This year, for the first time in history, the Oxford English Dictionary asked the public to help them decide on their Word of the Year. More than three hundred thousand people voted for their favourite of three options. The winner (by a landslide) was ‘goblin mode’. The fact that the term was included in the top three at all surprised many people, who argued that the term was not widely known. However, the editors at Oxford Languages defended the public choice, saying that it does reflect the ethos of 2022.
‘Goblin mode’ describes behaviour that’s self-indulgent, lazy or greedy. A person in goblin mode typically rejects social norms and doesn’t care what anyone thinks of them. An example of goblin mode behaviour is lying on the sofa in dirty clothes, binging on Netflix while eating pizza. In most European folklore traditions, goblins are grotesque, malicious creatures. They could not care less about their appearance or reputation.
Note that a person can ‘be in goblin mode’ or they can ‘go goblin mode’. The term first appeared back in 2009, but became popular thanks to the headline on a celebrity news story posted on Twitter in February 2022. The headline read: “Julia Fox opened up about her difficult relationship with Kanye West: ‘He didn’t like when I went goblin mode’.” In fact, the headline was fake; Julia Fox says she never used the term ‘goblin mode’. But, being fake didn’t stop it going viral and soon ‘goblin mode’ had become a meme.
Sick of self-improvement
According to American lexicographer Ben Zimmer, “goblin mode really does speak to the times and the zeitgeist”. After the stress of the pandemic, going goblin mode seems to be a backlash against aspirational social media content that bombards us with images of beautiful people doing wholesome things like baking and yoga. Goblins don’t do either! So, if you’re sick of self-improvement videos giving advice on how to get fitter, work harder and look better, like those with the popular hashtag #ThatGirl, it’s time to go goblin mode! To connect with other goblins, try looking at the app BeReal. This photo-sharing app encourages people to share unfiltered, spontaneous images of their everyday life and not edit out their goblin-mode moments.
Metaverse
The second-most voted word was ‘metaverse’, a term that was used four times more frequently in 2022 than in 2021. A metaverse is (or might be in the future) an immersive virtual reality environment where users interact with each other through avatars. It doesn’t exist yet, but some people believe it will be the next phase of the internet. There was an increase in use of the word ‘metaverse’ after Mark Zuckerberg changed Facebook’s name to Meta in October 2021. Although the term has only become popular recently, the concept of a virtual reality world called a Metaverse appeared thirty years ago in an American sci-fi novel called Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson.
#IStandWith
In third place was #IStandWith, a hashtag used to show solidarity with a person or a cause. #IStandWithUkraine appeared soon after the Russian invasion of Ukraine in late February and have become very popular. They are examples of ‘hashtag activism’, the phenomenon of using the internet to connect and organise followers of a particular cause. Other well-known examples of hashtags used in hashtag activism are #BlackLives Matter, and #MeToo.
permacrisis
Oxford Languages aren’t the only ones to choose a word of the year. The publishers of Collins Dictionary chose 'permacrisis' as their 2022 Word of the Year from a shortlist of ten. They define a permacrisis as ‘a prolonged period of instability or insecurity, especially one resulting from a series of catastrophic events.” So, for example, the Covid pandemic followed by the war in Ukraine has caused a permacrisis.
Kyiv, gaslighting, woman
Also on the Collins shortlist was Kyiv, capital of Ukraine. Before the Russian invasion, the name of the capital was normally spelled in English as Kiev, pronounced /key-ev/. But this reflected the Russian pronunciation. After the invasion, most English-language journalists adopted the spelling K-y-i-v, pronounced /keev/, to reflect the city’s name in Ukrainian.
The publishers of the Merriam Webster dictionary chose ‘gaslighting’ as their Word of the Year for 2022. ‘Gaslighting’ means misleading someone, especially using psychological manipulation. The term comes from a 1938 stage play called Gaslight about a husband who uses psychological tricks to make his wife think she’s going mad. In an age of misinformation and fake news, gaslighting is becoming an essential term.
And finally, Dictionary.com chose a Word of the Year that isn’t new, needs no explanation, but, in their view, reflects the ethos of 2022. Their choice was ‘woman’.