At this time of year, as others are trimming Christmas trees, a clutch of dictionary publishers ponder their choice for word of the year. Oxford Dictionaries revealed theirs on Monday: “goblin mode”. That means a state in which someone indulges their laziest or most self-indulgent habits—perhaps suitable as a symbol for the first proper post-lockdown year. For the first time ever, the word of the year was selected by public vote. “Goblin mode” beat two of Oxford's other choices. One was “#IStandWith”, a hashtag used frequently in solidarity on Twitter but whose status as a word seems questionable. Another was the “metaverse”, the name of a thing which Meta (owner of Facebook) and other companies have poured fortunes into developing—but which few people seem to be actually spending time in. It has been a strange year: war, economic upheaval and a pandemic hangover are hard to sum up in a single dictionary entry. Perhaps 2023 will bring better news, and more inspiring words. *摘自《经济学人》Expresso 12月5日报道
词汇积累
Picking the word of the year
选出年度词汇
▼ the word of the year年度词汇 挑选年度词汇是西方各大词典每年年末的保留节目，包括牛津（Oxford）、柯林斯（Collins）、韦氏（Merriam-Webster）等在内的几大主流词典会根据各自的筛选标准，选出当年度它们认为最重要的词汇。 相比起牛津，柯林斯和韦氏两家今年先行一步，早在11月就已公布了各自的年度词汇，分别是permacrisis和gaslighting。 柯林斯选出的permacrisis是个合成词（perma-「永久的」+crisis「危机」），描述的是一种「长期不稳定和不安全的状态」，柯林斯认为permacrisis一词精准地概括了过去的这一年，对很多人来说，2022年是疫情阴霾、物价飞涨、战争冲突等各种危机层出不穷的一年。 韦氏的年度词汇是gaslighting「煤气灯效应」，对应的是一种心理操纵方式，出自1944年的美国电影《煤气灯下》（Gaslight）。片中的丈夫故意将煤气灯调得忽明忽暗，却向妻子否认灯光有变化，让妻子开始逐渐质疑自己的精神状态。 按照韦氏的说法，gaslighting一词在过去几年的出现频率激增，各种假新闻、政客的虚伪言论，都在gaslighting the public「操纵着大众」。 牛津词典的年度词汇则以不走寻常路闻名。 2015年，牛津的年度词汇并不是词汇，而是「笑哭」的emoji（