AI-klonad, bubbelhoppa and gargasnipe: the full list of new Swedish words for 2023
It was the year when artificial intelligence began to show its full revolutionary potential, bringing a technological flavour to this year's list of new Swedish words.
ChatGPT, the first of the large language models released to the public, came out in the tail end of 2022, but it was only in 2023 that AI started to be used widely, bringing new words like prompta, AI-klonad, cyberresiliens and streamingfarm, into the annual list of new Swedish words published by the Swedish Language Council.
"We could have have had ten different AI-words," Anders Svensseon, managing editor of the council's Språktidningen magazine, told the TT newswire, adding that artificial intelligence could now create "entirely new content, for example text, pictures and music".
This year's list also includes words related to the gang violence which continued to be a problem in the country in 2023, as well as words related to marketing, culture, and health.
Here is the full list of new words:
AI-klonad: An adjective describing a piece of content, such as a work of art or music, or even just a voice, that has been copied using AI technology.
Barbenheimer: A portmanteau title combining Barbie and Oppenheimer, two, very different, cinema blockbusters both released on July 21st, is included in the list (despite arguably being a proper noun).
bubbelhoppa: Literally, to "bubble-hop". To consciously attempt to escape your media or social media bubble by following people or reading publications with different political viewpoints from your own.
cyberresiliens: The Swedish word for "cyber resilience", describing a country or organisation's ability to withstand IT attacks without losing the ability to fulfil their most important functions.
deinfluencing: When an 'influencer' with a lot of followers on social media encourages their followers not to buy a certain product or service.
det svenska tillståndet: Translated into English, it's "the Swedish condition". This describes the situation Sweden faces where gang criminality has a serious impact on society.
dna-pass: A card which includes all the most important genetic information about a person, which can be used in healthcare.
dopaminfasta: This directly translates as "dopamine fast", and describes deliberately avoiding activities which stimulate the release of dopamine in the brain in order to increase the brain's sensitivity and so improve concentration.
dubbelswisha: To pay twice in a row in a massage parlour, with the second payment suspected of being for a sexual service.
evighetskemikalie: "Forever chemicals". This describes synthetic substances such as PFAS which cannot be broken down easily in nature and so persist for long periods in the environment.
exposekonto: Social media accounts created with the intention of publicly shaming individuals in compromising situations.
gargasnipe: This describes a picture of a person, often middle-aged, which is taken in secret and then posted on social media with the aim of ridiculing the person, who is thought to look strange or stupid. The trend of gargasniping originated in Sweden.
generativ AI: A form of artificial intelligence which generates text, images, or other media by learning the patterns and structure of their input training data and then generating new data that has similar characteristics.
grön kolonialism: A phrase which describes the establishment of wind farms or other forms of green industry on land to which indigenous people -- in Sweden, almost always the Sami minority -- have a claim.
hyschpengar: A translation of "hush money", describing payments made to someone, usually by a criminal, to stop them devolving sensitive or incriminating information.
ick: A word taken from the English "icky", which describes behaviour or qualities of a person which another person finds disgusting or offensive.
insynsprincip: The 'transparency principle', which means that private actors in society should give the public some insight into their businesses, although not to the same extent as the freedom of information requirements which apply to public bodies.
klivare: A person who commits crimes in exchange for payments from a criminal network.
korankris: This describes the 'Quran crisis', a difficult political situation caused by political protests, given permission by the police, which involve the burning of the Quran.
krigssponsor: Literally a "war sponsor", this describes companies or individuals who contribute indirectly to a war by operating businesses or buying services from warring nations.
känslighetsläsare: The Swedish translation of a "sensitivity reader". This is a person tasked with reviewing texts to remove potentially objectionable content.
longtermism: This ideology, which has the same name in English, describes the ethical view that positively influencing the long-term future is a key moral priority of our time. The ideology has come to prominence after it emerged that Tesla founder Elon Musk is an adherent, among other Silicon Valley figures.
menstrosa: Literally 'period knickers', these describe the newly released type of women's underwear which has an inbuilt, high-absorption material which can soak up blood released during menstruation.
multilojal: A marketing term describing customers who are members or regular customers of several competing chains, hoping to get the best prices and take advantage of special discounts.
nepo baby: This term, which is the same in English, describes a person who is given advantages in their career by their influential parents.
neurodiversitet: The Swedish translation of "neurodiversity", describes a new way of seeing psychiatric conditions such as autism and ADHD less as disorders and more as part of a spectrum of diverse neurological types.
prompta: A new Swedish word based on the English word "to prompt", which describes the skill of learning how to instruct an artificial intelligence program in order to get the best results.
relationism: This word, also directly taken from English, along with "positionism", describes a theory or strategy of football playing which takes as its starting point the ball's position on the pitch rather than the area which needs to be covered.
situationship: This word, taken directly from English, describes a long-term relationship somewhere between a romantic one and a friendship.
snikflation: This is the Swedish translation of "sneakflation", a portmanteau word describing the impact of companies taking advantage of widespread inflation to increase their profits by increasing prices by more than the increase in their costs.
streamingfarm: A collection of computers all signed up with free accounts at a streaming service such as Spotify, which are automated to repeatedly stream certain songs in order to maximise revenues for the song's creators and make them seem more popular than they are.
tantparkour: This word combines the word "tant", slang for a middle-aged woman, and parkour, the sport which uses urban architecture for feats of gymnastics. There was a light-hearted social media trend in Sweden in 2023 posting images of middle-aged women clambering over obstacles.
toxisk positivitet: Again, a near direct translation of the English "toxic positivity", this describes situations where positive thinking leads to a harmful suppression of all negative feelings.
vild graviditet: Literally a "wild pregnancy", this describes a trend, popular among alternative health practitioners in Sweden, when someone who is pregnant opts not to get into contact with the mainstream healthcare system, preferring a more 'natural' approach.
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ChatGPT, the first of the large language models released to the public, came out in the tail end of 2022, but it was only in 2023 that AI started to be used widely, bringing new words like prompta, AI-klonad, cyberresiliens and streamingfarm, into the annual list of new Swedish words published by the Swedish Language Council.
"We could have have had ten different AI-words," Anders Svensseon, managing editor of the council's Språktidningen magazine, told the TT newswire, adding that artificial intelligence could now create "entirely new content, for example text, pictures and music".
This year's list also includes words related to the gang violence which continued to be a problem in the country in 2023, as well as words related to marketing, culture, and health.
Here is the full list of new words:
AI-klonad: An adjective describing a piece of content, such as a work of art or music, or even just a voice, that has been copied using AI technology.
Barbenheimer: A portmanteau title combining Barbie and Oppenheimer, two, very different, cinema blockbusters both released on July 21st, is included in the list (despite arguably being a proper noun).
bubbelhoppa: Literally, to "bubble-hop". To consciously attempt to escape your media or social media bubble by following people or reading publications with different political viewpoints from your own.
cyberresiliens: The Swedish word for "cyber resilience", describing a country or organisation's ability to withstand IT attacks without losing the ability to fulfil their most important functions.
deinfluencing: When an 'influencer' with a lot of followers on social media encourages their followers not to buy a certain product or service.
det svenska tillståndet: Translated into English, it's "the Swedish condition". This describes the situation Sweden faces where gang criminality has a serious impact on society.
dna-pass: A card which includes all the most important genetic information about a person, which can be used in healthcare.
dopaminfasta: This directly translates as "dopamine fast", and describes deliberately avoiding activities which stimulate the release of dopamine in the brain in order to increase the brain's sensitivity and so improve concentration.
dubbelswisha: To pay twice in a row in a massage parlour, with the second payment suspected of being for a sexual service.
evighetskemikalie: "Forever chemicals". This describes synthetic substances such as PFAS which cannot be broken down easily in nature and so persist for long periods in the environment.
exposekonto: Social media accounts created with the intention of publicly shaming individuals in compromising situations.
gargasnipe: This describes a picture of a person, often middle-aged, which is taken in secret and then posted on social media with the aim of ridiculing the person, who is thought to look strange or stupid. The trend of gargasniping originated in Sweden.
generativ AI: A form of artificial intelligence which generates text, images, or other media by learning the patterns and structure of their input training data and then generating new data that has similar characteristics.
grön kolonialism: A phrase which describes the establishment of wind farms or other forms of green industry on land to which indigenous people -- in Sweden, almost always the Sami minority -- have a claim.
hyschpengar: A translation of "hush money", describing payments made to someone, usually by a criminal, to stop them devolving sensitive or incriminating information.
ick: A word taken from the English "icky", which describes behaviour or qualities of a person which another person finds disgusting or offensive.
insynsprincip: The 'transparency principle', which means that private actors in society should give the public some insight into their businesses, although not to the same extent as the freedom of information requirements which apply to public bodies.
klivare: A person who commits crimes in exchange for payments from a criminal network.
korankris: This describes the 'Quran crisis', a difficult political situation caused by political protests, given permission by the police, which involve the burning of the Quran.
krigssponsor: Literally a "war sponsor", this describes companies or individuals who contribute indirectly to a war by operating businesses or buying services from warring nations.
känslighetsläsare: The Swedish translation of a "sensitivity reader". This is a person tasked with reviewing texts to remove potentially objectionable content.
longtermism: This ideology, which has the same name in English, describes the ethical view that positively influencing the long-term future is a key moral priority of our time. The ideology has come to prominence after it emerged that Tesla founder Elon Musk is an adherent, among other Silicon Valley figures.
menstrosa: Literally 'period knickers', these describe the newly released type of women's underwear which has an inbuilt, high-absorption material which can soak up blood released during menstruation.
multilojal: A marketing term describing customers who are members or regular customers of several competing chains, hoping to get the best prices and take advantage of special discounts.
nepo baby: This term, which is the same in English, describes a person who is given advantages in their career by their influential parents.
neurodiversitet: The Swedish translation of "neurodiversity", describes a new way of seeing psychiatric conditions such as autism and ADHD less as disorders and more as part of a spectrum of diverse neurological types.
prompta: A new Swedish word based on the English word "to prompt", which describes the skill of learning how to instruct an artificial intelligence program in order to get the best results.
relationism: This word, also directly taken from English, along with "positionism", describes a theory or strategy of football playing which takes as its starting point the ball's position on the pitch rather than the area which needs to be covered.
situationship: This word, taken directly from English, describes a long-term relationship somewhere between a romantic one and a friendship.
snikflation: This is the Swedish translation of "sneakflation", a portmanteau word describing the impact of companies taking advantage of widespread inflation to increase their profits by increasing prices by more than the increase in their costs.
streamingfarm: A collection of computers all signed up with free accounts at a streaming service such as Spotify, which are automated to repeatedly stream certain songs in order to maximise revenues for the song's creators and make them seem more popular than they are.
tantparkour: This word combines the word "tant", slang for a middle-aged woman, and parkour, the sport which uses urban architecture for feats of gymnastics. There was a light-hearted social media trend in Sweden in 2023 posting images of middle-aged women clambering over obstacles.
toxisk positivitet: Again, a near direct translation of the English "toxic positivity", this describes situations where positive thinking leads to a harmful suppression of all negative feelings.
vild graviditet: Literally a "wild pregnancy", this describes a trend, popular among alternative health practitioners in Sweden, when someone who is pregnant opts not to get into contact with the mainstream healthcare system, preferring a more 'natural' approach.
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