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Fellow goblins, now is our time.
Regular readers of this newsletter know I love to talk about words, pandemic words, and pandemic zeitgeist. I especially love when I can discuss all three. Which brings us to “goblin mode,” Oxford’s 2022 Word of the Year.
Technically two words, “goblin mode” is a slang term defined as “a type of behavior which is unapologetically self-indulgent, lazy, slovenly, or greedy, typically in a way that rejects social norms or expectations.”
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The word nerds at Oxford opened up the process this year, allowing the public to vote.
“New words catch on when they capture our imagination, or fill a hole with a word for a concept we need to express,” Katherine Connor Martin, product director at Oxford Languages, told the New York Times. “What “goblin mode” tells me is it resonated with the feeling that the pandemic is over, but we’re still grappling with it. Do we want to go back to the notions of respectability of the pre-pandemic world?”
I don’t think I’m the only one who went full goblin mode during the height of the pandemic (and, as I’ve mentioned prior and will repeat now: I view the current era as being “late pandemic”). I gave in to almost every impulse in pursuit of joy (see also the previous NEXT about “treat brain”). I took rest when I needed it. How I looked took a back seat to how I felt. Was I “unapologetically self-indulgent”? I mean, sure? But it also felt like freedom from the shackles of “performance.”
We do a lot of “performing” in our lives. We track our fitness performance via wearable tech. We perform at our jobs. We perform our identities online. And performance, in all of its iterations, requires a certain level of being “on.”
Goblin mode is decidedly not “on.” Goblin mode is “off.” Goblin mode is inbox infinity. Goblin mode is crumbs in the sheets. Goblin mode is not knowing when you last shampooed your hair. Goblin mode is sweatpants at the grocery store. Goblin mode is eating from the pan (hat tip to my friend Emily for that one). Goblin mode is pleasure for pleasure’s sake.
Goblin mode is not elaborate skincare. Goblin mode is not having a “morning routine.” Goblin mode is a wholesale rejection of all the little rules we’ve made up for ourselves under the banner of being “presentable” and “productive” because goblin mode is not caring what other people think.
The pandemic allowed us to switch “off” in many ways, which makes the rise of goblin mode make sense. I think there’s also a close relationship between “goblin mode” and the pandemic-era proliferation of the “cozy meme,” the most popular of which features the Sleepytime Tea Bear or some other hibernating animal that looks like it belongs in the pages of a Beatrix Potter book.
People want to be both snug and semi-feral, is what I’m saying.
Anyway, I’m writing this in jeans at an office, so “goblin mode” is less daily than it used to be. But tell me, what does “goblin mode” mean (if anything!) to you?
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