Vol. 10 · Portmanteaus ·Contemporary (2000–) ·2018
Doomscroll
doom scroll
- Meaning
- To compulsively read bad news on a phone or computer.
- Source words
- doom + scroll
- Coined by
- unknown
- Year
- 2018
Background
First appears on Twitter around the 2018 political news cycle; explodes during the 2020 pandemic. Merriam-Webster added it in 2021. A true portmanteau of behaviour: the word encodes both what you're reading and how you're reading it.
Contemporary (2000–)
Faster coinage, faster canonisation. Brexit and podcast both reached the OED within a decade of first use — historically rapid. Social media has made visibility, not invention, the rate-limiting step.
Two words, one coinage.
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