Slang: 'Selfie' or 'Unselfie'? 'Fularious', 'Interesting' or 'Meh'?

It's true! That's Pope Francis' selfie.
Image from Telegraph

I have always said, we don't need Oxford or Cambridge when it comes to slang. However, they always get to the news when they do add an internet word into their dictionary, even if it is just the online version they are adding... like the netizens don't already know them.

Last month, Oxford Dictionary made "selfie" the word of the year, beating 'twerk' and other increasing popular words such as 'showrooming', 'binge watch', 'bitcoin' and 'schmeat'.

For those of you who are still unfamiliar with the above words,

selfie -- (n)[C] once known as a self-portrait taken with a smartphone
twerk -- (vb)[I or T] once known as to perform a butt dance or booty dance, a word supposedly first seen in 1889 and peaked in 1975.

showrooming -- (n)[U] The act of going to retail stores like Best Buy and Walmart to check out certain products and then once satisfied with the look and feel, purchasing the item online on Amazon or other retailers.
binge watch -- (vb)[T] once known as TV series watching marathon, modified from binge eat.
bitcoin -- (n)[C or U] an open source peer-to-peer payment network and digital currency introduced in 2009 by pseudonymous developer "Satoshi Nakamoto".
schmeat -- (n)[U] the synthetic meat grown from a soup of antibiotics and foetal bovine serum.

A slab of schmeat
Image from The Guardian

For those of you who have already heard of these terms, how about learning some I have come across when reading online articles?

Image from mashable

You know I like Tesla Model S very much, and as I was reading an excellent article about the company, I found a cute little one,

"Tesla isn't just a car, or even a brand in the sense that nearly every other for-profit company is a brand ... It's actually the ultimate mission -- the mother of all missions -- and that is, to wean our planet off its addiction to fossil fuels, helping to create a long-term sustainable society; one that our grandchildren can enjoy and be proud of.

No automaker that chooses to concurrently produce internal combustion engine vehicles, can ever be authenticated as having a 'mission' that is as purposeful and meaningful as Tesla's is. This mission -- in combination with a brilliant product -- is the reason everyone wants to own a Teslaand the reason everyone wants to work for Tesla. It is creating an unfathomably powerful brand that makes us say "meh" to BMWs, Aston Martins and even Ferraris. We subliminally ask owners of these vehicles: "what good are you doing for the world?", and then smugly laugh to ourselves, because a 10 year old company is making cleaner, more high-tech, and better performing cars than companies that have had generations to perfect their products."

So what is meh?

meh -- (exclamation) indifference; to be used when one simply does not care.

I guess I will use this really often from now on. It's short and sweet! It's 'fularious' or not?

fularious -- (adj) 

Image from Urbandictionary

Do you know what is "unselfie"?
Image from PetaPixel

Can't let selfie steal the show, right?

unselfie -- (n)[C] a self-portrait which doesn't show your entire face.

Do you think this is 'interesting'?

interesting -- (adj)

Image from Urbandictionary

Slang from Internet is and will continue to play a key role in the expansion of all languages, particularly English and Chinese, due to massive number of users globally. Keep reading and you will learn what tuhao means!

Wanna create your own slang? Yes, you can! I did! Maybe very soon you will see 'typhooliday' on Urbandictonary just like millions of others!

Want to understand how the modern English language has evolved? You are recommended to take a look at this article too! Urban Dictionary, Wordnik track evolution of language as words change, emerge @ Poynter.

Resources:
Selfie the 'Word of the Year' and on course for the Oxford English Dictionary @ Telegraph
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/howaboutthat/10457525/Selfie-the-Word-of-the-Year-and-on-course-for-the-Oxford-English-Dictionary.html

Cameron Diaz shaking her ass booty dance @ YouTube
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l9UqVxZ6b0M

Instagrammers Boosting Aid for Typhoon Victims With 'Unselfies' @ PetaPixel
http://petapixel.com/2013/11/18/instagrammers-boost-aid-typhoon-victims-unselfies/

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=selfie
http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=twerk
https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=twerk&year_start=1800&year_end=2008&corpus=15&smoothing=3&share=&direct_url=t1%3B%2Ctwerk%3B%2Cc0
http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=showrooming

Medical Vocabulary: Medical Words from House M.D.@ Locky's English Playground
http://lockyep.blogspot.com/2012/07/medical-vocabulary-medical-words-from.html

Bitcoin @ Wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bitcoin

Schmeat: a tasty-sounding word, but what does it mean? | Books @ The Guardian
http://www.theguardian.com/books/shortcuts/2013/nov/19/schmeat-oxford-dictionaries-word-of-the-year-synthetic-meat-sheet

Tesla Brand Is Crown Jewel To Big Automakers @ Seeking Alpha
http://seekingalpha.com/article/1885311-tesla-brand-is-crown-jewel-to-big-automakers?source=yahoo

Meh @ Urbandictionary
http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=meh

We Said "meh" @ YouTube
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LCcZqcPOlNM

Urban Dictionary: Six Million Words You Won’t Find in Webster’s @ Information Today
http://www.infotoday.com/LinkUp/Urban-Dictionary-Six-Million-Words-You-Wont-Find-in-Websters-76779.shtml

Man Buys $103K Tesla Model S With Bitcoin @ Mashable
http://mashable.com/2013/12/09/tesla-bitcoin/

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=fularious
http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=interesting

Urban Dictionary: 12 Surprisingly Useful, Unknown Words @ HEAVY
http://www.heavy.com/entertainment/2013/02/12-surprisingly-useful-unknown-words-from-urban-dictionary/

Urban Dictionary, Wordnik track evolution of language as words change, emerge @ Poynter.
http://www.poynter.org/latest-news/top-stories/158438/urban-dictionary-wordnik-redefine-meaning-of-meaning/

Culture: "Typhoo-lidays", Britons and Weather @ Locky's English Playground
http://lockyep.blogspot.com/2011/06/culture-typhoo-lidays-britons-and.html
http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=typhooliday