OMG! What New Words Are In The Dictionary?

The Oxford English Dictionary has added a few new words.  Some of them hardly seem like words at all, but have gained popularity through texting, tweeting and emails. What words made the list?

LOL (Laugh Out Loud), OMG (Oh My God), FYI (For Your Information), BFF (Best Friends Forever) and IMHO (In My Humble Opinion) are a few of the “initialisms”  common in texts and tweets that Oxford says have crossed over in everyday use of our language.  And if you have any interactions with younger generations you know full well that OMG, BFF and LOL have become staples of many of their conversations.

Here is a fun fact for you. Many of these “initialisms” are associatied with modern digital media, but some of these phrases date back several decades or more!

“Our first quotation for OMG is from a personal letter from 1917; the letters LOL had a previous life, starting in 1960, denoting an elderly woman (or ‘little old lady’; and the entry for FYI shows it originated in the language of memoranda in 1941.”

Read more about the new words included by Oxford here.

A few of the other new additions:

• muffin top: A protuberance of flesh above the waistband of a tight pair of trousers.
• WAG: “Wives And Girlfriends.” It was first used in 2002 to describe the female partners of members of the England soccer team. Now it denotes the glamorous and extravagant female partners of male celebrities.
• “heart” as a verb: A casual equivalent of “to love” that is represented with a symbol, as seen on millions of souvenirs proclaiming “I (heart) New York.”
• meep: a short high-pitched sound.
• ego-surfing: The practice of searching for your own name on the Internet.
• dot-bomb: A failed Internet company.
• TMI: “Too Much Information.”
• la-la land: can refer either to Los Angeles or to a state of being out of touch with reality – and sometimes to both simultaneously.

You know, I lot of language purists are going to be upset over this, but really language is fluid and is all about creating shared meanings.  So I say, bring on the new words!