The word of the year should be "apathy". It encapsulates how, in 2024, society had stopped reacting with support when something bad happened and instead got used to the drama and laughed at the stupidity of these situations
I always thought woty was supposed to be a newly formed word that was gaining traction. Didn't know it could be literally any word, even old-as-dirt ones.
Demure, era, brat, and others are trends of older words, versus all the neologisms. Brat is really old and has wandered a lot in meaning, it was emblematic of the Harris loss in a lot of ways. I would have picked that.
I think a couple of good words that encapsulates 2024 would be “exhaustion” (from the election), eras, and overconsumption (from the overconsumption trend, and all I feel like a lot of people were just buying things just to buy them, like the Stanley cups) And I also can’t believe that the word “espresso” wasn’t included in any of the dictionaries that were mentioned! 🤯
I think people are starting to think about Word of the Year the sane way they think about Game of the Year and Film of the Year. People are thinking it should be "the most prominent word of the year"
It's a compound noun. Air conditioner, swimming pool, speed limit, etc. are thought of and follow the grammatical rules for words, because they refer to a single thing, separate from the simple combined meaning of each individual word.
I'm a big advocate for setting a personal WOTY. For example, mine is "Recovery". I was hurt pretty badly, physically and mentally, these past two years. So my personal mission is to put all of my energy into healing and revamping myself to the best I can before I ever try to push myself to surpass myself.
I had not heard it before, but I vote for "enshittification". Especially because stupid Grammarly has underlined it in red. I'm going to uninstall it; it keeps trying to homogenise my phraseology, instead of just shutting up and alerting me to my typos. I never saw a change to TH-cam last year that was not enshittifying..
In Portugal, the "word of the year" was "liberdade", or "liberty". That's because 2024 marked the 50th anniversary of the revolution of 25 April. Also, I didn't know this, but apparently they (more specifically, a publishing company) hold a vote for people to choose the word, so I guess it's a bit different.
or.. schadenfreude (that's an English word if you're not familiar, imported from German and meaning happy for someonelse's misfortune, kinda like f-out, find out, and happy that they found out)
While I agree that most of the named words are just trends that shouldn't be the WOTY, I actually think brain rot is a good choice as it represents the decrease of quality in content online as well as the fact that more and more people have the habit of doom scrolling through brain rot content which also takes part in shaping us as a society. It's actually pretty close to enshittification I think and fits just as well in my opinion.
I disagree with your definition of "word of the year" as a word that encapsulates the year in question. As I see it, and as others in the comments have mentioned, WOTY primarily reflects words which have been added to the English language in that year, i.e. being completely new terms, or more commonly existing words which are suddenly entering the collective consciousness due to a shift in meaning or usage. Information superhighway from '93, metrosexual from '03, #hashtag from '12 and rizz from '23, as well as brainrot (or brain rot if you prefer) last year, all provide a good example of a word or compound phrase that wouldn't have been used in that way previously, that is to say, a novel term. In that sense, surreal for 2016 isn't up to the same standard, and I much prefer the ADS selection: Dumpster fire. Love your content, even though I disagree this time. Have a wonderful 2025! Edited to correct a spelling error.
It was recognized as a word only last year, by Merriam-Webster. Kind of a separate category of "words of the year" is "words made officially words this year"
The thing about "brat" and "demure" is that they were sort of sarcastic or ironic repurposings of the words. Yes, they referred to aspects of female empowerment, but they didn't really some anything up.
Brainrot and slop I think are only good words of the year if you see woty as an online thing, and it kinda has become that. Enshittification however, even though I'm pretty sure the word was coined to describe online subscription services, the business model applies elsewhere too.
true, although it moar applies to apps that were good once but now that they are established they become enshittified to maximise profits for the shareholders
I think brainrot is a really good encapsulation of 2024 and i think the Woty being chosen by the people who actually dictate how the language they speak is spoken. It makes the woty more in line with what people were actually saying. The previous words of the year just being words that they think describe the year is kinda boring ngl. It makes more sense for something called the "word of the year" shouldn't be a word thats decided by an institution of boomers that aren't in touch with the people who actually move the culture. Also i disagree with surreal describing 2016, it felt pretty real to me. But most people seem to agree that brainrot describes 2024 pretty well
Well, I'm going to pat myself on the back for thinking Enshittification should have been word of the year as soon as I saw the title of the vid, before I even started watching it. But I do think you should have given some credit to Cory Doctorow, who came up with it. It didn't just spontaneously 'happen' - he created it, to make a point. Just think yourself lucky that you may be too young to recall that 'Vagazzle' was once one of the contenders!
I think Brainrot was actually pretty good, not the best perhaps but pretty good But I don’t look at brainrot as exclusively shitty TikTok videos, but rather as a “condition” people can have
What would pick as 2024's word of the year?
Trumpturd
"Trumpturd" wins the award for 2024.
Trumpturd
Based
Typo
Slop and brain rot are actually IMO good descriptions for what 2024 was. Comparable to enshittification
The word of the year should be "apathy". It encapsulates how, in 2024, society had stopped reacting with support when something bad happened and instead got used to the drama and laughed at the stupidity of these situations
Mostly every year mate, it gets even worse
Bro thinks he’s onto something with that one
I always thought woty was supposed to be a newly formed word that was gaining traction. Didn't know it could be literally any word, even old-as-dirt ones.
Yes! Me too! I thought it was for new words!
Yes! New terms, or old words which have taken on new meaning, like (eugh) alpha.
I think it's better that its new trending words gaining traction. It's more interesting than just describing what the year is like, anyone can do that
Demure, era, brat, and others are trends of older words, versus all the neologisms. Brat is really old and has wandered a lot in meaning, it was emblematic of the Harris loss in a lot of ways. I would have picked that.
It’s emblematic for the 2024 Charlie XCX album ‘brat’ actually
I think a couple of good words that encapsulates 2024 would be “exhaustion” (from the election), eras, and overconsumption (from the overconsumption trend, and all I feel like a lot of people were just buying things just to buy them, like the Stanley cups)
And I also can’t believe that the word “espresso” wasn’t included in any of the dictionaries that were mentioned! 🤯
I think people are starting to think about Word of the Year the sane way they think about Game of the Year and Film of the Year. People are thinking it should be "the most prominent word of the year"
Brain rot is two words. If they’re going with two words, then why not hock tuah?
It's a compound noun. Air conditioner, swimming pool, speed limit, etc. are thought of and follow the grammatical rules for words, because they refer to a single thing, separate from the simple combined meaning of each individual word.
It's kind of worrying that none of them went with fascism as the word of the year.
I'm a big advocate for setting a personal WOTY. For example, mine is "Recovery". I was hurt pretty badly, physically and mentally, these past two years. So my personal mission is to put all of my energy into healing and revamping myself to the best I can before I ever try to push myself to surpass myself.
"Chaos" is the word I'd give for 2024
Too broad, it's frankly been 9 years of chaos since 2016
I had not heard it before, but I vote for "enshittification". Especially because stupid Grammarly has underlined it in red. I'm going to uninstall it; it keeps trying to homogenise my phraseology, instead of just shutting up and alerting me to my typos. I never saw a change to TH-cam last year that was not enshittifying..
welp we managed to rot the brains of actual dictionaries
it's been rotten for ages. When I learned English in my teens, I was always amused when they said dick-tionaries 😛
In Portugal, the "word of the year" was "liberdade", or "liberty". That's because 2024 marked the 50th anniversary of the revolution of 25 April. Also, I didn't know this, but apparently they (more specifically, a publishing company) hold a vote for people to choose the word, so I guess it's a bit different.
2025 word will be 'Ignorance', seeing as everywhere is getting rid of fact checking
or.. schadenfreude (that's an English word if you're not familiar, imported from German and meaning happy for someonelse's misfortune, kinda like f-out, find out, and happy that they found out)
Collins considering looksmaxxing and rawdogging is scary
I think for me it would be “criminal” because of the 2 wars and Trump.
dictionaries aren't gonna make the word of the year political though--at least they shouldn't
While I agree that most of the named words are just trends that shouldn't be the WOTY, I actually think brain rot is a good choice as it represents the decrease of quality in content online as well as the fact that more and more people have the habit of doom scrolling through brain rot content which also takes part in shaping us as a society. It's actually pretty close to enshittification I think and fits just as well in my opinion.
In the Netherlands the word of the year was 'polarisatie', which I can gues you know what it means.
I disagree with your definition of "word of the year" as a word that encapsulates the year in question. As I see it, and as others in the comments have mentioned, WOTY primarily reflects words which have been added to the English language in that year, i.e. being completely new terms, or more commonly existing words which are suddenly entering the collective consciousness due to a shift in meaning or usage. Information superhighway from '93, metrosexual from '03, #hashtag from '12 and rizz from '23, as well as brainrot (or brain rot if you prefer) last year, all provide a good example of a word or compound phrase that wouldn't have been used in that way previously, that is to say, a novel term. In that sense, surreal for 2016 isn't up to the same standard, and I much prefer the ADS selection: Dumpster fire.
Love your content, even though I disagree this time. Have a wonderful 2025!
Edited to correct a spelling error.
Doom-Scrolling would have been better
It was recognized as a word only last year, by Merriam-Webster. Kind of a separate category of "words of the year" is "words made officially words this year"
The thing about "brat" and "demure" is that they were sort of sarcastic or ironic repurposings of the words. Yes, they referred to aspects of female empowerment, but they didn't really some anything up.
We gotta make supercalifragilisticexpialidocious word of the year someyear >.>
Brainrot and slop I think are only good words of the year if you see woty as an online thing, and it kinda has become that. Enshittification however, even though I'm pretty sure the word was coined to describe online subscription services, the business model applies elsewhere too.
My woty for 2024 would be “bonkers”
Word of the year is as useful as a Spotify wrap-up
Enshittification perfectly encapsulates the 2024 US Election
true, although it moar applies to apps that were good once but now that they are established they become enshittified to maximise profits for the shareholders
I agree with you... at least people found out what demure means this year
Fascism is the word of the year. Encapsulates pretty much the way the world is going.
It seems to be the WOTY of 2025
So is your pronunciation of Cymru as "coomlee" and translating Topolovgrad as "popular town" instead of "popplar town".
Bro is not good at pronunciation considering it’s a languages channel
I think brainrot is a really good encapsulation of 2024 and i think the Woty being chosen by the people who actually dictate how the language they speak is spoken. It makes the woty more in line with what people were actually saying.
The previous words of the year just being words that they think describe the year is kinda boring ngl. It makes more sense for something called the "word of the year" shouldn't be a word thats decided by an institution of boomers that aren't in touch with the people who actually move the culture.
Also i disagree with surreal describing 2016, it felt pretty real to me. But most people seem to agree that brainrot describes 2024 pretty well
Well, I'm going to pat myself on the back for thinking Enshittification should have been word of the year as soon as I saw the title of the vid, before I even started watching it. But I do think you should have given some credit to Cory Doctorow, who came up with it. It didn't just spontaneously 'happen' - he created it, to make a point.
Just think yourself lucky that you may be too young to recall that 'Vagazzle' was once one of the contenders!
I think Brainrot was actually pretty good, not the best perhaps but pretty good
But I don’t look at brainrot as exclusively shitty TikTok videos, but rather as a “condition” people can have
I can’t watch TikToks, so I’m being left behind, lol.
After 3:54 I got sick of the video padding and stopped watching without finding out a single WOTY or what you though about any of them.
My woty is dumpster fire
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