adminadept – Page 4 – Adept Word Management

From “Generation A” To “Zeitgeisty”: Over 200 New Words And Definitions Added To Dictionary.com

Published March 29, 2022

Homelessness

Accessibility

Disability

COVID

Climate And Environment

Social Sciences

Other Assorted Terms

by Nick Norlen, Research Editor, and Heather Bonikowski, Lexicographer

The latest update to Dictionary.com reflects our mission to help make sense of the world through words.

Of the hundreds of newly added terms, some define our times, notably those related to the ongoing COVID pandemic and climate emergency. Other updates cover important changes in how we talk about a vast range of topics, including disability, accessibility, homelessness, and countless aspects of culture.

The variety ranges from Generation A to zeitgeisty, from the timely (metaverse) to the old-timey (cheeseparing) to the timeline-bending (bootstrap paradox).

Our tireless team of lexicographers touched over 2,400 entries across our dictionary. Highlights include:

235 new entries
72 new definitions in existing entries
1,024 revised definitions

As you can see, this update consists of more than just newly added terms. We also added new definitions to existing entries, revised outdated definitions, and updated other content, such as pronunciations and etymologies. And remember: just because we just added a word to our dictionary doesn’t mean it’s brand new to the English language (in fact, many have been around for quite a while).

How do dictionaries work?

If you’re wondering why some words that get added to the dictionary aren’t necessarily new, read more about how dictionaries work and get answers to these questions and more:

How does a word get into the dictionary?

That word isn’t new. Why are you adding it now?

That’s not a word. Why is it in the dictionary?

I just created an awesome new word. How can I get it into the dictionary?

All that said, we’re well aware that it’s the newly added words that draw most of the attention and questions. Here are some of the terms that are likely to grab headlines and that you’ll probably start to encounter more and more.

Find out if you’ve been paying attention to the latest updates in the English language by taking the quiz on these new words.

Homelessness

If you haven’t yet, you’re likely to start encountering some of the newly added terms that are increasingly used in reference to people who lack stable housing. Each of these is often intended to convey a specific nuance of meaning:

unsheltered (Sometimes used in reference to people who sleep in cars or under overpasses, for example, but not people in temporary housing like shelters.)

unhoused, houseless (Both mean that a person lacks permanent housing, but may still be a member of a community that they call home—in which case the designation homeless is imprecise.)

Do these terms replace homeless?

The word homeless, as explained in the new usage note on that page, can be offensive or disparaging, especially when used collectively (the homeless), which can stigmatize or reinforce negative associations or assumptions, such as the pervasive notion that homelessness results from a stubborn refusal to work, or a substance or alcohol use disorder, for example. Such stereotypes ignore the many circumstances and factors that contribute to homelessness, including the high cost of housing, poverty, mental illness, domestic violence, and other forms of abuse.

It’s important to emphasize, though, that the term homeless is still widely used and even preferred as a term of self-identification among some people without stable housing.

Still, use of alternative terms is increasing among members of that community and by advocates who view those expressions as better able to convey the range of experiences that can be lumped together (and obscured) under the single term homeless. Some prefer unsheltered and unhoused because they frame homelessness not as a personal failing or defining characteristic, but rather as a condition, one that must be addressed through societal responsibility and policies.

Accessibility

As Dictionary.com Lexicographer Heather Bonikowski told Forbes recently, the increase in the availability of assistive technologies has brought with it an influx of terminology.

Here are some of the newly added terms related to accessibility tech:

That last term, closed caption, may sound familiar, but it’s a more recent noun form of closed-captioned. Closed-captioned is one of the existing entries whose definition was revised to reflect what it means today. Other updated entries include caption, CC, and subtitle.

You’re probably familiar with some of these terms, or at least the technologies they refer to. But the specific features of each type can differ and overlap—and capturing these distinctions and similarities is one of the challenges of defining these words.

Here’s a chart that breaks down the typical characteristics of each technology. It shows some of the nitty-gritty lexicographical research that goes into crafting definitions for such terms (which are certain to continue to evolve in meaning and use).

Disability

Among the many changes made to terms used in the context of disability was the addition of an important usage note for disability itself:

Disabled is a comprehensive umbrella term to describe people or communities of people who live with functional limitations in carrying out major life activities, such as walking, lifting, seeing, or learning. When should disabled be used to describe someone? First, in many cases, there is no need to mention disability; it is often not relevant to the information being conveyed. In most cases, when disabilities are mentioned, it is preferable to name the person’s specific physical or mental condition, like diabetes or traumatic brain injury. However, when addressing an issue that affects the larger community of people living with such functional limitations in daily activities, for example, when discussing accessibility in the workplace, disabled and disability are the appropriate terms.

Some people prefer person-first constructions like “a person with a disability” to emphasize the whole person, not defined exclusively by living with a disability. Others use identity-first language like “a disabled person” to center the disability as an important aspect of identity and push back on the presupposition that disability is inherently negative, unmentionable, or something to be politely ignored.

Following similar logic, the euphemisms “special,” “challenged,” “differently abled,” and “handicapable” are not recommended. The straightforward, simple, and descriptive term disabled is preferred.

The ongoing pandemic

After more than two years, COVID continues to change our lives and language in ways that will likely be long-lasting. Some new terms emerged during the pandemic. In other cases, existing terms became more established in mainstream use due to the influence of COVID on so many aspects of our lives. Many of the terms are examples of the evolving language of vaccination and masking, including:

In addition to these newly added terms, we’ve added new senses of existing terms, including:

In some cases, the addition of terms as a result of COVID was somewhat indirect. For example, we added nontaster and hypogeusia, which are both used in the context of COVID’s effects on smell and taste. These additions precipitated the addition of their opposites, supertaster and hypergeusia, which are not associated with COVID but nevertheless made sense to add in tandem.

Climate and environment

Climate change continues to change our planet and our lives in countless ways, including in the often overlapping contexts of science, personal behavior, politics, policy, activism, and tech innovations, all of which are sources of emerging terminology.

Chief among the terms we’ve added in this area is one that is now commonly used to capture the urgency of the issue:

climate emergency (the entry also notes the synonymous term climate crisis).

Our additions also reflect a focus on the extreme weather events driven by climate change—and the greater awareness and mainstream use of some of the technical terms used in studying and discussing them. Some of these include:

megadrought

mesovortex

We’ve also captured terms for other environmental issues becoming more prominent in mainstream consciousness, as well as some words related to energy technologies often cited in the discussion of climate change mitigation, including:

microplastics

overtourism

electrolyzer

The push to reduce the use of fossil fuels is often discussed in relation to the transportation industry, where many terms have emerged in relation to evolving technologies:

EV (electric vehicle)

HEV (hybrid electric vehicle)

PHEV (plug-in hybrid electric vehicle)

BEV (battery electric vehicle)

charging station

e-bike

micromobility

Here’s a chart to help visualize the overlap and differences between these terms for electric vehicles. We’ve included traditional gas-powered vehicles and bicycles as points of reference on the spectrum.

Social sciences

More than ever before, our everyday discussion of a wide range of issues features vocabulary initially used and developed by professionals and academics in fields like sociology, psychology, and race and gender studies. Of course, many of these terms are not at all new, but have been more recently adopted into (or are trending toward) mainstream use. Here are some of the terms we’re adding to the dictionary for the first time or whose definitions we’ve updated to reflect modern senses:

silo / siloed

compartmentalize / compartmentalization

hegemonic masculinity

Assorted Terms: Culture, Life, Everything Else

Here’s the thing about words: they’re used in literally every context. Our lexicographers take note of a vast span of topics, tracking terms that have become an established part of a subculture or that go on to make headlines or even enter mainstream awareness as “household words.” In this section, you’ll find entries as diverse as Generation A (the one after Gen Z), UAP (different than UFO), throuple (three + couple), chair yoga (yoga with a chair), and verklempt (yet another useful Yiddish word), as well as many, many others.

Of the hundreds of new terms and definitions we’ve added, here’s a group that stands out, among many other reasons, for its sheer variety. We’ve broken them down into categories, including:

Sports

Gaming

Pop culture

Leisure pursuits and wellness

Relationships

Beer

sour (as a noun)

Internet and online life

Words and names

And whatever category NFT (non-fungible token) falls under.

Along with NFT, new additions include several significant acronyms and abbreviations, including:

AAPI (Asian American and Pacific Islander)

BASL (Black American Sign Language)

UAP (unidentified aerial phenomenon; we also updated the entry for the distinct term UFO).

STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, and Mathematics—STEM that incorporates art)

We’ve even tackled a timeline-bending set of terms that see frequent use in sci-fi and pop culture discussion:

bootstrap paradox

causality paradox

grandfather paradox

predestination paradox

time paradox

Here are just a few miscellaneous examples that show how much variety our lexicographers have to tackle in terms of diversity of topics:

Generation A (the latest generation name)

verklempt, wabi-sabi (both borrowed from other languages and added due to their widespread currency in English)

cheeseparing (actually quite an old word, and not what it sounds like)

peak (the sense used in peak TV)

zeitgeisty (a slangy adjective variation of the noun zeitgeist)

Review our new additions and updates from recent years:

Summer 2021 Update

Spring 2021 Update

2020 Update

2020 Coronavirus Words Update

2020 Slang Update

2019 Update

How New Words Get Added To Dictionary.com—And How The Dictionary Works

What Is The Longest Palindrome In English?

WORD FACTS

Why MLK’s “I Have A Dream” Speech Is A Perfect Example Of Anaphora

HOLIDAYS

Where Do Christmas Words Like “Wassail” And “Sugarplum” Come From?

WORD FACTS

LofC Veteran’s History Project New Online Exhibit: Transcribed Correspondence Collections

March 29, 2022 by Megan Harris

Part of the suite of interpretive resources released earlier this month focusing on letters in the VHP archive, this online exhibit came to life a bit differently than others on our list.

LC staff member Candace Milburn at her bedroom work station during the Covid-19 pandemic, June 2020. Photo courtesy of Candace Milburn.

In the spring of 2020, Library of Congress staff members left our Capitol Hill campus to isolate at home due to COVID-19 safety protocols. For many of us, this transition to telework was a fairly easy process. Once we worked out the kinks of remote connections and video conference etiquette, we could resume our normal day-to-day operations with just a few hiccups here and there. But for many others—those staffers whose work requires in-person access to collection materials—telework presented a huge challenge. How could these colleagues contribute to our mission-critical activities with little or no access to physical collections?

One of the many creative solutions to this problem was the establishment of VHP’s ongoing program of transcribing correspondence collections. Transcription is such a laborious process that up until recently, VHP has not had the time or resources to transcribe collection materials (whether they are manuscripts or oral histories). While VHP has a vast array of digitized letter collections in our archive, prior to the pandemic, very few of them featured transcripts.

Rare though they are, transcripts can be a lifesaver for researchers and those interested in reading correspondence collections, exponentially increasing the accessibility of the contents. Anyone who has squinted their eyes trying to decipher a vintage letter knows how hard it can be to interpret handwritten material. Our modern eyes are accustomed to reading typewritten or printed words, and not those written in cursive script. In the case of VHP materials, many of the letters in our archive were written under less-than-ideal conditions, often making them even harder to read. Servicemen and women would frequently compose their correspondence in foxholes and leaky tents, aboard trains and tempest-tossed ships—and their handwritten letters sometimes reflect these rough conditions. Add to it the inherent degradation of decades of wear and tear, and it’s a wonder that these letters are legible at all!

Screenshot of a transcribed letter from the Ewing Miller II collection, showing the original letter beside the transcript. Ewing Miller II Collection, Veterans History Project, AFC2001/001/102421.

That’s why VHP’s pandemic transcription efforts have been so valuable. Over the last two years, staff members working from home have transcribed over 5,000 letters in over 50 different VHP collections. Many of these collections included hundreds of letters—the Andrew Del Regno Collection almost 600! We chose nine of these collections to include in Line by Line, to offer readers a taste of what transcribed collections have to offer.

On each veteran’s digitized collection page, the transcripts are situated alongside the original letters; readers can view the original letter while simultaneously reading through the transcript. This mode of presentation maintains the integrity and distinctiveness of the original letter without demanding that the viewer stumble through deciphering each and every word. Having access to these side-by-side transcripts means that readers can focus on the contents of the letter rather than on interpreting the quirks of a veteran’s handwriting.

And the content of these letter collections is riveting: by turns poignant and heart-wrenching, humorous and eye-opening. You might chuckle over Edward Zahler’s jocular exchanges with his sister, and glimpse his anxiety over the fate of his kid brother, Donald, who was also serving. Perhaps you’ll be drawn to John Carson’s dry wit, evident throughout his missives to his parents. Or you can take a look at Henry Walker McIver’s letters, which all begin with a detailed, evocative pen-and-ink sketch illustrating his text.

“Letter to Folks [March 10, 1944].” Henry Walker McIver Collection, Veterans History Project, Library of Congress, AFC2001/001/67942.

All of these letter collections illustrate the power of personal correspondence as a primary historical resource. Though they originally functioned as a means of reassuring loved ones and providing the writer with a momentary escape from the desolation of wartime conditions, these letters now personalize and contextualize larger historical events. You may think of D-Day a bit differently after reading Ellsworth Hill’s account of it in a letter to his family.

We hope you enjoy browsing through the featured collections, line by line. Many thanks to Tamika Brown, Yvonne Brown, Glenn Ferrara, Rachel Frederick, Jordan Kearschner, Laura Kells, Helen McNamara, Candace Milburn, Sarah Mitrani and Justina Moloney for all of their hard work in making these letter collections more accessible.

For more blog posts detailing VHP staff activities during the pandemic, see our blog series Working Together Apart, with posts authored by Tamika Brown, Yvonne Brown, Tracey Dodson, Andrew Huber, Candace Milburn, and Justina Moloney.

Uncategorized

President’s FY 2023 Budget Calls for Increased Support for Nursing Education and Research

30-Mar-2022 8:30 AM EDT, by American Association of Colleges of Nursing (AACN)

favorite_border

Newswise — WASHINGTON, DC – March 29, 2022 – President Biden has released the Administration’s Fiscal Year (FY) 2023 Budget, which outlines additional investments in nursing and other key programs under the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and Department of Education, as well as a commitment to addressing many pressing issues facing the nation.

In FY 2023, the Biden Administration specifically recommends $294.972 million for Title VIII Nursing Workforce Development Programs, which reflects a $30.5 million increase over FY 2021 Omnibus levels and a $14.5 million increase over the recently passed FY 2022 Omnibus. This total includes a $25 million increase in Advanced Nursing Education to support maternal health, an additional $3.5 million for Nursing Workforce Diversity, and an increase of $2 million for the Nurse Education, Practice, Quality and Retention program to help prepare nurses in rural and underserved areas. For the National Institute of Nursing Research (NINR), the President proposes a total of $198.670 million in FY 2023 to support nurse scientists and researchers as they help address racial, ethnic, and socio-economic health disparities.

“Recognizing the instrumental role that nursing schools, deans, faculty, and students have in preparing the current and future nursing workforce is imperative to sustain the health of our nation,” said Dr. Cynthia McCurren, Chair of the AACN Board of Directors. “The increased funding outlined in this Administration’s budget for Title VIII Nursing Workforce Development Programs and NINR, as well as an increased focus on prioritizing mental health, is welcome news for academic nursing and a strong step forward as we begin this year’s budgetary conversations on the federal level.”

In addition to proposed increases to nursing workforce and research programs, the budget also provides $88.3 billion for the Department of Education. This funding includes increases to the maximum Pell Grant by a total of $2,175 over the 2021-2022 award year, and more equitable funding for Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs), Tribally Controlled Colleges and Universities (TCCUs), Minority Serving Institutions (MSIs), and low-resourced institutions.

“As we work to advance priorities that are sustainable, inclusive, and innovative, we were pleased to see this budget reinforcing the importance of academic nursing,” said Dr. Deborah Trautman, AACN President and Chief Executive Officer. “Moving to a more equitable healthcare system requires smart investments in nurses and nursing students practicing in all communities, including in rural and underserved areas.”

AACN is also proud to see an ongoing focus on fighting public health challenges, including gun violence research, and additional support for mental health services. As we continue with the budgetary process, AACN remains committed to working with Congress to boldly increase critical funding for Title VIII programs and support innovative research at NINR in FY 2023 and beyond.

###

The American Association of Colleges of Nursing (AACN) is the national voice for academic nursing representing more than 850 schools of nursing nationwide. AACN establishes quality standards for nursing education, influences the nursing profession to improve health care, and promotes public support of baccalaureate and graduate nursing education, research, and practice.

Uncategorized

The “KNOLL”edge You Need To Always Win At Wordle

Lately, a particular word game known as Wordle has been all the rage online. If you haven’t heard the good word about Wordle, it’s a game created by and named after puzzle fan Josh Wardle that challenges you to name a particular five-letter word with only six guesses. With each guess, any letter that isn’t in the mystery word is shaded gray, a letter that is in the word (but was guessed in the wrong spot) is shaded yellow, and a correct letter in the right spot is shaded green. Land five greens, and you win!

Why Five Letters?

Most Common English Letters

Most Common Letters In Wordle

Most Common Pairs

Best Starting Words

Our Favorite Starting Words

Users’ Favorite Starting Words

Find the best words with Word Finder

If you’re STUCK in Wordle and need a helping NUDGE, you can always rely on Word Finder! This tool—perfect for games like Scrabble™ and Wordle—should be in any word lover’s pocket, when the right word is just out of reach. Turn those yellow and black boxes into a row of green with just one quick search for that elusive 5-letter word.

This simple game has taken the internet by storm, largely due to how addictive it is to play and how easy it is to share your attempts on social media. Wordle can only be played once a day, and it keeps track of your winning streak and scores. Wardle has chalked up the game’s popularity to this once-a-day rule and the ease of sharing game results with friends.

It seems our users can’t get enough of Wordle either, as Wordle answers have been among some of our top lookups recently! Some popularly searched Wordle words include knoll, youth, great, and gnome. With that in mind, we wanted to take a moment to share some popular Wordle strategies and a bunch of words that we and our users like to use as go-to moves in pursuit of Wordle success.

Why five letters?

In interviews, Josh Wardle hasn’t said specifically why he chose five letters. However, he and his partner narrowed it down from the “around 12,000” five-letter English words to 2,500 to use as the master list. It’s possible that the five-letter word goal (and Wordle itself) was inspired by the 1980s game show Lingo, which had very similar rules to Wordle.

Brush up on these spelling rules before the next round.

Most common letters in English

The exact numbers vary according to who measures and how, but the 15 most common English letters in order tend to be:

Unsurprisingly, Z, Q, J, and X consistently round out the bottom. As for the letters that begin the most English words, the top five are T, O, A, W, and B. For the end letter, the most common are E, S, T, D, and N.

Most common letters in Wordle

Our Wordle experts (we can call ourselves that, right?) here at Dictionary.com have put together a unique list of the most common letters appearing in Wordle so far (based on past answers).

Most common pairs

Which two letters go well together? According to letterfrequency.org, the 10 most common letter pairs are:

What are the best starting words?

According to the experts, some of the best starting words are:

arose

soare

later

saine

tares

lares

rales

rates

cares

So, what should you guess if you want to win? Generally speaking, the strategy you pick depends on whether you simply want to have the best chance to win in six tries or you want to win in as few guesses as possible. That being said, the experts agree that going after the vowels is a good opening move. For this reason, the words ADIEU and AUDIO are extremely popular opening guesses that give a lot of info on the vowels. However, those words will leave you at a loss for consonants, and you will likely need to repeat some vowels if you want to learn anything about consonants.

Another common piece of advice is to include as many different commonly used consonants as possible to narrow things down. Words like SIRED, ANTES, TONER, RINSE, and RATES are good first picks as you have both some vowels and top 10 consonants too.

Many statistically-minded people like to make the absolute most out of their starting two guesses by squeezing in all of the top 10 most common letters. That means you need two words that include all of E, T, A, O, I, N, S, R, H, and L. If that’s your game, might we suggest HATER and LIONS? Or maybe RINSE and LOATH?

What Dictionary.com team members love to start with (yes, we are obsessed with Wordle, too)

While trying to stack the odds is all well and good, everyone has their own preferences and favorite words that they like to use. Because at the end of the day, the most important thing is to have fun.

Dictionary.com Employees’ Wordle Survey

Name: Mike Porter
Job title: senior software engineer
Word: laugh
Why I like it: A good mix of vowels and consonants.

Name: Heena Narottam
Job title: senior software engineer
Word: stear
Why I like it: I like it because it uses the top two most common vowels and the top three most common consonants.

Name: Heather Bonikowski
Job title: lexicographer
Word: ocean
Why I like it: First vowel-heavy word that came to me, and it works pretty well.

Name: Mike Sandula
Job title: senior software engineer
Word: earth, noise, adieu
Why I like it: They cover a lot of common letters. Adieu because of the number of vowels, plus it makes me feel fancy.

Name: Jess Miller
Job title: director of marketing
Word: group, heart
Why I like it: I used to do group but switched to heart for more common letters. I switch it up sometimes, though.

Some of our users’ favorite words to start with

Take a look at the best starting words (according to you!) and join in the conversation on Twitter.

adieu, aisle, alien, alter, anime, aorta, arise, aside, audio, bacon, beaut, bored, cause, crate, crack, crest, earns, eight, farts, feast, great, harpy, hoist, ideal, ideas, ingot, irate, learn, least, loyal, meany, meats, media, mousy, niche, notes, omega, onery, opera, peace, pears, pilot, pithy, plant, point, ports, power, prior, quest, rages, rates, ratio, rents, rouse, scale, shape, shore, snare, soare, sport, stare, steak, stern, stoic, stony, store, strap, table, teams, tears, those, tired, touch, train, water, yeast, youth

Uncategorized

Welcome!

Here at Adept, our Experts are waiting to help you.

Current clients, use the buttons to the right to get us your file.

New clients please fill out the CONTACT form and we will get back to you ASAP to discuss your needs and get you setup as a client so you can start uploading your files to us.

Not sure if you would like to be a client of Adept Word Management? Please review the SERVICES we provide, and learn about our EXPERTS. We are sure you will discover Adept Word Management is the solution you have been looking for to handle your transcription, captioning, and copy editing needs.

Uncategorized

How do dictionaries work?

Homelessness

Do these terms replace homeless?

Accessibility

Disability

The ongoing pandemic

Climate and environment

Social sciences

Assorted Terms: Culture, Life, Everything Else

Review our new additions and updates from recent years:

Find the best words with Word Finder

Why five letters?

Most common letters in English

Most common letters in Wordle

Most common pairs

What are the best starting words?

What Dictionary.com team members love to start with (yes, we are obsessed with Wordle, too)

Some of our users’ favorite words to start with

UPLOAD FILES HERE