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WORDS OF THE DAY 2 pages

“Trend” Is a Trendsetter in Language

The word “trend” has numerous usages in modern English, some rather neutral and others specific to a certain area of language, such as technology (“What’s trending on Twitter right now?”) or fashion (“Early 2000s fashion is the latest trend”). With these of-the-moment connotations, it may be surprising to learn of the word’s more humble, ecological roots.

Trend as Tendency

At its most neutral, “trend” simply means “a general direction in which something is developing or changing.” It can be used as a noun or verb and sometimes forms the base of a whole new word (“trendsetter”). In addition to its modern fashion and technology connotations, it can also pertain to business and the economy, as in, “Unemployment has been trending down.”
The English word first appeared in the 1590s, meaning “to run or bend in a certain direction,” referring to the literal course of rivers, coasts, and other natural phenomena. It comes from the Middle English trenden, “to roll about, turn, revolve,” and from the Old English trendan, meaning the same thing. That word comes from the Proto-Germanic word trandijan, meaning “round lump, ball,” which comes from the Old Frisian trind (Frisian being an archaic West Germanic language thought to be most similar to modern-day English).
It wasn’t until 1863 that its more modern, figurative usage — “to have a general tendency” — was first recorded, but that still had geographical connotations in terms of the borders of nations, rivers, and coasts. That meaning persists today with statisticians and economists, if in less popular or flashy contexts than its fashion and Twitter counterparts.

Fashion as Trendsetter

According to Google Ngrams, the word’s usage began a slow, upward trajectory in the late 19th century. It peaked in the mid-20th century, when its most popular contemporary usage as a fashion term appeared in 1950. “Trendsetter” was coined in 1950 and “trendy” in 1962.
The word’s roots pertaining to something as slow-moving as the way coastlines can shift over time lends itself to the contemporary usage. Trends aren’t something that occur overnight. Examining an economic trend such as unemployment requires studying weeks, months, or years of data. And tracing a fashion trend requires placing the style in context over time — is it a return from another decade? Did it originate with a popular movie or TV show? What other designers and collections does it reference?
Given that fashion trends have a way of circling back around — for example, many older millennials fear Gen Z’s penchant for low-rise pants, a trend they hoped would be forever relegated to the early 2000s — we come back to the word’s ancient Germanic roots, “round” or “circumference.”

#Trending

Given that Twitter launched in 2006, a spike for the word “trend” might have been expected, but curiously enough, Google Ngrams shows a downward current beginning in the 1980s. However, the word continued to evolve as Twitter gave us “trending,” a verb that has become so ubiquitous as to be used even by those who don’t partake in social media discourse.
There is nothing subtle or incremental about the current usage in the Twittersphere — something can “trend” on the platform in the space of a few hours and immediately jump to fodder for the 24-hour news cycle. So quickly does it move that by the time a “trending” topic hits the news, it might no longer be trending anymore in online spaces.
In that way, maybe Twitter is our current, most quintessential trendsetter. It has the power to set into motion a trend that might slowly make its way through the cultural zeitgeist, such as the way a style may be born on a high-fashion runway and eventually makes its way to the bargain bin at a fast-fashion store. Drawing back to the course of a river carving into stone, no trend is instantaneous.