year: "polarization....

2 More Words Chosen for 'Word of the Year'
Here's Merriam-Webster's
Word of the Year for 2023
IN CASE YOU MISSED IT
Dec 2, 2023 5:05 PM CST

Here's Merriam-Webster's Word of the Year for 2023

It goes with 'authentic,' while Cambridge Dictionary chooses 'hallucinate'

(Newser) - In an age of deepfakes and post-truth, as artificial intelligence rose and Elon Musk turned Twitter into X, the Merriam-Webster word of the year for 2023 is "authentic," the AP reports. Authentic cuisine. Authentic voice. Authentic self. Authenticity as artifice. Lookups for the word are routinely heavy on...

Man Who Threatened Merriam-Webster Is Sentenced

Jeremy Hanson will likely spend an additional 4 months in prison

(Newser) - A California man who pleaded guilty to sending repeated death threats to Merriam-Webster because he was upset with its definitions on gender identity has been sentenced to one year and one day in prison. The sentence handed down to Jeremy David Hanson by a federal court in Massachusetts on Thursday...

Merriam-Webster Sees Elon Musk's Twitter Blue, Taunts With Red

Dictionary cheekily discontinues its M-W Red within hours

(Newser) - Merriam-Webster likes to get cheeky every once in a while, and Elon Musk and his Twitter Blue are the latest target. As Insider reports, the dictionary powerhouse used Musk's own forum to mock Twitter Blue, in a tweet that's currently clocking north of 4 million: "People who...

Merriam-Webster Chooses Its Word of the Year
Merriam-Webster
Chooses Its
Word of the Year
IN CASE YOU MISSED IT
Dec 3, 2022 4:45 PM CST

Merriam-Webster Chooses Its Word of the Year

It's 'gaslighting'

(Newser) - “Gaslighting”—mind manipulating, grossly misleading, downright deceitful—is Merriam-Webster's word of the year, the AP reports. Lookups for the word on merriam-webster.com increased 1,740% in 2022 over the year before. But something else happened. There wasn't a single event that drove significant spikes in...

Scrabble Dictionary Gets a Radical Update

First update since 2018 contains abbreviations and—gasp!—some proper nouns

(Newser) - Hey "bae," want to turn this "convo" into a Scrabble game over "margs"? If so, you'll want to seek "inspo" from the seventh edition of the official Scrabble dictionary, which includes 500 new playable words, some of which break with the typical Scrabble...

Man Pleads Guilty to Threatening Merriam-Webster

Jeremy Hanson was reportedly upset by changes involving gender identity

(Newser) - Update: A California man has pleaded guilty to sending repeated death threats to Merriam-Webster in October of last year because he was upset with its definitions on gender identity. His actions caused the company to shut down its offices for five days. The US Attorney’s Office for the District...

'Adorkable' Merriam-Webster 'Levels Up'

Dictionary adds 370 new words, including 'cringe' and 'dumbphone'

(Newser) - As you update your vocabulary, so does Merriam-Webster. The dictionary has added 370 new words and terms to its pages, noting that "when many people use a word in the same way, over a long enough period of time, that word becomes eligible for inclusion." There are several...

This Is Merriam-Webster's Word of the Year

'Vaccine' wins out for 2021

(Newser) - With an expanded definition to reflect the times, Merriam-Webster has declared an omnipresent truth as its 2021 word of the year: vaccine. “This was a word that was extremely high in our data every single day in 2021,” Peter Sokolowski, Merriam-Webster's editor-at-large, told the AP ahead of...

Inauguration Inspires New Dictionary Entry

Merriam-Webster's volume now includes 'Second Gentleman'

(Newser) - Merriam-Webster is adding more than 500 words and phrases to its dictionary to kick off 2021, including one term inspired by the inauguration. With Doug Emhoff's elevation to the role of "Second Gentleman," the term is "finally common enough to have met our entry criteria,"...

Merriam-Webster Settles on 2020 Word of the Year

'Pandemic'

(Newser) - Last year, Merriam-Webster picked "they" as its word of the year. In 2020, people had other things on their minds. The dictionary announced Monday that "pandemic" is the new word of the year. One stat explains why: Lookups of the word on the dictionary's website spiked 115,...

Woman Gets Dictionary to Redefine Racism

'It's not just "I don't like someone," it's a system of oppression for a certain group of people'

(Newser) - Merriam-Webster currently has, as its first listed definition of racism, "a belief that race is the primary determinant of human traits and capacities and that racial differences produce an inherent superiority of a particular race." A 22-year-old Missouri woman had a problem with that, and as a result,...

Merriam-Webster Updates 'Dated, Offensive' Term

It has to do with MSG in Chinese restaurants

(Newser) - Merriam-Webster has updated its entry on "Chinese restaurant syndrome," a term many Asian Americans saw as antiquated and even racist. The phrase was previously defined as a legitimate illness brought on by food seasoned with monosodium glutamate but "especially Chinese food." Merriam-Webster.com said symptoms include...

Merriam-Webster Reveals Word of 2019

'They:' As one M-W editor puts it, 'So many people were talking about this word'

(Newser) - A common but increasingly mighty and very busy little word, "they," has an accolade all its own. The language mavens at Merriam-Webster have declared the personal pronoun their word of the year based on a 313% increase in look-ups on the company's search site, Merriam-Webster.com , this...

M-W in Fighting Mode on One of Its New Words

'They' can now be used as a singular, gender nonbinary pronoun, per Merriam-Webster

(Newser) - "Deep state," "dad joke," and "escape room" may seem ubiquitous in our modern vernacular, but now they're officially part of it. Merriam-Webster has announced the addition of more than 500 words, terms, and new meanings, an etymological evolution it calls "a happy fact...

Look Up 'Snowflake.' It's Got a New Meaning in the Dictionary

Merriam-Webster adds derogatory meaning for common word, plus a whole lot of other new words

(Newser) - Get swole, prepare a bug-out bag, grab a go-cup, and maybe you'll have a better chance of surviving the omnicide. Translation: Hit the gym and bulk up, put a bunch of stuff essential for survival in an easy-to-carry bag, grab a drink for the road, and perhaps you'll...

Merriam-Webster Picks Its Word of the Year

'Justice'

(Newser) - The word of the year, at least in the eyes of Merriam-Webster? "Justice." The dictionary's editor at large tells the AP that M-W isn't "editorializing"—the pick is made largely on a spike in people looking it up throughout the year on the dictionary'...

Scrabble Dictionary Adds Long-Awaited New Words

'OK is now OK. So is 'yowza'

(Newser) - Scrabble players, time to rethink your game because 300 new words are coming your way, including some long-awaited gems: OK and ew, to name a few. Merriam-Webster released the sixth edition of "The Official Scrabble Players Dictionary" on Monday, four years after the last freshening up. The company, at...

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