The Simpsons Invent a Word.

• Position: LANGUAGE - Brief article

Bart Simpson and his cartoon family may be crude, but some influential people pay attention to them. Merriam-Webster added 850 new words to its dictionary in March and one of them--embiggen, meaning to make bigger or more expansive--was first used in a 1996 episode of The Simpsons. In the episode, the motto of the fictional town of Springfield is revealed: "A noble spirit embiggens the smallest man." Merriam-Webster adds hundreds of new words every year, which it says come from a "cross section of our linguistic culture." This year's list includes cryptocurrency (a form of digital-only cash); wordie (a lover of words); and chiweenie (a...