Dictionaries’ days are probably numbered in this age of the world wide webbytubes. Nevertheless, there’s always interest in which new words are incorporated ever year, chosen by the lexicographers as reflective of our age.

This year Collins – the Rolling Stones to Oxford’s Beatles in the UK dictionary world – are shaking things up a bit. Rather than bringing in words they’re threatening to chuck some out.

“We’ve been fiddling around with the typeface to try to get more in, but it is at saturation point,” says Cormac McKeown, Collins’ senior editor (Daily Telegraph, see also Times). “There is a trade-off between getting them in and legibility.”

But in a nice little publicity stunt, Collins is letting people try to save the words. If any of the 24 words set for defenestration appear six times in the company’s database of recent word usage in the media then they will be spared execution (although presumably mentioning them in stories like this one won’t count).

If any biologist is studying fubsy animals that may have a tendency to skirr or exuviate (leaving skin as recrement) and this is apodeictic maybe your next paper could use these words a bit more?

Skirr – move rapidly, especially with a whirring sound.

“I’m a very keen birdwatcher,” poet Andrew Motion told the Telegraph. “Birders do use this word from time to time so I thought it might have a better chance than others, such as vilipend. I saw 10,000 knot flying over The Wash in the evening recently and the noise they made was a skirring noise.”

Apodeictic – clearly established or beyond dispute.

“… by virtue of demonstration” adds the Times.

Exuviate – (of an animal) shed (a skin or shell)

Fubsy – fat and squat

Recrement – a waste product of an organism

Definitions from the Oxford English Dictionary, as that’s what we had in the office.

Image: all 24 words, run through Wordle