It's the Most WOTY-full Time of the Year
It's not just Japanese publishers and education associations; the New York Times' Week in Review has just published its Word of the Year-esque "Buzzwords of 2008".
How's about I just add more links to this post as WOTY-announcements come out?
(Oh, and I see I've already missed some. Please feel free to point out more I've missed via comments.)
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10 November 2008, Oxford University Press: Word of the Year 2008. (hypermiling)
25 November 2008, Merriam-Webster dictionary: Merriam-Webster's Word of the Year 2008. (bailout)
1 December 2008, Jiyu Kokuminsha: Fashionable Words of the Year [in Japanese]. (arafo, guu [tie])
1 December 2008, Webster's New World dictionary: Word of the Year 2008. (overshare)
11 December 2008, Gesellschaft für deutsche Sprache: Wort des Jahres 2008 [in German]. (Finanzkrise)
11 December 2008, Das Institut für Germanistik an der Karl-Franzens-Universität: Österreichisches Wort des Jahres 2008 [in German]. (Lebensmensch)
12 December 2008, Nippon Kanji Noryoku Kentei Kyokai: Kotoshi no Kanji [in Japanese]. (変)
15 December 2008, Internationalen Liechtensteiner Presseclub: Liechtensteiner Wort des Jahres 2008 [in German]. (Steueraffäre)
21 December 2008, New York Times Week in Review: The Buzzwords of 2008. (See the article for the full list of thirty eight phrases.)
(no date) chworter.ch (Switzerland): Schweizer Wort des Jahres 2008 [in German]. (Rettungspaket)
9 January 2009, American Dialect Society: Word of the Year. (bailout)
[Wikipedia offers some history on ADS's WOTY voting.]