How to sum up 2024?
Look no further than the words of the year published by leading English-language dictionaries.
Merriam-Webster’s 2024 word of the year is “polarization.” For Australia, it is “enshittification”. England’s prestigious Oxford Dictionary declared “brain rot” as the word of the year. For the Collins English Dictionary, the word of the year is “brat.” Meanwhile, Dictionary.com hailed “demure” as its word of the year.
Bruh, clearly, 2024 had some issues.
And yet, there was joy to be found, especially for the 10,168,008 people who purchased tickets for the Eras tour. Swiftonomics is a real phenomenon – disruptive, you could even say. Now that it has come to an end – we are holding space for all Swifties. Many have now entered the Wicked era, defying gravity and all that. Not sure if Elphaba and Glinda sync with Taylor in the rizz department, but that remains to be seen.
See you this time next year for the next installment of Inkhouse’s words to retire in 2026. Meanwhile, here is this year’s list, our 15th:
- Polarization
- Enshittification
- Brain rot
- Brat
- Demure
- Bruh
- Holding space
- Disruptive (which first appeared in our 2014 post)
- Sync
- Rizz
