A Guide to New Words from the Age of Corona (No, Not the Beer)
In the time of COVID-19, circa spring 2020, society has come up with some words that help explain the seriousness and the lunacy of this moment. As a writer, I am fascinated by this cropping up of new words in the English language and how they are used to express our shared humanity. Like UrbanDictionary, I wanted to capture these words. They are organized here in no particular order.
Coronabod – What you look like after weeks of sheltering-in-place and baking every day.
Related: COVID15
Covidiot – Did you cut a hole in your mask to make it easier to breathe? Did you sneeze on your neighbor? Do you think using bleach on or in your body is a good idea? You get the gist…
Doom scrolling – Finding it impossible to stop checking Twitter and other social feeds; to keep reading all of the bad news about COVID, especially at night. The Anglo Saxon origins of “doom” make a great backstory.
Related: quarantweets – Posts to keep things exciting or just to document the day while sheltering-in-place or quarantining.
Corona-shaming – Making someone feel bad about doing something we once thought of as normal, like taking your kids to the park or going for a walk without a mask.
Zumping – Getting dumped via ZOOM (still better than getting dumped via txt).
Boozezoom – Getting together with friends and family to drink and socialize on ZOOM.
And as for Normalish, I coined the term just the other day while talking with a friend about the TV show pilot I am going to write, scheduled for release a year from today, about the trials and tribulations of life with kids while sheltering-in-place. I’m a white, suburban mom of two, so it is unlikely to find any traction, right? #justkidding #callme #Ineedajob #normalish
