Cambridge Dictionary has announced its word of the year for 2021, and it probably won’t come as much of a shock.
This year the word is “perseverance”, defined by the dictionary as a “continued effort to do or achieve something, even when this is difficult or takes a long time.” According to a press release sent to Mashable, the word has been looked up 243,000 times globally in 2021.
Perseverance was chosen by the dictionary for a couple of reasons. On the one hand it follows on from their word of the year for 2020, “quarantine”, drawing attention to the continued global struggle brought on by the coronavirus pandemic, not to mention other looming threats like climate change, with has been thrown into even starker relief recently via a huge report from the U.N.’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and speeches and commitments made during COP26.
Collins Dictionary names ‘lockdown’ the word of the year, as if any of us needed a reminder
Meanwhile, the word is also the name of NASA’s Perseverance rover, the little robot which landed on Mars back in February and is currently trundling around the red planet looking for signs of microbial life.
“Just as it takes perseverance to land a rover on Mars, it takes perseverance to face the challenges and disruption to our lives from COVID-19, climate disasters, political instability and conflict,” said Wendalyn Nichols, Cambridge Dictionary publishing manager. “We appreciated that connection, and we think Cambridge Dictionary users do, too.”
Well, we don’t know about appreciated, but perseverance certainly seems fitting.
