Shanghai Daily鈥檚 English Word of the Year 2021
Print Edition
AT the end of the year, many institutions around the globe are selecting “Word of the Year.” Oxford’s pick is vax (short for vaccine, vaccinate, and vaccination), followed by perseverance from Cambridge Dictionary, NFT from Collins Dictionary, and vaccine from Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary.
I used to teach at Soochow University’s English Department in Taiwan, where I was in charge of picking “Taiwan’s English Word of the Year.” Now as a teacher at Sanda University’s English Department in Shanghai, I am keen to carry on this tradition in Shanghai, with Dr Men and Dr Yang, my colleagues here.
The three of us agreed to use Shanghai Daily, the only English-language newspaper in Shanghai, as the source of the corpus data for 2021. We were able to conduct relevant studies on the basis of the PDF file of this year’s newspaper.
Well, the Word of the Year does not have to be a word in the strictest sense. It can be a phrase or even a short sentence. The key point is that this “word” should reflect the ethos of the year, with the intensity and length of the word’s impact fully assessed.
All the candidates had gone through several rounds of rigorous pre-selections, evaluations, and reappraisal to make it to the shortlist.
We are well prepared that many will not agree with our decision.
Unanimously, we settled on vaccine as Shanghai Daily’s Word of the Year 2021. In our fight against the Covid-19 pandemic, the word vaccine has been here and everywhere, as testified to by our research of the newspaper corpus.
There are also many instances of vaccinate and vaccination, but they are fewer, and could be well seen as derivatives of vaccine.
Three others also made to the shortlist.
CPC, short for Communist Party of China. This year marks the centenary of the founding of the Communist Party of China, and Shanghai has a special role to play in CPC history.
Climate. With the 26th United Nations Climate Change Conference held in Glasgow, UK, and China’s determination on mitigating climate changes, the choice of this word should not be a surprise.
Delta, a Covid-19 virus variant. This mutant strain emerged in the middle of the year, and its impact is overwhelming.
Omicron, the latest Covid-19 virus variant, deserves a special mention. Omicron entered our virus-fighting battlefield when the word selection process is underway. However, its rather relatively late debut means it will probably be shortlisted next year.
Hugo Tseng (Professor of English, Sanda University)
Men Haiyan (Lecturer of English, Sanda University)
Yang Zhixia (Lecturer of English, Sanda University)
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