brain rot

(n.) Supposed deterioration of a person’s mental or intellectual state, especially viewed as a result of overconsumption of material (now particularly online content) considered to be trivial or unchallenging. Also: something characterized as likely to lead to such deterioration.

Origin

The first recorded use of ‘brain rot’ that we’ve identified was in Henry David Thoreau’s book Walden in 1854, with a small number of further occurrences in the nineteenth century.

Why is it in our shortlist?

Although it is not a new or recent concept, ‘brain rot’ has been widely used on social media this year, particularly on TikTok, and the term has become more prominent, increasing by 250% in frequency per million words between 2023 and 2024 in our corpus.

demure

(adj.) Of a person: reserved or restrained in appearance or behaviour. Of clothing: not showy, ostentatious, or overly revealing.

Origin

The earliest use of ‘demure’ in the Oxford English Dictionary is from 1377, referring to the sea being calm.

The OED sense—‘Of persons (and their bearing, speech, etc.): Sober, grave, serious; reserved or composed in demeanour’—is attested from the late 1400s and has been in continuous use since then. We’ve seen use referring to unostentatious clothing since at least the seventeenth century.

Why is it in our shortlist?

We saw a big increase in usage of ‘demure’ in August 2024, after Jools Lebron used the word in a short viral video on TikTok. Lebron’s use of the phrase ‘very demure, very mindful’ to refer to her clothing and makeup choices was picked up and widely repeated by users on the platform and in the media.

Some commentators saw the trend as a reaction to the idea of a ‘brat summer’ (popularized in the wake of Charli XCX’s album Brat); while ‘brat’ was widely associated with impulsive, hedonistic, and self-confident behaviour and outlook, ‘demure’ is linked to an idea of personal reserve and careful self-presentation.

dynamic pricing

(n.) The practice of varying the price for a product or service to reflect changing market conditions; in particular, the charging of a higher price at a time of greater demand.

Origin

‘Dynamic pricing’ is a loan translation—or ‘calque’—of the Swedish term ‘dynamiska prisbildning’. It found its way into English through the work of two Swedish economists: Gunnar Myrdal, who coined the original phrase in 1927, and Erik Lindahl, who translated Myrdal’s work into English in 1929.

Since then, the term has been regularly used in economic and business contexts, but has recently become prominent in less specialized use.

Why is it in our shortlist?

Whilst dynamic pricing is not a new phenomenon, this year has seen a heightened awareness of—and controversy over—its use. In some high-profile cases, dynamic pricing was used in setting prices for concert tickets, resulting in fans (often reluctantly) paying very high prices to see their favourite artists. In some cases, fans were in a virtual queue for hours before realizing how much they would be asked to pay, leading to questions about the transparency of dynamic pricing practices, as well as value for money.

lore

(n.) A body of (supposed) facts, background information, and anecdotes relating to someone or something, regarded as knowledge required for full understanding or informed discussion of the subject in question.

Origin

The oldest sense of ‘lore’ in the Oxford English Dictionary is ‘the act of teaching; the condition of being taught; instruction, tuition, education’, coming from the Blickling Homilies, a collection of Old English sermons which is around 1,000 years old.

Another sense refers to ‘the body of traditional facts, anecdotes, or beliefs relating to some particular subject; as in animal lore, bird lore, fairy lore, plant lore, etc.’.

Why is it in our shortlist?

In recent years, people have been using ‘lore’ in different ways and in new contexts. For example, they might now talk about the lore surrounding a particular celebrity, or a character in a book or film, or even refer to their own personal history as their lore. Online cultures and social media have seen the emergence of new kinds of celebrities and highly-engaged fandoms, and the word has been applied much more widely.

It is often a sign of ‘gatekeeping’ behaviour, in which some fans lay claim to a superior knowledge as a means of asserting themselves over other fans who they claim ‘do not know the lore’ as well as them.

romantasy

(n.) A genre of fiction combining elements of romantic fiction and fantasy, typically featuring themes of magic, the supernatural, or adventure alongside a central romantic storyline.

Origin

In this sense, ‘romantasy’ originates from 2008 when the word was used as a genre label by Random House in Germany, for a German translation of an English romantic fantasy novel.

Why is it in our shortlist?

After a gradual increase in use over time, ‘romantasy’ has sharply increased in use and become mainstream in the past year. This increase could be down to a couple of factors. The romantasy genre is very popular in spaces on TikTok where people discuss and recommend books—a community known as BookTok—which may have contributed to wider awareness and use of the word. Meanwhile, the popularity of the romantasy genre itself could perhaps be linked to an increased appetite for escapism to counteract widespread political and economic gloom.

slop

(n.) Art, writing, or other content generated using artificial intelligence, shared and distributed online in an indiscriminate or intrusive way, and characterized as being of low quality, inauthentic, or inaccurate.

Origin

‘Slop’ has been used to refer to cultural material since at least the mid-nineteenth century, originally being applied to overly sentimental literature, and later more generally to nonsense or rubbish.

Why is it in our shortlist?

In 2024, we have seen a 332% increase in the use of ‘slop’ to refer specifically to material produced using a large language model (LLM), which is often viewed as being low-quality or inaccurate. This type of low-quality, AI-generated material is becoming increasingly visible to people using internet search engines or social media, who often view it as unwanted or inferior.