Greetings,
my dear poets and storytellers. I hope December (and
January, too)
brings us all sorts of wonders we need and many (wonderful
things)
we didn’t even know we wanted. We all need… something good to soothe our memories
of 2020, don’t you think? So much happened this year, and most of it not great
at all. Still, there has been a silver-lining or three: strangers spreading kindness, previously buried social issues coming into the light, and the Word
of the Year going from 1 word to more than 40.
All
right, so the last item in my listed trio might not truly make the
silver-lining category for some of us, since more isn’t always better. But it certainly
is different. The Word of the Year is most often just one word, or a phrase, or
in the case of 2015 a laughing emoji 😂. Not in 2020. This year produced 47 words (in a 38-page report that can be downloaded HERE).
Today’s
prompt was inspired by the “Words of an Unprecedented Year”. On our preview of
this prompt, shared on our last Writers’ Pantry, I offered the words Allyship, Blursday,
Covidiot, Doomscrolling, and Virtue-signalling, and then invited everyone to write new
poetry or prose where the central theme revolves around one or more of the given
words. But here is a longer list for you to choose from (all these words appear in this year’s report):
Allyship, n. active support for the rights of a minority or
marginalized group without being a member of it.
Anthropause, n. a global slowdown of travel and other human activities.
Blursday, n. a day
of the week that is indistinguishable from any other.
Blended learning, n. a style of education in which students learn via
electronic and online media as well as traditional face-to-face teaching.
Cancel culture, n. a culture in which there is a widespread practice of
publicly rejecting or withdrawing support from people or things regarded as
promoting socially unacceptable views.
Covidiot, n. a
person who disobeys guidelines designed to prevent the spread of Covid-19.
Doomscrolling, n. the
action of compulsively scrolling through social media or news feeds which
relate bad news.
Hygiene theatre, n. cleaning practices which give the illusion of sanitization
without reducing the risk of infection.
Infodemic, n. a proliferation of diverse, often unsubstantiated
information relating to a crisis, controversy, or event, which disseminates
rapidly and uncontrollably through news, online, and social media, and is
regarded as intensifying public speculation or anxiety.
Moonshot, n. an extremely ambitious and innovative project.
Virtue-signalling, n. the
public expression of opinions or sentiments intended to demonstrate one’s good
character or the moral correctness of one’s position on a particular issue.
Wokeness, n. the fact or quality of being alert to racial or social
discrimination and injustice.
Workation, n. a working vacation; a holiday during which one also
works.
Please, choose one or as many
of these words as you wish, and write new poetry or prose with a central theme
inspired by your choice(s). This prompt will stay open
for a week. One link per participant, please. If you choose to write prose, the
word count should be 369 words or fewer. Let us create… with words!
If we wanted a word to describe the year, yes 'unprecedented' is about right! 2020 took us into uncharted territory ... and perhaps poets and storytellers have always been the first to chart human experience.
ReplyDeleteI completely agree, artists are quite good at being the first historians of their times.
DeleteSooo Clever!! All these neat "wanabe Words" to chose from. I fell in love with "Blursday",
ReplyDeleteOff to sleep again after I read a but. Thank You, Magaly.
..
There's something about Blursday! LOL. A lot of us have chosen that one.
DeleteWannabe? If so, I think they've gone beyond that since most of them have made it into the dictionary. And yes, Jim, like Rosemary said, there's definitely something about Blursday!
DeleteDecided to give an American sentence a whirl for this prompt. I'm pretty happy with it.
ReplyDeleteI read your American sentence, and wow! It's magnificent. And true, too.
DeleteI love the word "blursday," but when I sat down to write on that I ended up with well over 1,000 words! "Blended learning" is an odd one for them to include. That's nothing new. Homeschool families have been doing that for years, decades even at this point!
ReplyDeleteI don't think that that they include words because they are new or just in use. Many of the words and phrases are there because their usage has increased significantly, I believe, and/or they are being used differently. "Take-a-knee" is a good example of this. It's not a new word at all, but these days it can't be said without conjuring images of the Black Lives Matter movement.
DeleteA safe and Happy Wednesday to all
ReplyDeleteMuch💜love
Thank you, Gillena. Happiest week to you.
DeleteI was going to write something else for this, but it was not happening. Good prompt, though!
ReplyDeleteWe give what we have. We can't do more than that. So glad you liked the prompt. ;-)
DeleteIt has been TOO long since I have written poetry and visited all of you. I have missed you.
ReplyDeleteMissed you too, babe!
DeleteSooo... we weren't supposed to use the word but allude to it? (sorry, I seem to often comprehend the intent of prompts after the fact.
ReplyDeleteI think either is fine! We were to be inspired by it, which doesn't preclude actually using it.
DeleteWhat Rosemary said!
Delete