Dictionary.com just added several new LGBTQ+ words & also “grundle”

Dictionary.com has added a handful of LGBTQ+ terms to its latest official update, making one of the largest online resources for English just a bit queerer.

Amongst the 313 newly entered words for the website’s winter 2023 update, are pinkwashing, queerbaiting, abrosexual, and multisexual. The update also added 130 new definitions to pre-existing words and 1,140 revised definitions.

Related:

What does ambisextrous mean? These 12 queer terms are in the dictionary now.

What the heck is “hodophobia”? Is “deadname” a verb? Is “biromantic” the same thing as bisexual? Here’s how to use the new slew of queer-inclusive words.

In case you don’t know, here are the definitions for each of the LGBTQ+ related words:

• pinkwashing: (noun) an instance or practice of acknowledging and promoting the civil liberties of the LGBTQ+ community, but superficially, as a ploy to divert attention from allegiances and activities that are in fact hostile to such liberties.

• queerbaiting: (noun, slang) a marketing technique involving intentional homoeroticism or suggestions of LGBTQ+ themes intended to draw in an LGBTQ+ audience, without explicit inclusion of openly LGBTQ+ relationships, characters, or people.

• abrosexual: (adjective) noting or relating to a person whose sexual orientation is fluid or fluctuates over time.

• multisexual: (adjective) noting or relating to a person who is sexually or romantically attracted to people of more than one gender, used especially as an inclusive term to describe similar, related sexual orientations such as bisexual, pansexual, omnisexual, etc.

The website also included a few new words that aren’t exactly LGBTQ+ but are terms or concepts that the queer community may also be familiar with.

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• grundle: (noun, slang) the region between the anus and the genitalia; perineum.

• cyberflashing: (noun) an act or instance of sending someone unsolicited, unwanted, sexually explicit images or video using digital platforms.

• woke: (adjective, disparaging) of or relating to a liberal progressive orthodoxy, especially promoting inclusive policies or ideologies that welcome or embrace ethnic, racial, or sexual minorities.

To use woke in a sentence: “Some haters will probably respond to Dictionary.com’s newly included words by claiming that the online dictionary has become ‘woke.'”

The website wrote of its newly added terms, “Our lexicographers observe it all, documenting language change wherever it’s happening and defining the terms that help us to understand our times,”

“Words that are new to the dictionary are not always new to the language (or even remotely recent),” the site noted, adding that its inclusion of new words isn’t an endorsement of the concepts, but rather a documentation of language as it is used (rather than how they or others want it to be used).

In 2020, the website added LGBTQ+ terms like “ace,” “deadname,” and “ambisextrous.”