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[Korey]

http://www.americandialect.org/hashtag-2012
http://www.visualthesaurus.com/cm/wordroutes/tag-youre-it-hashtag-wins-as-2012-word-of-the-year/

Previous winners:

• 2011: Occupy
• 2010: App
• 2009: Tweet

Runner ups were, in order:

• marriage equality
• 47 percent
• YOLO
• fiscal cliff
• Gangnam style

BOSTON MARIOTT COPLEY PLACE — JAN. 4 — In its 23rd annual words of the year vote, the American Dialect Society voted “hashtag” as the word of the year for 2012. Hashtag refers to the practice used on Twitter for marking topics or making commentary by means of a hash symbol (#) followed by a word or phrase.

...

“This was the year when the hashtag became a ubiquitous phenomenon in online talk,” Zimmer said. “In the Twittersphere and elsewhere, hashtags have created instant social trends, spreading bite-sized viral messages on topics ranging from politics to pop culture.”

Word of the Year is interpreted in its broader sense as “vocabulary item” — not just words but phrases. The words or phrases do not have to be brand-new, but they have to be newly prominent or notable in the past year. The vote is the longest-running such vote anywhere, the only one not tied to commercial interests, and the word-of-the-year event up to which all others lead. It is fully informed by the members’ expertise in the study of words, but it is far from a solemn occasion. Members in the 124-year-old organization include linguists, lexicographers, etymologists, grammarians, historians, researchers, writers, editors, students, and independent scholars. In conducting the vote, they act in fun and do not pretend to be officially inducting words into the English language. Instead they are highlighting that language change is normal, ongoing, and entertaining.

In a companion vote, sibling organization the American Name Society voted “Sandy” as Name of the Year for 2012 in its ninth annual name-of-the-year contest. It refers to the superstorm that ravaged the East Coast.

Though hashtag has been around for a few years now (first used on Twitter in 2007), it's fair to say that 2012 was the Year of the Hashtag. Hashtagging became so popular that the practice spread to other social media, and hashtag could sometimes be heard in oral use introducing a snappy metacommentary on what had just been said. And as Dennis Baron pointed out, this was also the year that a baby was named Hashtag.

American Dialect Society Vote Tallies


WORD OF THE YEAR

#hashtag: a word or phrase preceded by a hash symbol (#), used on Twitter to mark a topic or make a commentary (118)

marriage equality: legal recognition of same-sex marriage (99)

47 percent: portion of the population that does not pay federal income tax (31)

YOLO: acronym for “You Only Live Once,” often used sarcastically or self-deprecatingly (32)

fiscal cliff: threat of spending cuts and tax increases looming over end-of-year budget negotiations (25)

Gangnam style: the trendy style of Seoul’s Gangnam district, as used in the Korean pop song of the same name (19)​

MOST USEFUL

-(po)calypse, -(ma)geddon: hyperbolic combining forms for various catastrophes (115)

YOLO: acronym for “You Only Live Once,” often used sarcastically or self-deprecatingly (62)

hate-watching: continuing to follow a television show despite having an aversion to it (39)

beardruff: dandruff from one’s beard (10)​

MOST CREATIVE

gate lice: airline passengers who crowd around a gate waiting to board (93)

mansplaining: a man’s condescending explanation to a female audience (90)

alpacalypse: the Mayan apocalypse predicted for Dec. 21, 2012 (alpaca + -lypse) (50)

dancelexia: inability to pull off dance moves (such as misspelling “YMCA&#8221 (36)​

MOST UNNECESSARY

legitimate rape: type of rape that Missouri Senate candidate Todd Akin claimed rarely results in pregnancy (94)

HD: abbreviation for “high-definition,” used for things that could not be high-definition 21
feels: slangy shortening of “feelings” (20)

Frankenstorm: term for Hurricane Sandy’s hybrid storm system (after Frankenstein’s monster) (14)​

MOST OUTRAGEOUS

legitimate rape: type of rape that Missouri Senate candidate Todd Akin claimed rarely results in pregnancy (156)

butt-chugging: an alcohol enema, used in college fraternity hazing rituals (36)

Dunlop effect: when one’s stomach protrudes over ill-fitting pants (“belly done lop over the belt&#8221 (3)

slut-shaming: attacking a woman for socially stigmatized sexual activity (2)​

MOST EUPHEMISTIC

self-deportation: policy of encouraging illegal immigrants to return voluntarily to their home countries (142)

evolution: change of opinion (21)

Gray Thursday: name given to Thanksgiving as a shopping day before Black Friday (12)

ratchet: slang term originally referring to “urban divas” now used to mean “ghetto” (7)

disruptive: destroying existing business models (3)​

MOST LIKELY TO SUCCEED

marriage equality: legal recognition of same-sex marriage (156)

big data: large collections of digital information used for revealing behavioral insights (20)

fiscal cliff: threat of spending cuts and tax increases looming over end-of-year budget negotiations (8)

superstorm: an unusually large and destructive storm, such as Hurricane Sandy 9
MOOC: acronym for “massive open online course” (4)​

LEAST LIKELY TO SUCCEED

phablet: mid-sized electronic device between a smartphone and a tablet (92)

YOLO: acronym for “You Only Live Once,” often used sarcastically or self-deprecatingly (91)

meggings: a blend for “male leggings” (22)

Windows Metro: name originally used for the Windows 8 operating system (8)

cray-cray: slangy shortening and reduplication of “crazy” (5)

Gangnam style: the trendy style of Seoul’s Gangnam district, as used in the Korean pop song of the same name (5)​

ELECTION WORDS (new category)

binders (full of women): term used by Romney in the second presidential debate to describe the resumes of female job candidates that he consulted as governor of Massachusetts (107)

47 percent: portion of the population that does not pay federal income tax (64)

Romney/Obama: names of candidates used for blends (Obamaloney, Obamageddon, Romnesia, Romney Hood) (13)

Eastwooding: photo fad inspired by Clint Eastwood’s unscripted speech at the RNC (10)

Etch-a-Sketch: metaphor of reinvention used by Romney campaign adviser Eric Fehrnstrom (8)

malarkey: nonsense, empty talk (as used by Biden in the vice-presidential debate) (8)​

 

[Data West]

I hate what the internet has become.

 

[Escape Goat]

Malarkey! All of it!

 

[pants]

No prizes for guessing the neogaf word of the year

 

[Sadsic]

remember when the internet was just the right amount of social and nerdy? that was cool

 

[Escape Goat]

No prizes for guessing the neogaf word of the year

Mewling quim?

 

[marrec]

Gangnam style is not a word, it's two words.

 

[blame space]

remember when the internet was just the right amount of social and nerdy? that was cool

no this was never a thing.

 

[Korey]

Gangnam style is not a word, it's two words.

Word of the Year is interpreted in its broader sense as “vocabulary item” — not just words but phrases.

.

 

[Escape Goat]

Gangnam style is not a word, it's two words.

Word of the Year is interpreted in its broader sense as “vocabulary item” — not just words but phrases

bam

 

[Blearth]

I hate what the internet has become.

Yeah! The internet was so much better in the 90s!

Pixelated videos that took hours to load! Woo!

 

[Sadsic]

no this was never a thing.

it was for like, 15 seconds

 

[marrec]

bam

They should rename it then. The title of the award is misleading and now I'll never trust them again.

 

[Kinyou]

.

Or... "Word of the year actually doesn't mean word of the year and we make this up as we go along."

 

[Escape Goat]

They should rename it then. The title of the award is misleading and now I'll never trust them again.

I dont think i can trust you again. Nothing is true, everything is permitted again.

 

[blame space]

what the hell is "word of the year" supposed to mean anyway

 

[marrec]

I dont think i can trust you again. Nothing is true, everything is permitted again.

Word of the Year 2013

 

[Colonel Nasty]

I've been using Butt-Chugging for years

 

[Anth0ny]

then what's the hashtag of the year

 

[Escape Goat]

I've been using Butt-Chugging for years

I dont think this is going to catch on. Keep trying though. You just need a celebrity to say it once in public.

 

[marrec]

then what's the hashtag of the year

#WOTY2K12

 

[Dead Prince]

what the hell is "word of the year" supposed to mean anyway

popularity

we should create a word and spread it over the internet!

 

[blame space]

then why isn't "the" word of the year every year?

 

[Escape Goat]

popularity

we should create a word and spread it over the internet!

That is so fetch, DM.

 

[Colonel Nasty]

I dont think this is going to catch on. Keep trying though. You just need a celebrity to say it once in public.

I can see it now...

"Yo Bieber, you gonna finish that beer or are you saving it for some Butt-Chugging?"

 

[Meatfist]

then what's the hashtag of the year

#YOLOswag4jesus420

 

[Xzeon]

after becoming a heavy user of Tumblr, 'Feels' has gotten under my skin. its fucking stupid. and people also use it sometimes when being serious. 'man, all my sad feels is making me so depressed.' fuck off.

Hashtag was number one cuz ALL of the tv stations whore it out to the max.

not even joking, watch the Price is Right in the morning. when they go up to spin the big wheel, guess whats in the corner of the screen? #PIRBIGWHEELSPIN

who the fuck is up at 10 am tweeting about the fucking Price is Right?

every live show pushes it like crazy as well. half of the election coverage was reporters reading tweets on air. all the singing competitions do it now, they take time out to read tweets on air. on The Voice, they even display them on screen after performances.

Twitter has consumed everything.

 

[Nemesis_]

I think hashtag is more deserved than others.

 

[twinturbo2]

No prizes for guessing the neogaf word of the year

I'm going to start a campaign to make "BOHICA" the 2013 GAF word of the year.

Because I will be screaming it a lot over the year.

 

[Vermillion]

"Mansplaining" is creative? Intriguing.

 

[Phonomezer]

Previous winners:

• 2011: Occupy
• 2010: App
• 2009: Tweet

Runner ups were, in order:

• marriage equality
• 47 percent
• YOLO
• fiscal cliff
• Gangnam style

 

[GK86]

I wonder what dumb shit aliens are declaring winners, back in their home planets.

 

[MIMIC]

beardruff: dandruff from one’s beard (10)

As opposed to coming from one's dan, I suppose.

Also....yuck.

phablet: mid-sized electronic device between a smartphone and a tablet (92)

Now who in the hell came up with this garbage?

hate-watching: continuing to follow a television show despite having an aversion to it (39)

Heh. I like this one.

mansplaining: a man’s condescending explanation to a female audience (90)

I don't get this.

 

[GrizzNKev]

twitter is dumb

 

[GK86]

As opposed to coming from one's dan, I suppose.

Also....yuck.



Now who in the hell came up with this garbage?

You haven't seen The Note, I'm guessing.

 

[Alphahawk]

I kind of wish it would of been Yolo just for the outrage that would occur.

I don't get why people hate that word so much.

 

[GK86]

I kind of wish it would of been Yolo just for the outrage that would occur.

I don't get why people hate that word so much.

Probably because of the guy who came up with it.

Speaking of which, you guys owe him money for using it.

 

[EVOL 100%]

I kind of wish it would of been Yolo just for the outrage that would occur.

I don't get why people hate that word so much.

Whenever I imagine someone actually saying 'Yolo!' I want to destroy something

 

[MIMIC]

ratchet: slang term originally referring to “urban divas” now used to mean “ghetto” (7)

It's hilarious how quickly this term caught fire. My students use it ALLLLLL the time (but it's mostly the boys using it to insult girls). I remember seeing a YouTube video of two guys singing about it, then BOOM! It was all I ever heard.

EDIT: here it is: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9oBlnb5orJo

 

[ReturnOfTheRAT]

I weep for humanity after reading this list.

 

[Ultima_5]

#yologangnamcrackin'wise

 

[Mushroomer25]

Honestly? Not a bad pick.

A hashtag is, in a way - a unique grammatical creation of the 21st century. It's a sub-comment. Extra information & context delivered in a way that isn't quite like anything else in the English language.

 

[Ultima_5]

Honestly? Not a bad pick.

A hashtag is, in a way - a unique grammatical creation of the 21st century. It's a sub-comment. Extra information & context delivered in a way that isn't quite like anything else in the English language.

Parentheses ?

 

[Stellactic]

Perhaps it's just me, but I don't actually see hashtag as a word. It's just a symbol used in front of other words. It's not as though you actively say out loud 'hashtag' as you read a tweet. I'm sad to say this, but I think YOLO should have won that category.

Hashtag should win it's own category called 'overused symbol that nobody truly understands why it's being used'.

 

[bobbychalkers]

I'm kind of sad that "He gon' get this work" didn't make the cut.

 

[Korey]

Honestly? Not a bad pick.

A hashtag is, in a way - a unique grammatical creation of the 21st century. It's a sub-comment. Extra information & context delivered in a way that isn't quite like anything else in the English language.

Agreed completely.

Parentheses ?

Parenthesis aren't the same at all. Hashtags are like a list of related mini-thoughts or concepts you tack on at the end of your main thought and furthermore they can literally be anything. Also they serve as a categorization device which was the original intent of them as they are tags. #awesome #21stcentury #englishftw #bestwordever #excited #parenthesessuck

 

[sleepykyo]

Hatewatch made it on nominations for most useful? I blame SAO.

 

[reggie]

Phablet? Glad I'm only seeing it now for the first time, what a terrible fucking word.

 

[Funchameleon]

It would be hard to comprehend the brilliance and wit of the term "mansplaining" unless you've tried to read or participate in any feminist discussion but by god does it deserve recognition.

 

[SmokyDave]

I've been using Butt-Chugging for years

Does your shit smell like beer?