Infoplease Editors' Blog

The "32nd Annual List of Words Banished from the Queen's English for Mis-Use, Over-Use and General Uselessness" is just out. Each New Year’s day, Lake Superior State University in Michigan publishes a list of irritating buzz words and witlessly glib expressions so overused that they deserve permanent exile from the English language. The 2007 list, which was culled from more than 4,500 nominations submitted by the public, includes “GITMO,” “awesome,” “we’re pregnant,” and the use of combined celebrity names (e.g., Bennifer, TomKat, Bragelina).  Here are the complete lists from 2007 and  2006 on Infoplease.

LSSU first published the Banished list on New Year's day 1976. Here’s an extremely abbreviated timeline of words that have been banished in the past:

• At this Point in Time (1976)
• Meaningful Dialogue (1976)
• Irrespective (1979)
• Ballpark Figure 1980
• Paying My Dues (1981) 
• User Friendly (1984) 1984
• Enclosed Please Find (1985; 1989) 
• Quality Time (1985) 
• Let's Do Lunch (1986)  
• Orientate (1988)  
• Alternative Lifestyle (1988)
• To Be Perfectly Honest With You (1992)
• Cautiously Optimistic (1992)
• Empower (1993)
• Happy Camper (1993)
• Pushing the Envelope (1995)  
• Vision Statement (1996)  
• Thank You for Taking my Call (1997) 
• Don't (even) Go There (1997)
• Hello?! (1999)
• Thinking Outside the Box (2000)
• Ramp Up (2002)
• No-Brainer (2002)
• Foreseeable Future (2002)
• Make No Mistake About It (2003)
• Having Said That (2003)
• Metrosexual (2004)
• Wardrobe Malfunction (2005)
• Breaking News (2006)
• Dawg (2006)

As I’m sure you quickly realized, banishment has had no effect whatsoever on limiting the use of these phrases.

Here are the archives of the banished words by year from the LSSU site and a complete alphabetical listing of the words banished since 1976.