Most Facebook users have logged on, ready for a daily dose of stalking bliss, only to find someone missing from his or her friends list. The occurrence is familiar — they’ve been unfriended.Though “unfriend” was poor grammar a few years ago, the recent popularity of Facebook and other social networking sites has led to the word being chosen as the 2009 Word of the Year by the New Oxford American Dictionary on Nov. 16.The Word of the Year selection, described by the Oxford University Press’s Web site as a “combination of solid lexicographic practice and a light-hearted look at the changing face of English,” chooses a word that acts as a cultural snapshot for the year.To “unfriend” is “to remove someone as a ‘friend’ on a social networking site such as Facebook,” according to the Word of the Year announcement.”Unfriend,” as well as other nouns turned into verbs, like “Google” and “text,” become more popular as the technology behind them becomes more common and the words’ use increases in everyday conversation, said Meg Smith, an English professor specializing in linguistics.”We want to communicate as efficiently as possible, so we morph the language in such a way that it’s usable,” Smith said.Smith said as people started talking about Facebook in person, a vernacular developed to make conversation easier.”Saying ‘he submitted a friend request to me’ would be too formal,” Smith said. “Saying ‘he friended me’ is more casual and has a better function.”Because Facebook shows no signs of losing popularity, the word has the potential to remain in use for a while, said Christine Lindberg, senior lexicographer for Oxford’s U.S. dictionary program, in a blog post on the OUP Web site.”It has both currency and potential longevity,” Lindberg wrote. “In the online social networking context, its meaning is understood, so its adoption as a modern verb form makes this an interesting choice for Word of the Year.”Oxford also released a list of the other finalists not selected this year, including “netbook,” a small, portable laptop computer with limited memory, “death panel,” a theoretical body that determines which patients deserve to live when care is rationed and “deleb,” a dead celebrity.Scott Szymanski, philosophy graduate student, said “unfriend” is more appealing than some of the other words because it’s less gimmicky than hybrid words like “deleb.””‘Unfriend’ is not a conglomerate,” Szymanski said. “It’s just used in place of another phrase.”Smith said words like “deleb” are called “blends,” which are words formed by combining the meaning and sounds of two or more words.Buzzwords like the ones nominated for Word of the Year typically gain popularity quickly because they catch on with young people and adults, and the media follow, Smith said. But as the years go by, the words become dated and mark certain time periods.”You could look at it in terms of decades,” Smith said. “That is not to say a word will last 10 years, but we can look back and say ‘that’s 80s’ or ‘that’s 90s.'”Smith said the Word of the Year is exciting because it chronicles the unexpected paths taken by language.- – – -Contact Ryan Buxton at [email protected]