We’ve heard the word “justice” thrown around a lot in the past year: racial justice, economic justice, social justice. There were confirmation hearings for Justice Kavanaugh, and cries for justice for victims of abuse and assault. And everyone is still wondering what’s going on with the Justice Department and its Mueller investigation.
Justice is a familiar word, embedded in the foundation of our country, and yet it represents an abstract concept. What does justice really mean? Equality? Fairness?
Apparently, a lot of people wanted to know the answer to that question, because “justice” had the most look ups in 2018 at MerriamWebster.com. It also had a spike in look ups compared to 2017. For those reasons, Merriam Webster chose “justice” as its Word of the Year for 2018.
Which brings us back to the question, what does justice mean?
Justice comes from the Latin justus, from jus right or law, and it has several meanings, including:
- the maintenance or administration of what is just especially by the impartial adjustment of conflicting claims or the assignment of merited rewards or punishments
- a judge or supreme court justice
- the administration of law
- the quality of being just, impartial, or fair
- the quality of conforming to law
- conformity to truth, fact, or reason : CORRECTNESS
I’m glad people are looking up justice and pondering its meaning. We live in challenging times, when we are questioning ideas and patterns of behavior that have been accepted for many years. We need to ask these important questions, but what can guide us to the answers?
In America we have our law, the Constitution, for a standard, but the Constitution is open to interpretation. And look at that last definition for justice: “Conformity to truth, fact, or reason: correctness.” These days, thanks to the Internet and social media, opinion can be misunderstood as fact, truth can be relative, and reason sometimes gets lost among passionate beliefs. When we speak of justice, we must not only decide what conforms to “correctness”, but also determine what exactly “correctness” is.
Justice is not a word to toss around carelessly, and its meaning will definitely be tested in 2019. I plan to watch carefully. How about you?
Other popular look ups on the Merriam Webster site in 2018:
- Nationalism-a sense of national consciousness exalting one nation above all others and placing primary emphasis on promotion of its culture and interests as opposed to those of other nations or supranational groups
- Pansexual-of, relating to, or characterized by sexual desire or attraction that is not limited to people of a particular gender identity or sexual orientation; also : tending to suffuse all experience and conduct with erotic feeling
- Lodestar– one that serves as an inspiration, model, or guide (used in reference to John McCain)
- Excelsior– “higher” (motto of New York and sign off of famous comic book writer Stan Lee, who died in 2018)
What words from 2018 most interested you?
Thanks for getting nerdy with me!
How telling that this is the word of 2018 – definitely a reflection of where we are as a country.
Btw, I meant to mention in your most recent post that I like your new header!
Yay! Thanks for noticing. I did a little “blog housekeeping”. 😉
How interesting that is was 2018’s most looked up word!