Language · 2

What made Oxford Dictionaries' 2015 Word of the Year announcement historically unprecedented?

Answer

It was the first time a pictograph rather than an actual word was chosen

Oxford Dictionaries broke with its own tradition by selecting the Face with Tears of Joy emoji in 2015, the first time a symbol rather than a word had ever won its annual Word of the Year distinction.

💡 Did you know?

Oxford Dictionary's 2015 'Word of the Year' was 😂 (face with tears of joy)—the first time a pictograph, not a word, won globally.

Other options people guess

  • It was the first time the winner was chosen entirely by public vote
  • It was the first time a foreign-language term won the title
  • It was the first time an acronym was selected as the winner

Topics

  • emoji
  • oxford-dictionaries
  • word-of-the-year
  • linguistics
  • digital-communication

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