The 2019 word of the year has recently been announced by Collins Dictionary, and this year it is “climate strike”.
The dictionary compilers define “climate strike” as “a form of protest in which people absent themselves from education or work in order to join demonstrations demanding action to counter climate change”. The term will now receive a listing in the next edition of the dictionary.
The phrase came to prominence last year when Greta Thunberg, the young Swedish activist made headlines around the world, by skipping school on a Friday to protest outside her country’s parliament in a bid to stop climate change.
It is the second year running that an “environmental” phrase has been chosen by the dictionary compilers after “single use” was chosen as word of the year last year.
Each year, the dictionary chooses a list of ten new terms that have been widely used in the past year for consideration for inclusion.
Other words or phrases that made the shortlist for consideration this year included cancel, bopo, double down, influencer, nonbinary, rewilding, deepfake, entryist and hopepunk.
