Oxford Dictionaries names 'selfie' as word of the year

The word "selfie" has been declared the Oxford dictionary word of the year for 2013.

The term selfie refers to a self-taken photograph, usually taken via smartphone or laptop, but can also be taken by camera. These photos are often posted to social media sites such as Instagram, Twitter and Facebook.

Fox News reports that the usage of the word "selfie" has increased immensely in the past year. The term was added to the online version of the Oxford dictionary back in August, and is even being considered for entry in the traditional Oxford English Dictionary.

"Using the Oxford Dictionaries language research program, which collects around 150 million words of current English in use each month, we can see a phenomenal upward trend in the use of 'selfie' in 2013,and this helped to cement its selection as Word of the Year,” Oxford Dictionaries Editorial Director Judy Pearsall said, according to Today News. In fact, the usage of the term increased an estimated 17,000 percent from past years.

This year, "selfie" beat out other new terms such as "twerk," a dance move made popular by pop star Miley Cyrus, "showrooming," when someone shops around in stores to look at a product before buying it online and "binge-watch," which describes the practice of watching several TV show episodes in succession for a long span of time.

Pearsall claims that "selfie" was first used in 2002 on an Australian online forum, but said that "usage wasn't widespread until around 2012, when `selfie' was being used commonly in mainstream media."

Previous winners for word of the year include last year's "GIF," 2009's "unfriend," 2008's "credit crunch," 2007's "carbon footprint" and 2005's "Sodoku." A team of lexicographers, dictionary consultants and editorial, marketing and publicity staff at Oxford Dictionaries work together to chose the word of the year each year using software and online trends.

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