I’m late to the game talking about this, but I’ve noticed that a lot of people seem to be upset that the Oxford English Dictionary will now include OMG and LOL, as of the March 24 update. This adds insult to injury, I suppose, after previous additions included IMHO, BFF and TMI. (To translate, that’s oh my God/gosh/goodness, laughing out loud, in my humble opinion, best friends forever and too much information.)
I think it’s pretty silly to be upset. The dictionary is updated four times a year to reflect current language, which changes all the time. As the editors note, some of these initialisms (abbreviations consisting of the initial letters of a name or expression) “are strongly associated with the language of electronic communications (email, texting, social networks, blogs, and so on).” They’re easy to tap out on a keyboard or smartphone, and they can be used to “signal an informal, gossipy mode of expression.” Like it or not, including them makes sense.
The site notes that most of us think these are recent coinages, but OED’s research shows surprising historical use: OMG was first found in a personal letter from 1917, and FYI goes back to a memo in 1941.
OMG!
1917? OMG indeed.
I find a useful one to be PITA…pain in the you-know.
Donna, I know – 1917? A forward-thinking person for sure. Gloria, PITA is a good one! Maybe it will make the next update, or is it already there? I will have to check!
WTF is my favourite. (Would that be: With the Family? Wednesday, Thursday, Friday? What the …?)
Sue, I didn’t know that WTF had made it in! But there it is, noted as “vulgar.” 🙂
I discovered OED has a blog, which contained this interesting post on how a new word enters an Oxford dictionary:
http://oxforddictionaries.com/page/newwordflowchart/how-a-new-word-enters-an-oxford-dictionary
Trust me to find the vulgar one. ;o)
and PS, I find OMG even more vulgar than my fave. (Probably only trumped by OMFG.) Just goes to show, there’s something for everyone.
Speaking of vulgar, you might find amusing the OED’s blog post on how often people look up the F-word:
http://oxforddictionaries.com/page/fword/the-fword-how-often-do-people-really-look-it-up-