Banished Words

I just finished reading an interesting article in the December 31st St. Paul Pioneer Press about an annual list of banned words and phrases. Now, before your mind goes into the gutter, let me explain these are words that are overused, misused, and just plain annoying to many.

Lake Superior State University of snowy Sault St. Marie, Michigan, has published these lists for 33 years. The newest list has such words as wordsmithing, organic, surge, webinar, GITMO, awesome, and the phrase "it is what it is."

The full list is at the LSSU's website. You might want to read the hundreds of comments with other suggested words and some disagreement on the 2007 list.


I confess that I do use some of these words.