A word from the Simpsons has officially made it into the Merriam-Webster Dictionary. From now on, ’embiggen’ is a word, though it will likely remain underlined in red on any research paper or report or any typed Word document that it graces until the program is changed. Right now it’s not clear whether to be worried about such a thing as this or to be more accepting since the dictionary is bound to expand as the years go by and more and more words begin to change or become altered as needed to accommodate those that want to use them in different ways. It seems a little elitist and even snobbish to say that things can’t change in the dictionary, but it also seems kind of nonsensical to throw out the rules of a language just because they don’t fit the parameters of the current era.
Of course since we’re talking about English those rules are fairly loose to begin with. After all the term ‘bling-bling’ was added to the dictionary, as were jiggy, phat, and even breakbeat. So who’s to say that embiggen shouldn’t be as well? A lot of people will no doubt shake their heads at this since the Simpsons have been at the base of a lot of talk at this point, from this to their supposedly clairvoyant manner that has been seen in current events. Of all the shows that have made predictions about and changes in our society, the Simpsons has been the one that seems to have been on the ball about most of it. While the show is purely fiction and isn’t meant for anything more than entertainment it still seems capable of dictating just how American society is going and in what direction. That might seem bit nuts to think about but when you take into consideration that the dictionary, a guide to American English, is being altered in any way by an adult cartoon, then it’s time to see the truth. The Simpsons are an integral part of American culture, and as a result have become a way of life.
Well, kind of, sort of, but not in a sense that they’ll be telling us how to live at least. The show has been on the ball about certain things and has certainly been seen as kind of spooky when it comes to predicting what will happen. But this seems like more of a silly push to create a word that already has a great deal of similarity with a lot of other words in the English language that mean the same thing. The only reason to tack on another word like this would be to increase the likelihood that it might be used in some obscure way after the newness has rubbed off. Watch, you’ll probably see people begin to use it continuously for a while and then forget about it, just like so many other trends that come along.
The only bad part is that you know that this is only the beginning.
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