'Credit crunch', 'wardrobe malfunction' squeeze into dictionary

AFP, August, 2008

LONDON (AFP) — Credit crunch, carbon footprint and electrosmog squeezed into Chambers dictionary Thursday, reflecting the world's belt-tightening and ecologically-worried times, its editor said.

More prosaically, "wardrobe malfunction," "comfort food" and "nail bars" were also among a raft of new words and and expressions included in the latest print edition of a lexicographical tome.

The war on terror has brought "blue-on-blue" -- "accidental firing on one's allies" -- as well as "IED" (improvised explosive device) and "extraordinary rendition" into the Chambers-defined language.

But economic worries and climate change concerns generate a lot of new terms.

The global credit crunch, defined as "a sudden and drastic reduction in the availability of credit," has helped tip long-booming Britain to the brink of recession in barely 12 months.

Homeowners facing falling property prices for the first time in a decade are also all too familiar with "Hips" ...