Oxford Word of the Year

The Oxford Word of the Year is an expression or a word that attracted a lot of interest in the preceding year. It is chosen by Oxford Languages. For 2020, it had chosen a series of words in a report, titled “Words of an Unprecedented Year”, that are COVID-19 related- such as social distancing, lockdown, shelter-in-place and also other words and expressions like Black Lives Matter and cancel culture. Declaration of a word as ‘Oxford Word of the Year’ does not guarantee its inclusion in the Oxford dictionary.