Merriam-Webster’s Twin Picks for Word of the Year 2012

Editor-at-Large Peter Sokolowski announced Merriam-Webster’s Words of the Year 2012 on CBS News this morning. In 2011, users of the online dictionary were looking up pragmatic more than any other word. This year, we were pragmatically turning to the dictionary to discover exactly what socialism and capitalism mean.

As Sokolowski explains, out of a total of a hundred million page views per month on Merriam-Webster.com, these two words “trended together.” Socialism had the largest number of lookups, but capitalism was often looked up at the same time. Other words on this “top eleven” list: touché, bigot, marriage, democracy, professionalism, globalization, malarkey, schadenfreude, and meme.

Merriam-Webster has been tracking and reporting their Word of the Year since 2003 (democracy). To see how the top lookups from past years compare to the twin picks this year, check out their Word of the Year Archive.

Image courtesy of arminho-paper.