'Lockdown' named word of the year by Collins Dictionary amid COVID-19
“Lockdown” has been named Word Of The Year 2020 by Collins Dictionary following a dramatic surge in the usage of the word over the past one year.
- World News
- 2 min read
“Lockdown” has been named Word Of The Year 2020 by Collins Dictionary following a dramatic surge in the usage of the word over the past one year. Publishers Harper Collins, awarded the honour to the word on November 10 asserting that the word has now become synonymous with populations across the world struggling to tackle the coronavirus. In a blog post, they mentioned that what was originally a piece of prison vocabulary, has now turned into a unifying experience.
"Lockdown”, with its heavy, clunking syllables and heavier associations, is the condition we’ve most dreaded in 2020 – a state of national stasis, where almost everything that constitutes normal public life is suspended. Under lockdown, our waking hours get a lot smaller. We return to a simpler state – which some have, in fact, appreciated – but it’s a far more restricted one. We see few people, and fewer places,” they wrote in a blog post.
Lockdown is the word of the year
Collins registered more than a quarter-million usages of the word during 2020 coronavirus pandemic while it was only used for 4,000 times in 2019. Not only the word “lockdown” has been frequently used but other pandemic related words also saw a surge in their usages. As per the blog post, six out of the total 10 words of the year were related to the coronavirus crisis. The words included in the longer list included ‘coronavirus’ ‘ self-isolate’ and furlough’ amongst others.
Read our #CollinsWOTY #blog post written by journalist and author David Shariatmadari @D_Shariatmadari https://t.co/oV83EfigyG
— Collins Dictionary (@CollinsDict) November 10, 2020
#CollinsDictionary #WordoftheYear #lockdown pic.twitter.com/xOnGprLQmq
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According to the dictionary, coronavirus is "Anyone of a group of RNA-containing viruses that can cause infectious illnesses of the respiratory tract, including COVID-19." In addition, they also revealed that the word "Key worker" alone saw a 60-fold increase in usage reflecting the importance attributed this year to professions considered to be essential to society.
Significant social and political developments beyond the virus have also been reflected in the list. ‘BLM', an abbreviation used for Black Lives Matter, often used as a hashtag on social media by people protesting against racism was widely used in conversations. It registered an increase in usage of 581 per cent by Collins. In addition, there were a lot of words that the dictionary absorbed from social media including ‘TikToker’ 'Mukbang' and 'Megxit'.