Web leads new dictionary terms

The infiltration of internet culture and recession related lingo into everyday life is reflected among the new entries to the latest edition of the Chambers English Dictionary.

A growing interest in environmental matters and the notion that men have gotten more in touch with their sensitive sides can also be garnered from the hundreds of new terms which make the 12th edition of the publication.

The addition of words such as tweet, defriend and paywall were a "clear indication" of the influence of the web, and social networking in particular, on how people now communicate, Chambers said, noting that "geek chic" had increasing clout and that Facebook now had some 500 million members.

Other internet related terms to make the cut include widget (single-purpose applications for computers or phones), webisodes (short programmes broadcast online) and augmented reality (a place where computer-generated elements are added to the real environment).

With the effects of the recession still being acutely felt Chambers has added a host of financial terms many hoped they would never need to know such as haircut, double-dip, quantative easing, toxic asset and overleveraged.

Banking acronyms such as CDO (collateralised debt obligation), CDS (credit default swap) and CFD (contract for difference) are also included having become part of common parlance, Chambers said.

Errors at white-collar level may have prompted the flow of financial terms into the lexicon but additions to the dictionary such as green-collar (jobs in the environmental sector) reflect a growing interest in ecological issues.

"Society's obsession with eco-awareness and the judgment imposed on those who fail to live up to high eco-standards has led to an entire host of new green words being admitted into the latest edition," Chambers said.

Among the additions are upcycling (converting waste products into something of a higher value), carbon offsetting, locavore (a person who will only eat locally produced food) and freegan (somebody who opposes materialism by retrieving and using discarded food or clothes).

The 12th edition of the single volume edition of Chambers Dictionary, which was first published in 1901, contains 620,000 words and definitions including a host of terms originating from Ireland.

Yoke, stocious, sleeveen, nixer, hoor, barmbrack and asthore all feature as do some of our better known acronyms such as RTÉ and CIE.