To LOL or not to LOL
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The word “LOL” has taken the world by storm. It dominates everything from our text messages to Facebook and it sometimes, quite accidentally, appears in our essays. However, for it to appear in the Oxford English Dictionary (which, entering into the spirit of things, I will now refer to as OED) really puts its prominence into perspective.
Now that it’s recognised as an actual word, does this signal the start of the degradation of the English Language? Traditionalists will argue that it is and it’s the addition of words like these which could degrade the linguistic value of the 130-year-old OED.
It is not hard to see why some may undermine the word “LOL” as it is commonly associated with the younger generation. But wait – “LOL” has a history – arguable though this may be, the word “LOL” has actually been used back in the mid-20th century. It made its not-so-celebrated debut back in the 1960s and stood, not for “laughing out loud” but rather, for “little old lady”. But by the 1980s, the “LOL” we know today was born and took off with the invention of the internet.

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