Each year, Oxford chooses one word as the word of the year, and this year, the award went to “Brain Rot”. It’s an improvement from last year’s winner, “Rizz” as it has more meaning to it. It describes a situation that many people will experience on a daily basis without even realizing it. If you don’t know what exactly Brain Rot is or if you want to know where it came from, then we highly recommend that you keep on reading!
What exactly is Brain Rot?
Have you used the term or heard the term, but you never understood what it meant? Well, we’re here to help you out. According to the modern definition, it is the word used to describe when someone consumes too much content to the point where their mental state deteriorates. For example, spending 5 hours a day or more on TikTok or other social media platforms. It is also used to describe content that is super low quality or has no value but still gets watched. This year, the word saw a usage growth of nearly 250%, which can mostly be credited to TikTok and its content.
Even though the word was used frequently between 2023 and 2024, it is much older! Apparently, the word is more than a century old and was first used in a book from 1854. However, the word’s meaning has slightly changed over the past century!
Other contenders for the word of the year in 2024
Oxford has to decide based on a large list of possible words. However, if you haven’t lived under a rock, you probably know some of the nominees! Oxford chose Brainrot over other options like Demure and Slop. Most of the words in the list were heavily used on TikTok. This makes brain rot the best choice, as that is what you get from scrolling on the app too much.
Oxford is not the only organization that chooses a word of the year; Collins Dictionary is another example of an organization that chooses one, too. Their chosen word was “brat,” meaning that someone is confident and independent. Other nominees on their list were Rawdogging and Delulu.
