'Extreme weather' makes shortlist for 2024 word of the year
'Extreme weather' saw a jump in online searches this year.
A year of wildfires, hurricanes, and record-breaking heat seems to have influenced the public psyche, with extreme weather landing on dictionary.com's shortlist for the word of the year.
The top spot went to "demure" - popularized by social media memes, and increasing searches for the word.
But extreme weather also saw significant movement in 2024, showing up repeatedly on news outlets and across social media, dictionary.com says.
"The discussion focused on events like Hurricane Helene, the drought in Brazil, flooding in Nigeria, and wildfires in Canada, Portugal, and California," the outlet says.
"The year 2024 saw a continued increase of the term extreme weather in web searches. In January 2024, for example, extreme weather was searched for 70 per cent more than it was in January 2023."
The increasing attention on "extreme weather" highlights its growing relevance in global conversations, driven by a year marked by hurricanes, droughts, floods, and wildfires.
Header image source: CIRA.
