Demure, lore, romantasy among Oxford's shortlist for 2024 word of the year. Cast your vote

Oxford University Press has released its shortlist for the 2024 word of the year.

Every year, the publisher of the multivolume Oxford English Dictionary taps their lexicographers to analyze the English language and "summarize words and expressions that have reflected our world during the last 12 months."

"We analyze data and trends to identify new and emerging words and examine the shifts in how more established words are being used," Oxford said in a statement. "The team also consider suggestions from our colleagues and the public, and look back at the world’s most influential moments of the year to inform their shortlist — culminating in a word or expression of cultural significance."

Last year, Oxford named "rizz" as its word of the year, highlighting the popularity of a term used by Generation Z to describe someone’s ability to attract or seduce another person. It topped “Swiftie” (an enthusiastic fan of Taylor Swift), “situationship” (an informal romantic or sexual relationship) and “prompt” (an instruction given to an artificial intelligence program).

The winning word is decided by a public vote. Voting for the 2024 word of the year is now open. You can cast your vote here.

This year's words reflect the trends that have shaped 2024.

Here are the six finalists for Oxford's word of the year 2024:

1. Brain rot (n.): Supposed deterioration of a person's mental or intellectual state, especially viewed as the result of overconsumption of material (now particularly online content) considered to be trivial or unchallenging. Also: something characterized as likely to lead to such deterioration.

Oxford says it's on the short list because it has been widely used on social media this year, particularly on TikTok, increasing by 250% in frequency per million words between 2023 and 2024.

2. Demure (adj.): Of a person: reserved or restrained in appearance or behavior. Of clothing: not showy, ostentatious, or overly revealing.

Oxford says it's on the short list because of its increase in usage starting in August 2024 after Jools Lebron used the word in a short viral video on TikTok. Lebron's use of the phrase "very demure, very mindful" to refer to her clothing and makeup choices was picked up and widely repeated by users on the platform and beyond.

3. Dynamic pricing (n.): The practice of varying the price for a product or service to reflect changing market conditions; in particular, the charging of a higher price at a time of greater demand.

While dynamic pricing is not a new phenomenon, Oxford says its on the short list because of the heightened awareness of — and controversy over — its use, particularly for concert tickets. Fans saw dynamic pricing setting very high costs for tickets to see their favorite artists.

4. Lore (n.): A body of (supposed) facts, background information, and anecdotes relating to someone or something, regarded as knowledge required for full understanding or informed discussion of the subject in question.

Oxford says its also seen a rise in the use of the word and in different ways and contexts. People might now talk about the "lore" surrounding a celebrity, film character or even themselves. Social media has seen the emergence of new kinds of celebrities and highly-engaged fandoms.

5. Romantasy (n.): A genre of fiction combining elements of romantic fiction and fantasy, typically featuring themes of magic, the supernatural, or adventure alongside a central romantic storyline.

Oxford says genre "romantasy" has become much more mainstream in the last year, thanks to TikTok where people discuss and recommend books in a community known as BookTok. The publisher poses that the increased appetite for romantasy genre content could be linked to a want for escapism to counteract widespread political and economic gloom.

6. Slop (n.): Art, writing, or other content generated using artificial intelligence, shared and distributed online in an indiscriminate or intrusive way, and characterized as being of low quality, inauthentic, or inaccurate.

Oxford says it has seen a 332% increase in the use of "slop" in reference to describing low-quality and inaccurate AI-generated material produced using large language model (LLM), particularly in internet search results and/or social media.