‘Climate Emergency’ named Oxford Dictionaries’ word of the year

12:20 • 21.11.19
Entertainment

English speakers spent enough time discussing a "climate emergency" that the phrase was awarded Oxford Dictionaries' word of the year on Wednesday.

The word of the year is "a word or expression shown through usage evidence to reflect the ethos, mood, or preoccupations of the passing year, and have lasting potential as a term of cultural significance."

The dictionary defined climate emergency as "a situation in which urgent action is required to reduce or halt climate change and avoid potentially irreversible environmental damage resulting from it."

According to Oxford's analysis of language data, use of the term rapidly increased over the year, hitting its peak in September at 100 times more common that it had been the previous year.

"This data is significant because it indicates a growing shift in people's language choice in 2019, a conscious intensification that challenges accepted language use to reframe discussion of 'the defining issue of our time' with a new gravity and greater immediacy," Oxford said in a press release, according to USNews.

Over 1,000 jurisdictions in 24 countries have issued climate emergency declarations. In most cases, the declarations are non-binding, which has led to some criticism.

The rise in these largely symbolic declarations is in part thanks to lobbying efforts from a grassroots environmental advocacy group called The Climate Mobilization.

"Climate Emergency is not simply a catchy phrase, it's a term designed to move the public into emergency mode with the understanding that if we don't act and mobilize on a scale unseen since WWII to protect the biosphere and all life on Earth, the consequences are unthinkable," Margaret Klein Salamon, executive director of The Climate Mobilization, said in a statement after the phrase was named word of the year.

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