Meaning
The practice of parents regularly sharing photos, videos and personal details about their children on social media. Usually neutral in news usage but often carries a critical undertone about oversharing, privacy and children's inability to consent. Neutral-to-critical register common in parenting, legal and privacy discussions; rarely positive. Regional use: General English.
Origin
The term is a portmanteau of 'sharing' and 'parenting', and its origins have been attributed to the Wall Street Journal, where it initially appeared as 'oversharenting', a blend of 'oversharing' and 'parenting'; Wikipedia's lead dates the coinage to around 2010, though no individual author is firmly credited. It gained public recognition through the 2010s as parents documented their children's lives on Facebook and Instagram: Time magazine featured it as a 'Word of the Day' in February 2013, and Collins English Dictionary entered it in 2016. Academic interest followed, with researchers such as Priya Kumar noting that detailed child documentation is old - diaries and baby books - but social media made large-scale public sharing normal across the US, UK, France, Spain and elsewhere. The exact first appearance in the Wall Street Journal is not pinned to a specific article in the sources.
Research Sources
References used to check this entry’s meaning, history, or documented forms.
Variants
- oversharenting
- sharent
- sharented
- sharents
Usage Examples
- The school newsletter asks parents to mind sharenting rules when posting photos from events.
- Researchers interviewed mothers about how sharenting shapes their children's digital footprints.
- He became a cautious sharer after reading about the risks of sharenting.