January is what it is — a time to re-start, yet a time to look back. So it is what it is when, at the stroke of midnight as one year disappears and the new one arrives, the powers that be at Lake Superior State University post their annual Banished Words List.
They’ve actually copyrighted the concept. Not sure why but I guess that’s what you do when you think you’ve come up with something unique you can use to help market your business or organization or school. They’ve been doing this since 1976 and I have to admit I have come to wonder what they come up with each year. It does, in its own way, provide a perspective on our culture and how it is changing.
They gather their nominees from suggestions from the public — more than 1,500 this year. “Nominations came from most major cities and many U.S. states,” their news release says, which strikes me as a refreshingly modest boast that seems to candidly admit that the submissions are not as diverse as they’d like. But they also list 22 foreign countries from which nominations arrive, including “throughout Canada.” And they like brag (I remember reading this in a prior year) that the list “has become such a cultural phenomenon that comedian George Carlin submitted an entry that made the annals in 1994: “baddaboom, baddabing.”
So what made the list this year?
“GOAT” is the best of the worst. They note that this acronym for Greatest of All Time “gets the goat of petitioners and judges for overuse, misuse, and uselessness.” Everybody wants to be clever.
Two of the words or phrases on the list are quite unfamiliar. “Inflection point” is apparently a mathematical term that has become a “pretentious was to say ‘turning point.’” Although I have heard about “gaslighting,” I do not fully grasp it’s cultural meaning. I do not understand the inclusion of the question: “Does that make sense?”
I applaud the inclusion of the word “irregardless” which actually is not a word. At most, it’s a nonstandard word, at least according to some dictionaries. As they put it in their commentary, “the prefix “ir” + “regardless” = redundancy.”
I have not heard the words “amazing” and “absolutely” overused or misused. In fact I must confess that I use them — just not too much, methinks.
Rounding out the top ten are two other phrases — “moving forward” and “it is what it is.”
I am wondering if they are running out of words and phrases to banish. They note that “it is what it is” is a repeat performer, having been banished in 2008 for “overuse, misuse and uselessness.” It’s another phrase I’ve used but have been careful to not overuse it. It does sound cliche-ish, but it’s a simpler way to describe something that people may not like but it’s not going to change.
I am thankful they have not banished the phrase “but I digress.” It is what it is.
miller@news-banner.com
