So we had the
twenties
thirties
…
nineties
noughties
So now, what is a good term for our new decade. There is the “tens”, the “two thousand and tens”, the “twenty tens” or the “teens”. None of these seem to have a good rhythm, so does anybody have a snappy term for it?
Let’s call them “The End Times”, for a laugh, and then when we reach 2020 we can resume the usual routine.
We’ll wait another ten years, and then settle for calling it the “turn of the century”.
Just like we did last time.
Okay, show-off. We weren’t all here when it last happened!
I pledge to fight this “noughties” thing. I know they are using it on TV retrospectives and what have you, but I have never heard anyone say it in real life, and I reckon that is where decades get their nicknames. I have always said that the decade just finished will be known as “the two thousands” (because IME people say “two thousand and nine” etc., not “twenty-oh-nine” and certainly not anything involving the word “nought”). I don’t believe “noughties” will stick, but it’s certainly the leading contender among smart-arse names for the decade.
As for this decade, I think we will tire of saying things like “two thousand and fourteen” so it will be “twenty fourteen”. So I would guess that the the decade will be the “teens”, regardless of the fact that not all of the years have “teen” in them.
I’m fond of the “Oh-No Decade” or the “Oh-Nos!”. Too apt. I wish I remembered where I first read it.
I hated it in 2000, when I first heard it, but It’s grown on me since. For what it’s worth I use it in real life, and so do a lot of people I know.
“Noughties” is just too cute and clever/stupid. Whatever term we settle on will be one that is usable not just in TV programme titles, but also in newspaper reports and sober academic treatises.
“During the eighties, the Soviet central committee introduced economic reforms”-- I can imagine reading such a sentence in a serious book.
“Saddam’s regime finally fell in the early noughties”-- tosses book aside.
It has to be the Teens. I can’t see a way out of that, even though we still have 3 years to go before we hit a true teen. But the Teens might sound more natural when, in a few years, we start referring to the date as twenty-thirteen and so on.
Also, as much debate as there was over what to call the past decade, I think the most common term I’ve heard is “the two-thousands”. Which sounds as natural to me as “the nineteen-hundreds”. I suspect, once we’re into the 20s and beyond we’ll refer to them as the first decade and the second decade respectively. Also, the turn of the century (Or millennium).
Umm, teens?
I could imagine such a sentence on Wikipedia though … :rolleyes:
Really, if it’s a book, what’s to stop them from writing “Saddam’s regime finally fell in the early '00s”? I’ve seen this in “serious books” (and newspapers), it’s just that “'00s” don’t have a set pronunciation like “'80s” does.
The problem with saying “the 1900s” is that that might mean the entire century. And “the 2000s” might mean the entire millennium. There needs to be a way of distinguishing the decade from these larger divisions.
“The '00s” rolls out quite nicely as “the Zeroes” though.
We have just transitioned into the “teens,” from the “uh-ohs.”
The twenty-tweens!