Gulf News

Milkshake duck is Australia’s top word

Term refers to a viral celebrity falling from grace

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Milkshake duck — a term born in the twittersph­ere that describes an overnight social media sensation whose viral support rapidly dissolves with closer scrutiny — was chosen Monday as an Australian dictionary’s word of 2017.

Macquarie Dictionary, the definitive authority on Australian English, defines a milkshake duck as: a person who is initially viewed positively by the media but is then discovered to have something questionab­le about them which causes a sharp decline in their popularity.

Australia’s response was that most had never heard of the term, which originated from the 2016 @pixelatedb­oat tweet: “The whole internet loves Milkshake Duck, a lovely duck that drinks milkshakes! (asterisk) 5 seconds later (asterisk) We regret to inform you the duck is racist.”

Macquarie’s committee said the milkshake duck phenomenon was familiar to Australian­s, even if the term was not.

“Milkshake duck stood out as being a much needed term to describe something we are seeing more and more of, not just on the internet but now across all types of media,” the committee said.

Contest

“It plays to the simultaneo­us desire to bring someone down and the hope that they won’t be brought down. In many ways it captures what 2017 has been about,” it added.

While coined in 2016, milkshake duck was not included in the dictionary until last year.

The dictionary’s word of the year contest has long been open to constructi­ons of two or more words. The word of 2016 was “fake news”.

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