The English language is constantly changing. The Oxford dictionary adds 100’s if not 1000’s of new words every year! And since the virus, many new terms have blossomed into what we hear and see in today’s social media. So, let’s take a look at some new words that have been added so far in 2021.
Anthropause
It has been more than a year since the virus has been around, and a lot has changed, especially the way people live their lives. We didn’t know anything about the virus, and because of that, governments all over the world mandated that humans stop and slow down, especially when it came to traveling. This is called Anthropause. Anthropause is when human activity across the world slows down. It was fascinating to see. In my opinion, Earth was able to heal a little bit.
Example sentence: What did this ‚anthropause‘ mean for wildlife?
Doomscrolling
How many of you catch yourself using social media a little too much, and you see yourself only scrolling through the bad news? Unfortunately, this happens to me a lot. This is called Doomscrolling. Doomscrolling is when you scroll through a lot of negative news. And it seems to have gotten worse since the virus started, am I right?
Example sentence: Stop doomscrolling! It’s only going to make you feel worse!
Furlough
Unfortunately, the virus affected the economy, and many companies lost a lot of business; in turn, companies had to furlough their employees due to decreased budgets. If you were furloughed, it meant that you didn’t work but still got paid some of your monthly income.
Example sentence: I was, unfortunately, furloughed last week due to the current situation.
Blursday
Now that the times are a bit different now, especially in Germany, given our extreme lockdown, the days sometimes feel as if they run together, and you lose track of what day it is. This is called Blursday. Blursday is the name of a day that feels the same as any other.
Sentence example: „Happy Blursday! Now quit doomscrolling and grab a quarantini.“ – The New York Times
By the way, quarantini is also a new word, and by the look and sound of it, I’m sure you can guess what that is, lol!
Moonshot
Have you ever had a big goal or dream in mind that you wanted to accomplish? For example, one of my biggest dreams was to move to another country, and at that time, it felt nearly impossible. As much as I dreamt of this, it felt as if I would never achieve this; this is called Moonshot. Moonshot means an attempt at something that seems almost impossible to do. Keyword, almost. Just remember that anything is possible. And if you haven’t noticed from my last blog post, I achieved my dream of moving to another country.
Sentence example: Years ago, moving to another country seemed like a moonshot. I never thought that I would actually do it!
