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Unword of the year 2020: Secret revealed - this time two words chosen

2021-01-12T09:29:28.329Z


The bad word of 2020 has been announced. The language-critical campaign is intended to draw attention to inappropriate language use and thus raise awareness. This year there is a novelty.


The bad word of 2020 has been announced.

The language-critical campaign is intended to draw attention to inappropriate language use and thus raise awareness.

This year there is a novelty.

Update from January 12th, 10 am

: The foreboding of the year 2020 is certain - this year the choice has been made for the first time on an "unsound pair":

  • Repatriation sponsorships

  • Corona dictatorship

A jury decided on the pair of bad words based on suggestions from submissions.

"With this double choice, the jury also wants to make it clear again that the" bad word choice "is by no means to be understood as an attempt at censorship, as it was occasionally assumed, but as an occasion for discussion about public use of language and its consequences for social coexistence", says it in the press release.

Unword of the year 2020 - The jury's justification in full

"With"

return sponsorships

"(41 times proposed) a new mechanism of migration policy was designated by the EU Commission in September 2020: The EU states that refuse to accept refugees are supposed to do justice to their" solidarity "with the other members of the EU that they take responsibility for the deportation of rejected asylum seekers.

The jury regards this as “repatriation sponsorships” as cynical and euphemistic: The originally Christian, positive term sponsorship stands for the assumption of responsibility and support in the interests of those in need.

In the composition with the word "repatriation", which is also used euphemistically for "deportation", it is suggested that "deportation is a good human act" (quote from a submission). 

The word “

Corona dictatorship

” (suggested 21 times) has been used by the self-proclaimed “lateral thinker” movement, and in particular by its right-wing extremist propagandists, since the beginning of the public discourse on how to deal with the pandemic in order to discredit government policy measures to contain the pandemic .

That the term is used on demonstrations that - unlike in authoritarian systems!

- are expressly allowed is in itself a contradiction in terms. In addition, the expression belittles actual dictatorships and mocks the people who turn against the dictators there and have to face imprisonment and torture or even death or have to flee.

This appears all the more problematic as the catchphrase is often used by those who - as it says in one of the submissions - "aim even and partly quite openly at the abolition of civil liberties and the constitution that represents them".

The expression also makes it more difficult to openly and constructively discuss legitimate doubts about individual measures to contain the pandemic. "

First report from January 12, 2021

Darmstadt - A jury of linguists announced the

unword of 2020

in Darmstadt on Tuesday 

.

As part of the nationwide much-noticed action,

inhuman

or

inappropriate terms have been

selected

from the jury's point of view since 1991

.

This is intended to

draw attention

to “

undifferentiated

,

veiling

or

defamatory public use of language

”.

Because of the corona pandemic, there will be no press conference this year.

Words are reprimanded with the bad word of 2020.

Pure swear words don't count.

Proposals must meet one of the criteria.

The jury is not based on the number of suggestions for a single word.

Unword of the year: The principles of action

  • because they violate the

    principle of human

    dignity (e.g. chatter of the moment for cases of abuse in the Catholic Church),

  • because they violate the

    principles of democracy

    (e.g. no alternative as an attitude / position in the political discussion in order to avoid such and evade the obligation to argue),

  • because they

    discriminate against

    individual

    social groups

    (e.g. through inadequate simplification or blanket condemnation, such as affluent garbage as a paraphrase for people who are unwilling to work or people who are unable to work),

  • because they are

    euphemistic, veiled or even misleading

    (e.g. voluntary departure as an official term for the only partially or not at all voluntary return of asylum seekers to their home countries from detention centers).

Unword of the year 2020 - what follows the term “climate hysteria”?

Last year the term “

climate hysteria

” was chosen as the bad word of the year.

According to the jury, the word would defame climate protection efforts and the climate protection movement and discredit debates.

The term had been used repeatedly in the political debate, especially by AfD politicians.

In addition to “climate hysteria”, the jury also criticized the terms “population change” and “ethical wall”.

"Isolation", "Systemling", "Wirrologie" or "Fluchen" were received, among other things, according to the jury on the subject of the corona pandemic.

Most frequently, however, “

systemically important

” (180) and “lateral thinker” (116) were suggested for the topic of 2020 that would dominate almost everything.

But there were also suggestions from other subject areas.

In connection with migration, for example, “deportation sponsorship”, “anchor children” or “protection against migration” have been suggested.

By the way:

A term

that everyone knows was chosen

for the

word of the year 2020

.

(AFP, dpa, ml)

Source: merkur

All news articles on 2021-01-12

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