Words of the Year

Every year, a group of Russian word-lovers, headed by linguist Mikhail Epstein, vote on the word – or rather words – of the year. Beside the value for translators and students, who need to know how Russian is expanding and changing, it’s a great snapshot of the year gone by. And it’s usually really funny. Or very sad. Or both.

The first impression of the 2017 nomination list: the preponderance of Englishisms, Americanisms, Trumpisms, and AboutTrumpisms. In the Word of the Year category, we find баттл (a battle, but of rap musicians); биткоин (bitcoin); and блокчейн (blockchain). We also find хайп (hype) and the Russified хайпожор (hypeglutton, from hype and жрать — to chow down), a person using company logos and social media to hype himself.

This sort of thing involves вирусный контент (viral content), another nominated phrase.  And while we’re down with a virus, let’s mention токсичный (toxic), which has become almost a parasitical word in 2017. There are токсические люди, мужья, коллеги, начальники и клиенты (toxic people, husbands, co-workers, bosses and clients). If _you spot one, run.

And then there is a bouquet of D-words: Димон (snarky nickname for Dmitry Medvedev); домарест (домашний арест — house arrest); домогательство (harassment); and допинг (doping).

My vote for word of the year goes to фейк (fake). Even though it’s been around for a while, 2017 was definitely the year of the фейк, especially фейковые новости (fake news). Russian has also come up with the calque постистина (post-truth) to describe the new era.

For best expression of the year category, I’m torn between фабрика троллей (troll factory), that place in St. Petersburg where English-speaking social media commentators create havoc and “Он вам не Димон” (He’s not Dimon to You), the name of opposition leader Alexei Navalny’s film about corruption in the government of Dmitry Medvedev. The phrase was first uttered by Medvedev’s press secretary, Natalya Timakova, in 2013, as she scolded journalists for their lack of respect for the Prime Minister. Didn’t work.

The category of “антиязык” (anti-language, i.e., hate speech) is particularly rich this year, although to be honest, the entire 2017 list seems to be filled with remarkably nasty phrases. You might be puzzled by the inclusion of “Можем повторить!” (We can do it again!), which appeared during the May celebrations of the end of ВОВ (Великая Отечественная война – Great Patriotic War, the part of WWII the Soviets fought). In the context of the aggressive state media, Можем повторить! sounded like more like a threat than an assertion of self-defense.

My favorite in this category is “Тьфу на тебя” (Phooey on you!), what billionaire Alisher Usmanov said to Alexei Navalny in a video address while pursuing a case of slander against him. It is notable not only because it is so rude, and not only because Usmanov calls Navalny ты (the familiar form of you), but because of the flat, emotionless monotone that he used to utter these otherwise inflammatory words.

The final category is authorial neologisms – where the clever language geeks tracking all these changes get to break loose and come up with their own new words and phrases. Here my vote goes to the гоп words. Гопник is a low-class, ignorant, thuggish lout; гопота is the plural form. Someone decided that the thugs became upwardly mobile and came up with гоп-политика (cretin-politics); гоп-журналистика (cretin-journalism); гоп-религия (cretin-religion) and гоп-государство (cretin-government), all defined as “агрессивно-куражистый стиль поведения, нарушающий нормы этики и профессионализма” (in-your-face aggressive behavior that violates the norms of ethics and professionalism).

Wait – which country are we talking about?