It's been delighting people around the world for 25 years but now formally holds a honored place in the cultural lexicon: "GIF" has been chosen as word of the year by the Oxford American Dictionary.
GIF 图像文件已经让全世界的人们欢乐了25年，如今这个单词终于正式在文化辞典中有了非常荣耀的一席之地。“GIF” 被《美国牛津词典》选为2012年度词汇。

"GIF celebrated a lexical milestone in 2012, gaining traction as a verb, not just a noun," said Katherine Martin, head of the U.S. dictionaries program at Oxford.
牛津在美国的辞典项目负责人凯瑟琳·马丁表示：“GIF成了2012年的词汇里程碑，作为动词形式当选为年度词汇，而不仅仅是名词。”

"The GIF has evolved from a medium for pop-culturalmemes into a tool with serious applications including research and journalism, and its lexical identity is transforming to keep pace."
她解释道：“GIF已经从当初的流行文化基因的媒介，发展成如今重要的应用工具，广泛应用于研究和新闻业等领域。它的作用转变有目共睹，所以它的词汇地位也应该紧随发生变化。”

GIF is, in fact, an abbreviation of three separate words: Graphics Interchange Format. It was first released by CompuServe in 1987 but has experienced a dramatic cultural resurgence in recent years, most commonly used to make humorous commentary on topics ranging from sports to the 2012 presidential election.
GIF实际上是三个独立单词的缩写：图形变换格式。首次出现在1987年，由美国最大的在线信息服务机构美联网发布，不过近些年又出现了强势的文化复苏，最常用来发表幽默评论，涉及到的话题非常广泛，从运动到2012美国总统大选等。

The runner-up for the word of the year was also an abbreviation, "YOLO," which stands for "You only live once."
《美国牛津词典》2012年度词汇榜单上的第二名也是一个缩写词：YOLO，意为：“生命只有一次。”

"Superstorm" was another runner-up for word of the year, after the major storm that affected the Eastern U.S. during the first week of November.
今年候选名单上还有“Superstorm”（超级风暴），这个单词上榜是由于11月第一周大面积影响美国东部地区的桑迪飓风带来的暴风雨。

The British Oxford Dictionaries went a different route, choosing "omnishambles," as their word of the year, which is defined as "a situation that has been comprehensively mismanaged, characterized by a string of blunders and miscalculations."
《英国牛津词典》则走的是不同路线，选择的2012英国年度词为“omnishambles” （一团糟），用来描述 “由于管理及其不善，造成一连串差错和误算的混乱局面”。

Needless to say, having all three words shows how neologisms are having a growing influence in the cultural landscape.
毫无疑问，这三个单词都代表着当下新词构词法对文化格局的日益加深的影响。

Still, some older words have found new linguistic relevance. "Pleb," taken from the Roman word "plebs," has found a modern context in its derogatory usage to describe "a member of the ordinary people or working classes."
另外还有一些老旧词汇也被赋予了新的语言涵义。源自罗马词汇“plebs” （平民）的“Pleb” 在新的语境中，用于描述“普通民众或是工人阶级”，含有贬义。

Interestingly, the word-of the-year distinction does not guarantee that the chosen words will actually be included in future editions of the Oxford English Dictionary.
不过有趣的是，尽管这些单词现在当选了年度词汇，也无法保证未来它们会真正被收录进新版的《牛津英语词典》。

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