2021 News Words Super Quiz

The word ‘Capitol’ originates in Latin and refers to Jupiter Optimus Maximus’s Temple on Capitoline Hill, Rome‘s seven hills. Thomas Jefferson insisted on naming the American legislative building ‘Capitol’ rather than ‘Congress House.’

The 2021 Capitol Riots

Rioters supporting former President Donald Trump stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, occupying parts of the building for several hours. The riots, incited by Trump, disrupted a joint session of Congress to certify Joe Biden’s  2020 election win.

The word inauguration stems from the Latin augur –  the rituals of ancient Roman priests interpreting if it was the gods’ will for a public official to assume office.

According to Oxford Languages, sedition is a conduct or speech inciting people to rebel against the state’s authority. The US sedition act defines it as ‘false, scandalous, or malicious writing’ against the government.

Sedition indictments 2022

A federal grand jury on June 6, 2022, charged five members of the Proud Boys with seditious conspiracy for their actions before and during the US Capitol riots on Jan. 6, 2021.

Red tides are the discoloration of the sea surface caused by harmful algal blooms.

The Gruesome Florida Red Tide

A harmful “red tide” was killing hundreds of tons of fish in Florida in the summer of 2021. At least 600 tons of marine life have been washed up on the shores of southern Florida in late June 2021. The media also reported waves of dead fish in South Tampa and St Petersburg. Environmental activists said industrial waste poured into Tampa Bay in March 2021 has worsened the annual algae bloom, killing hundreds of tons of fish and ruining Florida’s waters.

Montjoie Saint Denis! was the battle cry and motto of the Kingdom of France. The French first used it during the reign of Louis VI of France.

“Montjoie Saint Denis!” News fact:

On Tuesday, June 8, 2021, French President Emmanuel Macron was slapped in the face by a man who chanted “Montjoie Saint Denis!”. The term is popular with the French right political wing. French legislator Éric Coquerel claimed that the perpetrators of a 2018 pie attack against him had also chanted the phrase.

LIBOR stands for London Interbank Offered Rate. It is the primary benchmark, along with Euribor, for short-term interest rates around the world.

Libor 2021 fact:

On Friday, Mars 5, 2021, Britain’s Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) called a formal end to nearly all Libor rates on December 31. The Libor is being replaced by rates compiled by central banks after lenders were fined billions of dollars for trying to rig what was once “the world’s most important number” used for pricing home loans and credit cards across the world

In an interview with CBS’s Face the Nation on Sunday, Feb. 14, 2021, Boris Johnson characterized Donald Trump’s impeachment and acquittal on a charge of inciting insurrection against his government as “toings and froings and all the kerfuffle.” In British English, toings and froings is a state of going back and forth, while kerfuffle is a fuss, usually made by conflicting opinions.

Merriam-webster dictionary defines imbecilic as something very stupid or foolish. We should note that the terms imbecile, idiot, and moron were formerly used as technical descriptors in medical and legal contexts. These words are no longer in use in neither and are now considered offensive.

Did former British PM Tony Blair refer to US President Joe Biden as imbecilic?

In the context of the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan as soon as US forces were preparing to leave, Tony Blair accused US President Joe Biden of being “in obedience to an imbecilic political slogan about ending ‘the forever wars.’”

Although it is widely assumed that “chav” is an abbreviation for “council housed and violent,” it probably originated from the Romani word “Chavi,” meaning “child.” In British slang, “chav” is a slur meant for a young working-class person, stereotypically known for aggressively loutish behavior, flashy jewelry, and athletic tracksuits. In recent years the word saw a revival in the fashion world, even more so as an Instagram or Tik-Tok challenge trend. Throughout the 2020-2021 lockdowns, social influencers who have lounged around their houses in matching loungewear sets replaced the word “lazy” with “chav” on their ads.

Britain lifted most of its remaining COVID-19 restrictions on July 19 in what has been dubbed “Freedom Day.” Freedom from face masks, that is.

The word “Amazon,” meaning “warrior,” is likely rooted in the Persian (Iranian) language.

Bonus Fact

While the story of a race of warrior women first appeared in Greek mythology, excavations across the north and east of the Black Sea region have revealed that warrior women like the Amazons existed in real life. Experts have identified depictions of the women in battle with Greek men on vases and other ceramics dressed in Persian-style clothing. 

Conservatorship is a legal concept in the United States in which a judge appoints a guardian to manage the financial affairs or daily life of another. Like Britney Spears, who in recent years is trying to end her father’s conservatorship.

Britney Spears’s Conservatorship 2021 Facts

A New York Timed documentary, Framing Britney Spears, explored the star’s conservatorship since 2008. Following its launch on Friday, Feb. 5, 2021, Bet Midler and Sarah Jessica Parker tweeted #FreeBritney. Miley Cyrus shouted: “We love Britney!” during her pre-Super Bowl performance on Sunday evening. On Sep. 29, 2021, a judge approved Spears’s petition to suspend her father, Jamie Spears, as her conservator. Watch Framing Britney Spears. 

While according to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, blackfishing is Scottish for the illegal catching of blackfish, the term gained a very different meaning in recent years. It describes the behavior of people pretending to have darker skin on social media – through hair, makeup, and accessories, to blur their actual racial background.

Blackfishing News Fact:

Rapper Iggy Azalea met accusations of Blackfishing in her latest music video for “I Am the Stripclub.” Azalea addressed the issue on her Twitter account, explaining, “I’m the same color as I always am, just in a dimly lit room with red lights. It’s the same makeup from every other part of the video, just with a Smokey eye and different wig.”

Oxford Languages define colorism as prejudice or discrimination against individuals with a dark skin tone, typically among people of the same ethnic or racial group.

Colorism in the News:

“In the Heights,” a big-budget film based on the musical created by Lin-Manuel Miranda, was called out for its short supply of dark-skinned, Black Latinos in leading roles. Miranda, best known as the creator of the Broadway musical “Hamilton” and a longtime champion of including Latinos in the arts, recognized his own short-sightedness in addressing colorism and issued an apology.

The keffiyeh is a traditional Arabian headdress, which originated in Yemen and is worn throughout the Middle East region. The black and white chequered Palestinian keffiyeh became a symbol of Palestinian nationalism during the Arab Revolt of the 1930s.

Louis Vuitton’s Keffiyeh Trouble:

Screenshot: Diet Prada ™ on Instagram

Louis Vuitton is facing Pro-Palestinian backlash for selling a blue and white “monogram keffiyeh stole” for $705, saying on its website that it’s “inspired by the classic Keffiyeh and enriched with House signatures.” The product has since been removed from the website. Blue and white are the flag colors of Israel (and also Greece, Scotland, Argentina, and Finland).

Oman is a Sultanate on the eastern edge of the Arabian Peninsula (not confused with Jordan’s capital Amman, Ukraine’s Uman, and Iran’s Omman).

News Fact:

Oman was already facing economic trouble with tens of billions of dollars of outstanding debts and difficulty finding enough work for its young people when the coronavirus pandemic hit, further depressing growth in this nation of 4.5 million people. Protests over mass layoffs and Oman’s poor economy spread Tuesday, May 25, 2021,  to cities across the sultanate, a decade after its Arab Spring protests.

Apple introduced AirTags, a coin-like personal location device, on Tuesday, April 20, 2021. They can be placed on personal possessions and then tracked with the Find My app (formerly Find My iPhone) on iPhones, iPads, or Macs.

Do AirTags beep?

Like some other similar products, AirTags also emit noise to make them easier to find. Apple users can also lift their phone cameras and see their AirTags’ locations accurately in real physical space on the screen.

In essence, NFT art is a digital art piece with a unique sellable identity. NFT stands for non-fungible tokens. These tokens are crypto keys, much like crypto coins (such as Bitcoin), only not mutually interchangeable, thus enabling digital artists to auction “original” pieces, as these individual digital copies are now NFT unique.

What is the world’s first virtual NFT artwork sold at a significant auction?

On Thursday, Mar 11, 2021, Christie’s saw the world’s first virtual Non-Fungible Token (NFT) artwork sold at a major auction house, closing at a whopping $69,346,250 during an online auction. The record-breaking artwork by creator Mike Winkelmann (AKA Beeple) is named “Everydays: The First 5000 Days” and includes 5,000 images that took 13 years to make.

Simply put, Metaverse is a collection of Virtual 3D meeting spaces. It’s been one of the most prominent tech buzz terms of 2021. Epic Games directed fundraising to build Fortnite into a metaverse; Microsoft presented Mesh, a mixed reality software enabling virtual presence through Microsoft devices. South Korea announced the creation of a national metaverse alliance to build a unified national VR and AR platform.

What’s Facebook’s Metaverse?

In 2021 Facebook announced it attempts to develop a Metaverse. On Oct. 18, Facebook announced plans to create 10,000 jobs in the European Union over the next five years to help build the virtual environment. US tech news website The Verge broke the news that Facebook’s founder and chief executive, Mark Zuckerberg, is preparing to change the name of the company at the company’s annual Connect conference on Oct. 28, 2021, to match its new ambitions. The new name chosen for the company is Meta.

Dictionary.com defines allyship as the role of a person who actively works to include a marginalized group in all areas of society, not as a group member but in solidarity. The online dictionary named allyship word of the year 2021.

Wasn’t there a different definition of the word?

The dictionary also keeps the more traditional definition of allyship as the relationship of persons, groups, or nations cooperating.