Mark Memmott, “Occupy? Humble Brag? What’s Your ‘Word Of The Year?’” (“The Two-Way” NPR blog, Dec. 16, 2011)
Today on Morning Edition, Boston Globe language columnist Ben Zimmer — who chairs the society’s new words committee — told host Renee Montagne that the early favorite is probably “occupy.”
It is “an old word that has been invested with new meanings” thanks to the Occupy Wall Street movement and all the other occupy protests it has sparked, Zimmer said. “It has become a call to action itself,” he added.
But, of course, there are many other possibilities: “Arab Spring,” “bunga bunga” and “tiger blood” come to mind.
Zimmer has a personal favorite: “humble brag.” It describes the fake humility of some celebrities when they Tweet or talk about how hard their lives can be.
Read the rest here.
Interview on NPR’s “Morning Edition” about nominees for the Word of the Year selection. (Dec. 16, 2011)
Lovers of the English language are coming together to select the coolest word or phrase. Last year, app was voted the word of the year by the American Dialect Society. Now that group of etymologists, writers, historians and other language experts are considering new words for 2011. Linguist Ben Zimmer talks to Renee Montagne to offer his picks for 2011.
(Show page, audio, related Word Routes column, Boston Globe column)
Tom Segev, “Wilting Blossoms” (Editorial in Haaretz, Dec. 16, 2011)
A linguist named Ben Zimmer, who has a website called Visual Thesaurus, contends that the first event in the 20th century that was described in terms of spring was the introduction of liberal reforms in Russia in 1904. Since that time, the image has frequently been attached to numerous events, mainly in Eastern Europe: East Berlin, 1953; Warsaw and Budapest, 1956; Prague, 1968.
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Interview on “The Emily Rooney Show” (WGBH Boston) about the words of 2011 that garnered the most buzz. (Dec. 14, 2011)
Meta, Occupy, and planking. These are just a few of the words that entered our collective vocabulary in 2011. We’ll examine the buzziest words of the year – and the stories they tell.
Guest: Ben Zimmer, linguist, lexicographer, and Boston Globe columnist
(Show page, audio, related Word Routes column, Boston Globe column)
Interview on “At Issue with Ben Merens” (Wisconsin Public Radio) on the notable words of 2011. (Dec. 13, 2011)
The following are just some of the new words of 2011 – supercommittee, occupy, Arab spring, winning, planking and narb. After five, join Ben Merens and his guest as they discuss the words of 2011. What new words did you hear this year? Guest: Ben Zimmer, executive producer, VisualThesaurus.com and Vocabulary.com. Language columnist, The Boston Globe. Former “On Language” columnist, The New York Times Magazine. Formerly editor, American dictionaries, Oxford University Press. Chair, New Words Committee, American Dialect Society.
(Show page, streaming audio, download, related Word Routes column, Boston Globe column)
Interview on “Eight Forty-Eight” (WBEZ Chicago), about notable words of the year. (Dec. 13, 2011)
When the end of the year rolls around, people start making their best of lists–from music to movies, news stories and news makers. But could one word sum up an entire year? According to the American Dialect Society, it can. In early January, the group will choose one word to rule the year. There were plenty of words in contention, including humblebrag, narb and Mubaraked. To find out more, Eight Forty-Eight turned to Ben Zimmer, a University of Chicago alum, and executive producer of the VisualThesaurus.com and Vocabulary.com.
The word of the year will be chosen by the American Dialect Society on Jan. 6.
(Show page, audio, related Word Routes column, Boston Globe column)
Misty Harris, “New Words Are the New Cool Thanks to Social Media” (Postmedia News, Dec. 12, 2011)
Just as in the offline world, Zimmer says, fluency with such buzzy terms signals that a person is in-the-know, and indeed part of the cultural conversation. The key difference on social media is the speed at which others can catch on and join in, ultimately investing in a neologism’s stickiness.
“It’s playing an increasingly big role in language, having an effect both on the spread of new words and the ability to observe them,” says Zimmer. “But it’s also a little dangerous because we can get so caught up in what’s happening on social media that we think it’s representative of the entire world.”
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Ruth Walker, “A New Word of the Year Seizes Its Place?” (Christian Science Monitor, Dec. 12, 2011)
In an “On the Media” interview, Ben Zimmer, head of the New Words Committee of the American Dialect Society, said: Occupy “is this extremely useful word for the movement because as it spread[s] to other cities, it can very easily just work as a kind of a template. Occupy blank, Occupy the-name-of-your-town-here….”
Read the rest here.