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Over the past several decades, and since the conception of dictionaries, the importance of adding new words is critically important to understand in the ever-evolving English language.
When news broke about Dictionary.com upping their game by including several African American Vernacular English (AAVE) words, such as my personal favorites "chile" and "finna" which are words used in casual conversations with my friends or in comedies and rap music, I was pleasantly surprised.
Other definitive words related to the various identities and races that are prevalent in the United States have been added as well.
Dictionary.com included 94 new definitions on existing entries that focus on race, identity, and the effects Covid-19 has on culture, 7,600 updated entries, and 450 brand new entries.
Way to go!
"We have added such terms as BIPOC, Critical Race Theory, and overpolice, which have risen to the top of the national discourse on social justice, said Managing Editor, John Kelly in a statement on Thursday. "Another significant decision was to remove the noun slave when referring to people, instead using the adjective enslaved or referring to the institution of slavery. This is part of our ongoing efforts to ensure we represent people on Dictionary.com with due dignity and humanity."
The update also includes edits such as capitalizing Indigenous when referring to the earliest inhabitants as well as terminology related to the popular video calling tool, Zoom.
Here are some other terms that have been added to the website that reflect the direction the U.S. will continue to go. I'm here for every bit of it!
Race, culture, and identity terminology
BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, and People of Color): used as a unifying identity label for people of color that also emphasizes the unique racial experiences of Black people and Indigenous people.
Finna: a phonetic spelling representing the African American Vernacular English variant of fixing to, a phrase commonly used in Southern U.S. dialects to mark the immediate future while indicating preparation or planning already in progress:
Chile: A phonetic spelling of child, representing dialectal speech of the Southern United States or African American Vernacular English.
Racialization: An act or instance of viewing and interacting with people from a racist perspective, or of being viewed and interacted with in this way:
Critical Race Theory: A conceptual framework that considers the impact of historical laws and social structures on the present-day perpetuation of racial inequality: first used in legal analyses, and now applied in education, communication studies, and sociology.
Covid-19 and culture terminology
Blended learning: Education in which students receive some instruction in a face-to-face classroom, and some instruction in self-paced or student-directed study over the internet.
Telework: To work at home or from another remote location by using the internet or a computer linked to one's place of employment, as well as digital communications such as email and phone.
UBI( Universal basic income): A government program to alleviate poverty through periodic, fixed, direct payments to every citizen.
Doomscrolling: The practice of obsessively checking online news for updates, especially on social media feeds, with the expectation that the news will be bad, such that the feeling of dread from this negative expectation fuels a compulsion to continue looking for updates in a self-perpetuating cycle.
Superspreader:A who spreads a contagious disease more easily and widely than the average infected person:
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