Some of the comments about our nominations reveal your desire to have an open nomination process for WOTY. Here are a few of the words our users felt were missing from the nominations:
I voted for ‘social distancing’ because I could not submit my answer without a vote, but I think the word of the year should be ‘covid’ or ‘coronavirus’. (Wayne)
I also think the word “unmute yourself” is a very highly used word in this era of zoom and webex. (Mark)
a missing term is pandemic (Doreen)
And after voting for “social distancing,” “Mrs. C” said,
I personally would have chosen the word “triggered” to represent 2020, but since that was not an option, I picked social-distancing.
And her proposed nomination of “triggered” was a comment on our social conversation in 2020. She cleverly wove a comment on the frequency of the word in our conversations into an argument for the word she wanted to nominate. Social distancing, she notes:
went from zero to worldwide household use this year. Not only does it apply physically, but here in the USA, after so many people let their unfiltered, true colors fly on social media regarding many of the other nominees on this list (Quarantine, patriotism, racism, climate change, as well as politics) many of us have had to figuratively and mentally socially-distance ourselves from more than a few acquaintances.
In the future, we hope to widen the nomination process, and also to provide more opportunities for conversation about our words and their ideas.
Some dictionaries choose their WOTY based on the frequency with which people look the word up in their dictionary. For example, Merriam-Webster’s is chosen “Based upon a statistical analysis of words that are looked up in extremely high numbers in our online dictionary while also showing a significant year-over-year increase in traffic.”
But at Wordsmyth, we approach the WOTY differently. We want the choice of a WOTY to be a participatory process. We think it is important to know how people relate to a word and its meaning, and not just whether they wanted or needed to see a definition. The definition can be the starting point in our reflection on word meaning—especially when the meaning is under pressure to change.
Our purpose in opening our WOTY process to participation is to encourage awareness of our words, and how they work in communication. Of course, we’re grateful that many people use and trust Wordsmyth definitions. But we want this to be the beginning of a process of exploring meaning, and not the end of the process.
There is cultural and educational value in talking about how we are using words. The importance of a word may be revealed by what is said about the word and its use. And talking about a word can lead to attention to the ideas behind the word, opening spaces for dialogue. In this way the personal value of raising word awareness can be linked with a process of opening up avenues of understanding and paths to dialogue.
See more selected quotes from participants of Wordsmyth Word of the Year 2020
We are pleased with the responses to our nomination of 10 words. But if you haven’t voted yet, please vote soon. Our voting period ends on Dec. 15, 2020.