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(n.)
When automation reduces the quality of the daily tasks in a once meaningful job to a shadow of what it used to be.
Literary translators felt the rolehollowing first: decades of experience hunting for the perfect word were replaced by afternoons confirming the machine-generated drafts were, once again, fine.
Does it ring true?
From the future, or already here?
Role + hollowing. Role is from the French rôle, the roll of parchment an actor’s part was written on. But we went further than playing the part, and assumed an identity: “what do you do?” became shorthand for “who are you?” But when the doing is handled by a machine, that question will get harder to answer comfortably.
Future Words: A Non-Obvious Glossary of Terms That Don’t Exist (But Soon Will) collects all 100, each with its example sentence and coinage notes, from the bestselling authors of The Future Normal. Hardcover, October 20, 2026.