Best of 2016
Now that 2016 has drawn to a close, we must take the time to reflect upon the year and its highlights. 2016 was surely a year for the books, with events such as the United States Presidential election, Brexit, and the death of Cuban leader Fidel Castro.
Politics aside, 2016 was also a time for sports and games. In the United States,
the Chicago Cubs won the World Series for the first time since 1908. In the world of basketball, the Cleveland Cavaliers had a record-breaking season, overcoming a 3-1 deficit in the NBA Finals to triumph over the Golden State Warriors. Athletes across the planet had a chance to challenge one another and go for the gold at the 2016 Olympic Games, which were held in Brazil. Soccer players from across Europe left everything on the field at the UEFA Euro Cup, which was held in France. The Portugal National Football team brought home that championship. Real Madrid’s men’s soccer team won the FIFA Club World Cup, which was held in Japan. The United States also brought home a championship, with the Women's US Soccer team winning their third FIFA Club World Cup overall. This particular victory brought another, and perhaps more important, issue to light: the gender inequality rooted deep within the US Soccer teams, which includes a substantial gender pay gap. While the US Women’s Soccer team seems to have made progress toward one victory this year, a bigger challenge still looms ahead—one that affects almost all women in their lifetimes.
Turning to pop culture, Billboard declared Rae Sremmurd featuring Gucci Mane’s “Black Beatles” the best pop song of the year. The song first took off on social media when it was featured in freeze-frame videos of families, sports teams, politicians, and other members of the global community. Dubbed the ‘Mannequin Challenge,’ these fun, frozen videos surely helped “Black Beatles” to earn its title. The title for most streamed song of the year goes to Drake featuring Wizkid and Kyla’s “One Dance,” with over 142 million streams. The most streamed new album also goes to Drake, with his album Views. Drake seems to have had an overwhelmingly successful 2016 with over 4.7 billion streams on Spotify alone, making him the most streamed artist ever on Spotify. DNCE was named the best new artist at the 2016 VMA’s. In honor of that title, the group definitely deserves some cake by the ocean.
In other forms of entertainment, Finding Dory took movie of the year by storm,
with $486.2 million gross, and over 57 million box-office tickets sold. Young people and people who are young at heart all seemed to enjoy the long-awaited sequel to 2003’s Finding Nemo, and the witty blue fish and her friends did not disappoint. The Walking Dead was again one of the most-watched shows on TV, bringing in a 9.6 overall viewer rating. Zombies and the undead aside, 2016 was also a year of magic. The famous world of wizards and witches was again brought to life when JK Rowling topped bestseller lists with the release of her new book, Harry Potter and the Cursed Child. The book earned a place on Amazon’s #1 best-seller’s list almost immediately. Turning to another kind of magic, which is the technology inside our phones and the filters we put on pictures, our most-used apps of 2016 were social media. Facebook’s Messenger app is reported to be one of the top three most-downloaded apps of the year, with over 59 million downloads. Snapchat comes in close second with 54.5 million downloads, followed by Facebook, with 45.8 million downloads. That’s a whole lot of new likers, viewers, and notifications.
Selfies aside, new life was also welcomed into the world this year. An estimated 138 million babies were born in 2016, causing the world’s population growth to come in at around 80 million. The most popular names for those babies born this year? Baby girls were commonly named Emma, and baby boys were most commonly named Noah. Other top baby names included Olivia, Ava, Liam, and Mason.
On a global scale, 2016 had many successes. Politics were in the limelight for the majority of the year, with the hotly contested and controversial United States Presidency at stake. Music, movies and TV, media, and literature dominated our culture as we shared moments of joy, sorrow, remembrance, and laughter together. Here’s to a 2017 filled with health, happiness, growth, progress, and most importantly, memories with friends and family.
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Julia Tilton is a freshman and a guest contributer to Lamplighter.
If you are interested in becoming a staff writer, contributor, or guest writer for Lamplighter please reach out to either our Editor-in-Chief Anja Stadelmann '17 or our Management editor Richard Tarpey '17. Their contact information can be found in our 'Meet The Staff' section of our website.