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Pandexicon: How the Language of the Pandemic Defined Our New Cultural Reality

Pandexicon: How the Language of the Pandemic Defined Our New Cultural Reality

Current price: $24.95
Publication Date: March 7th, 2023
Publisher:
Greystone Books
ISBN:
9781778400391
Pages:
320
Usually Ships in 1 to 5 Days

Description

Did you keep a list of the words coined by Covid? Wayne Grady did They're deftly woven into a journal/timeline, taking us through two years of surrealism and limbo.--Margaret Atwood

This exploration of the many new terms of the Covid-19 pandemic provides insight into the ways an ever-evolving vocabulary helped us cope with our anxiety and adapt to a new reality.

When the pandemic struck in early 2020, Wayne Grady started collecting the words and phrases that arose from our shared global experience. Some, such as "uptick" and "pivot," had existed before but now took on new meaning, and others, such as "covidivorce," "quarantini," "covexit," and "shecession," appeared for the first time, their meaning instantly clear. Through this new vocabulary, we became more able to adapt to change, to domesticate it in a sense, and to reduce our fears.

Moving from the very beginning of the pandemic (the "Before Times") and our early response to it through the peaks and troughs of the various waves in countries throughout the world, and ending with a contemplation of what the "After Times" might look like, this book takes us on a journey through the pandemic and illuminates both how this new language has unfolded and how it has changed the way we think about ourselves and each other.

About the Author

Wayne Grady is the author of three novels and more than a dozen books of nonfiction. His many awards include four Science-in-Society Awards, the Amazon.ca First Novel Award, a Governor-General's Award for English Translation, and an Outdoor Book Award. He lives in Kingston, Ontario, and San Miguel de Allende, Mexico.