The words of the finalist of the “Word of the Year” competition have become known

The list of ten final words that will be chosen for the Word of the Year category was published on the website www.palavradoano.pt this Thursday by the publishing house Porto Editora, which promotes this initiative.

Online voting will continue until December 31, and the winner will be announced in January next year.

The first word on the list is “climate,” which is justified by the extreme weather events such as heat waves, storms, droughts and floods that have affected the country.

Another word is “conflicts,” given the military context in Ukraine and the Middle East, which is “exacerbating the global humanitarian crisis,” Porto Editora wrote in a statement.

Next comes “resignation”, chosen due to the “unexpected resignation of the Prime Minister”, which “caused an unprecedented political crisis in Portugal”.

The fourth word is “housing”, justified by the “shortage of houses, rising interest rates and rising rent costs” which have “motivated demonstrations for access to housing”.

The list follows “inflation”, justified by “the general increase in the prices of goods and services, directly affecting the purchasing power of the Portuguese.”

The next word in alphabetical order is a compound word, “artificial intelligence,” which is justified by the generalization of access to artificial intelligence raising “questions about the risks and opportunities of its use.”

The list of candidate words also included “travel,” “doctor,” and “navigators.”

The “journey” comes as Portugal hosted its first World Youth Day in August last year, which was attended by Pope Francis, who visited the country for the second time.

“The Doctor”, as “doctors continue to demand better working conditions in the National Health Service (NHS)”, and the “navigators”, as players on this year’s women’s national football team are nicknamed, are known for the first time at the championship world in this sport.

Another professional category included in the list is “teacher,” also due to “hundreds of protests across the country” for “professional assessment.”

The list of finalist words was compiled based on proposals submitted through the website www.palavradoano.pt, which is the most frequently searched in the Portuguese language dictionary Infopédia, as well as on the basis of “the monitoring of the reality of the language carried out by Porto Editora.”

Online elections for “Word of the Year” have been held for 15 years at the initiative of Porto Editora.

In previous editions, the winning words were: “war” (2022), “vaccine” (2021), “saudade” (2020), “domestic violence” (2019), “nurse” (2018) .), “Fires” (2017), “Geringons” (2016), “Refugee” (2015), “Corruption” (2014), “Firefighter” (2013), “Entroikado” (2012), “Austerity” ( 2011), “Vuvuzela” (2010) and “smuchar” (2009).