Natural and social phenomena have greatly influenced the 12 terms chosen by the Office québécois de la langue française (OQLF) to summarize the year 2024.
The organization, which unveiled its list on Thursday, indicates that it was inspired by trends and events in the news to make its choices.
These terms all appear in the Linguistic Showcase, which has around a hundred thousand specialized terms and definitions.
Here are the terms for the year 2024, as well as their definition provided by the OQLF
• Total eclipse: Eclipse in which no part of the occulted star is visible.
• Geomagnetic storm: Significant and sudden disturbance of the magnetosphere caused by its interaction with intense or fluctuating solar winds, and which is most often linked to a coronal mass ejection during a solar flare.
• Humanitarian drone: Drone intended to facilitate emergency aid in the event of a disaster or serious crisis affecting a population or a large number of people.
• Multimodal artificial intelligence: Artificial intelligence capable of processing, combining and analyzing several types of data at the same time, so as to more accurately reproduce human cognition and generate analyzes and more nuanced and contextualized responses.
• Voice theft: Fraud which consists of using computer processes to reproduce the voice of a person in order to impersonate them.
• Glass ceiling: Barrier to upward vertical mobility against which certain groups of individuals come up against in accessing the highest positions in a society or business, despite their skills, and which results from social constraints, stereotypes or systemic discrimination.
• Accessory dwelling unit: Secondary housing located on a lot already occupied by a primary residence.
• Overtourism: Phenomenon characterized by the excessive and recurring presence of tourists in a given place, which generally leads to a decline in the quality of life of the local population and negative consequences on the environment.
• Escalotage: Practice which consists of booking a flight whose stopover constitutes the real desired destination and getting off there without the knowledge of the air carrier.
• Molecular recycling: Chemical recycling which consists of carrying out depolymerization of the plastic, purifying the monomers thus obtained, then assembling them again to create polymers with properties identical to those of the original.
• Bissextilian, bissextilian: Person born on February 29.
• Collective bargaining: All discussions between the employer and the union representing the staff with a view to reaching an agreement relating to working conditions which will materialize in the form of a collective agreement.
The OQLF had chosen energy sector, discoverability, limit rate, consumer price index, circular economy, prescribed burning, anchoring day, sponge park, coworking space, repairability, spectator cheating and editor, editor to summarize the year 2023.
