In a shock move, Oxford Dictionaries \u2014 traditionally one of the world\u2019s staunchest defenders of the English language \u2014 has swapped its Word of the Year in favor of the public\u2019s favorite emoji, opting for the widely shared \u201ctears of joy\u201d icon.<\/p>\n
The popularity of emoji, a visual form of communication used by smartphone and social media users to illustrate their emotions, has led the \u201ctears of joy<\/em>\u201d icon to be listed as number one on the Oxford Dictionaries list this year.<\/p>\n In a seemingly incredible precedent that will shake traditional lexicographers to their core, this is the first time the Word of the Year list has included an entry that is not actually a word \u2014 indicating that, for good or ill, social media is revolutionizing the way people communicate.<\/p>\n Oxford Dictionaries said the emoji best represents the \u201cmood and preoccupations of 2015<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cEmoji culture has become so popular that individual characters have developed their own trends and stories<\/em>,\u201d said Casper Crathwohl, president of Oxford Dictionaries.<\/p>\n The icon shows the \u201cplayfulness and intimacy<\/em>\u201d of emoji culture, he added.<\/p>\n Many other interesting entries made the list, including digital terms such as \u201cdark web<\/em>\u201d and \u201cad block<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n Social media slang such as \u201cfleek<\/em>\u201d and \u201clumbersexual<\/em>\u201d were also runners up.<\/p>\n Words \u201crefugee<\/em>\u201d and \u201cBrexit<\/em>\u201d also made the shortlist, owing to their prevalence in current affairs.<\/p>\n \u201cYou can see how traditional alphabet scripts have been struggling to meet the rapid-fire, visually focused demands of 21st century communication<\/em>,\u201d Crathwohl said.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s not surprising that a pictographic script like emoji has stepped in to fill those gaps \u2014 it\u2019s flexible, immediate, and infuses tone beautifully. As a result emoji are becoming an increasingly rich form of communication, one that transcends linguistic borders<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Via RT<\/a>.\u00a0This piece was reprinted by RINF Alternative News<\/a> with permission or license.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" In a shock move, Oxford Dictionaries \u2014 traditionally one of the world\u2019s staunchest defenders of the English language \u2014 has swapped its Word of the Year in favor of the public\u2019s favorite emoji, opting for the widely shared \u201ctears of joy\u201d icon. The popularity of emoji, a visual form of communication used by smartphone and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":200990,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[487,18],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-200989","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-breaking-news","8":"category-latest-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/200989","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=200989"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/200989\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/200990"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=200989"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=200989"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=200989"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}