Avo, bougie and Generation Z: The new words added to the Merriam-Webster dictionary

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Just as Shakespeare did some four centuries ago, many people continue to adapt and invent words and phrases to fit with the zeitgeist (and within the 280-character limit on Twitter).

Nowadays, many words that seep into everyday language often originate from social media, something that American dictionary Merriam-Webster has taken note of.

More than 800 new words have just been added to the online version of the dictionary, including abbreviated words frequently used by social media aficionados such as ‘avo’, ‘guac’, and ‘fav’.

Many of the new entries are unsurprisingly related to the digital age, with ‘predictive’ (referring to predictive text), ‘airplane mode’ and ‘force quit’ now officially recognised by the American dictionary.

On top of that, several of the words now included in the dictionary highlight the strong influence that the millennial and Generation Z generations have had on contemporary culture.

‘Bougie’, ‘adorbs’ and ‘rando’ can now all be found on Merriam-Webster, terms that people in older generations may be slightly less familiar with.

Merriam-Webster takes note of the widespread use of certain words and phrases when updating the dictionary, as the announcement detailing the new entries explains.

“It’s important to remember that new words are added to the dictionary only when they have already been used by many people - often initially by specialists or subcultures. Then, gradually a word’s use spreads to the rest of us,” it states.

“Every word moves at its own pace; there is no average speed for a word’s acceptance into the language, the culture and the dictionary.

“The dictionary’s job is to report that usage as it enters the general vocabulary.”

The dictionary’s update also includes terms such as ‘TL;DR’, meaning ‘too long; didn’t read’, which refers to when someone couldn’t be bothered to read a message or article because it was too lengthy.

Widely used terms that refer to serious issues affecting thousands of people around the world have also been added, such as ‘tent city’, ‘food bank’ and ‘self-harm.’

Earlier this year, it was announced that 900 new words had been added to the Oxford English Dictionary.

Words and phrases including ‘imposter syndrome’, ‘pansexual’ and ‘spoiler alert’ were all formally added to the dictionary.