Leveraging the Words of the Year initiatives

Word of the Year initiatives have raised increasing attention around the globe. For Applied Linguists, the phenomenon is of twofold interest: First, empirically grounded selection processes of socially predominant words require sophisticated analytical tools from discourse and corpus analysis. Second, media coverage of every Word of the Year is an opportunity to raise both language awareness and the visibility of Applied Linguistics in society at large. These are two good reasons for a new AILA workgroup to explore ideas of collaborating with Word of the Year initiatives. To join the workgroup please contact: Word of the Year