Adam Aleksic

There’s no one who understands the internet and language better than Adam Aleksic. Blending meticulous research, original data, and an unmatched fluency in online culture, Adam unpacks how our vocabularies are evolving in real time. Algospeak is a masterclass in linguistic evolution and online culture. It doesn’t just unpack what’s happening to language, but also reveals the many ways the internet is impacting culture and the ways we communicate and connect in person. Incisive and funny, this is a page turner from start to finish. Algospeak is a must read for anyone seeking to understand how we communicate today.

Taylor Lorenz, author of Extremely Online

As someone who has neither Tik'd or Tok'd, I found Algospeak enthrallingly enlightening, written in an enticingly friendly way by one of the medium's most linguistically aware and experienced practitioners. Any Gen V [vintage] linguist like me has to read it. But not just us. All who use social media, or are puzzled by it, or are infuriated by it, will benefit from a reading. It's a brilliant exposé of the aims and strategies underlying the algorithms that control these media, and of the motivations of the companies who create them, as well as providing a beautifully illustrated account of how users change language in order to respond to them. Algospeak takes our understanding of online communication to a new level.

David Crystal, author of How Language Works

"Incisive and funny, this is a page turner from start to finish. Algospeak is a must read for anyone seeking to understand how we communicate today." - Taylor Lorenz, author of Extremely Online 
 
"Algospeak takes our understanding of online communication to a new level.” - David Crystal, author of How Language Works 
 
 
From the rise of leetspeak and words such as “unalive” to the trend of adding “-core” to different influencer aesthetics, the internet has ushered in an unprecedented linguistic upheaval. We’re entering an entirely new era of etymology, heralded by the invisible forces driving social media algorithms. And with over 7 billion internet users uploading over 2.5 quintillion bytes of media every day, the sheer volume of potential new words is astounding. 
 
In Algospeak, online etymologist Adam Aleksic shines a light on the roots of words that we don’t realise have come from unexpected places – from incel culture, from the innovation of users trying to get around content moderation algorithms, from the marketing speak that has invaded our personal lives. New slang emerges and goes viral overnight. Accents are shaped or erased on YouTube. Grammatical rules, loopholes, and patterns surface and transform our interactions, social norms and habits. 
 
Algospeak tells, through words, the bigger social story of how language shapes us, just as much as we shape it.

Adam Aleksic

Praise for Algospeak

There’s no one who understands the internet and language better than Adam Aleksic. Blending meticulous research, original data, and an unmatched fluency in online culture, Adam unpacks how our vocabularies are evolv ...

As someone who has neither Tik'd or Tok'd, I found Algospeak enthrallingly enlightening, written in an enticingly friendly way by one of the medium's most linguistically aware and experienced practitioners. A ...

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