Jezebel: Words

Say Goodbye To 'Baby Bump' And 'Man Cave'

Cassie Murdoch — Fri, 30 Dec 2011 15:00:00 EST

Another year is drawing to a close, and that means it's time for Lake Superior State University's annual List of Words Banished from the Queen's English for Misuse, Overuse and General Uselessness. After tens of thousands of nominations were submitted, LSSU narrowed it down to the twelve words and phrases which most offended our ears in 2011, and now it's time to delete these terrible things from our vocabularies for good: More »

Let's Stop Saying We're 'Obsessed'

Cassie Murdoch — Fri, 14 Oct 2011 18:00:00 EDT

I was standing in line at a coffee shop this morning when I heard a girl behind me say to her friend, "Yeah, I am totally obsessed with Breaking Bad." "Hmm, are you really obsessed with Breaking Bad?" I thought to myself, "Or do you just enjoy Breaking Bad?" Do you think about it constantly? Does it interfere with your ability to function? I am guessing no. Do you have a room in your house where you tear out newspaper clippings about the show and pin them methodically to the walls? Do you keep tiny specimens of Bryan Cranston's fingernail clippings in neatly organized jars on a shelf? Probably not. I mean, sure, you might like Breaking Bad. Maybe you even love it. And maybe you could even be called one of the shows biggest fans, but I feel like you are probably not actually obsessed with it. More »

Welcome To The Era Of 'Awkward'

Anna North — Fri, 09 Sep 2011 14:30:00 EDT

Remember when "random" became a catchall term, meaning anything from "silly" to "upsetting?" Well, now it's being unseated — by "awkward." More »

Sexting, Jeggings, And The Other Fake Words That Are Now Real

Whitney Jefferson — Thu, 18 Aug 2011 15:20:00 EDT

Now look what we've gone and done. This is why we can't have nice things: The Oxford Dictionary has just inducted a slew of new words into their holy pages, and out of the 400 hundred new additions, a handful of them were in sound smack-my-head territory. More »

What To Do With A "Bitch" Gone Mad

Andrew Belonsky — Fri, 14 Jan 2011 13:00:00 EST

Jared Loughner scrawled "die, bitch," on a 2007 letter sent to him by Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords. More »

"Austerity" Is The Word Of The Year

Margaret Hartmann — Mon, 20 Dec 2010 19:12:00 EST

According to Merriam-Webster, "austerity" was the most-searched word in its online dictionary this year, sparked by austerity measures announced by European governments. Runners up include "pragmatic," "moratorium," "socialism," and thankfully, no Jersey Shore-related phrases. More »

New Google Graphs Reveal Centuries Of Dicks, Pimps And Hos

Anna North — Fri, 17 Dec 2010 16:52:00 EST

An extremely addictive new Internet toy allows you to track the frequency of specific words in books going back all the way to 1500. We decided to check out how words like "depression," "ho," and "vagina" fared through the ages. More »

"Scary Smart" Is A Horrible Expression

Sadie Stein — Mon, 29 Nov 2010 18:12:00 EST

At a recent event, Gayle King threw her weight behind NYC schools chancellor nominee (and former boss) Cathie Black, calling the former Hearst head "scary smart." Fine, but can we get a moratorium on that phrase, please? More »

Publisher Removed Gender-Inclusive Language From New Bible To Protect Sales

Lauri Apple — Sat, 20 Nov 2010 13:00:00 EST

In 2005, Zondervan released an edition of the New International Version of the Bible that included language acknowledging the existence of women. Disgraceful! Evangelicals got mad and condemned the book, so Zondervan's put the "men" and "mankind" back in. More »

2010 Brought A Fresh Crop Of Annoying Words

Margaret Hartmann — Mon, 15 Nov 2010 19:03:00 EST

According to the annual Global Language Monitor survey, the top words of 2010 include "spillcam," "vuvuzela," "great recession," and "refudiate," which was coined by Sarah Palin. The silver lining: We've stopped panicking about last year's popular phrase, "flu virus H1N1." More »

"Nymphobrainiac" And Other Awesome Sexytime Words

Sadie Stein — Thu, 21 Oct 2010 17:30:00 EDT

We've defined the "O'Donnell" — but that's just the beginning. And when it comes to the terminology available for a sexually active woman, we've got a long way to go, baby. More »

Television's Most-Frequently Used Words Signal Downfall Of Civilization

Margaret Hartmann — Thu, 09 Sep 2010 15:42:00 EDT

"BP Spillcam" was the most-used word of the 2009-2010 TV season, according to the Global Language Monitor. "Dysfunctional," came in second due to the success of Modern Family, followed by the Jersey Shore kids' favorite phrase: "Guido." More »

Where "A Piece Of Cake" Came From

Sadie Stein — Wed, 08 Sep 2010 18:40:00 EDT

Fellow food-and-word nerds, you're in luck! More »

So Long Queef: "New Names For Sexy Stuff"

Sadie Stein — Thu, 01 Jul 2010 17:40:00 EDT

If the words "eating out" make you, like the author's friend, think of "a pig at a trough," you'll welcome the concept of new nomenclature for intimate acts. (Glaring omission: "missionary.") Discuss. [Glamour] More »

OMLG Is The New OMG

Dodai Stewart — Wed, 28 Apr 2010 10:20:00 EDT

Apparently "Oh My Lady Gaga" is all the rage on the web in China. Will "Lez Make A Sammich" be the new "I Can Has Cheezburger?" [Schott's Vocab/NY Times] More »

Liking "Like:" Wherein Christopher Hitchens Discovers Valley Girls

Anna North — Wed, 13 Jan 2010 17:20:00 EST

It appears Christopher Hitchens has finally seen Clueless, because he's come up with a decades-too-late analysis — and mild condemnation — of the word "like." More »

4 Reasons To Quit Being "Offended"

Anna North — Mon, 28 Dec 2009 14:00:00 EST

December is a good time to get rid of the year's accumulated crap, and it's also the season for culling useless words that take up space in the American vocabulary. Today's discard: "offended." More »

Repent, And Salahi No More: Celebrity Names That Should Be Verbs

Anna North — Fri, 18 Dec 2009 12:40:00 EST

Wall Street Journal writer Mark Helprin says those "strange pinheads," Tarek and Michaele Salahi, deserve their own verb. He also lists some other famous people whose names have entered the common lexicon — but we can think of more. More »

Has The Word "Bitch" Lost Its Bite?

Anna North — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 12:40:00 EST

Yesterday, reports started circulating that New York Senator Chuck Schumer called a flight attendant a 'bitch' - now, Republicans are trying to make an issue out of it. One question: does anyone even care about the word "bitch" anymore? More »

4 Reasons The Douchebag Has Jumped The Shark

Anna North — Thu, 10 Dec 2009 14:00:00 EST

While we're on the subject of language, I'd like to point out that both the word "douchebag" and the concept it stands for are, like, totally over. After the jump, four reasons why. More »

Dictionary Now Has New Words, Like Teabagging

Jenna Sauers — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 19:40:00 EST

The New Oxford American Dictionary's word of the year for 2009 is unfriend. For this honor, lexicographers also considered: zombie bank, birther, death panel, funemployment, and hashtag. Strangely, only half the definition of teabagging made it to print. [OUP] More »

A Rose By Any Other Name Might Make You Angry

Anna North — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 14:20:00 EDT

Do different languages evoke different emotions? That's the question posed by Times blogger Olivia Judson, inspired by research that shows just making a certain vowel sound can affect your mood. More »

Safire Would've Had A Field Day...

Sadie Stein — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 13:40:00 EDT

Apparently the longest entry in the new Historical Thesaurus of the Oxford English Dictionary goes to the word "immediately," which has a whopping 265 synonyms with which to express our collective impatience and probably exaggerated sense of urgency. [TimesUK] More »

What Words Would You Send To The Word Graveyard?

Hortense Smith — Sun, 19 Jul 2009 17:30:00 EDT

"I'm VERY tired of reading the word VERY," my fourth grade teacher would say, "To the word graveyard!" And with that, she'd bury another word in the tiny graveyard at the back of our classroom. More »

Life's Work

Sadie Stein — Mon, 13 Jul 2009 19:20:00 EDT

Professor Christian Kay has spent 42 years compiling the world's most comprehensive thesaurus. (Which of course means the Daily Mail refers to her as a "lingo-loving spinster.") Says she, "Scots are quite good at dictionaries." [Daily Mail] More »

"Ms." Dates Back To 1901

Anna North — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 11:20:00 EDT

"[W]hat is needed is a more comprehensive term which does homage to the sex without expressing any views as to their domestic situation" — a 1901 newspaper article, earliest known source of the word "Ms." [Visual Thesaurus] More »

Sic: Is The Econnomy Creating A Genneration Of Speling Bee-Otches?

Sadie Stein — Tue, 03 Feb 2009 13:00:00 EST

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“When I go through and mark up a menu, I’m not doing it to humiliate the person... I just want them to know so they don’t look uneducated." Is this persnickety dame a recession casualty? More »

Is Your Child The Slow Reader?

Sadie Stein — Fri, 02 Jan 2009 15:00:00 EST

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It's the ambitious parent's worst nightmare: a kid who moves his lips when he reads. How will he ever experience neurosis and loss?! More »

Word Of The Day

Sadie Stein — Wed, 17 Dec 2008 17:15:00 EST

A Dutch dictionary company has declared "swaffelen" word of the year. The word — a "slang verb meaning to swing one's exposed penis" — has been linked "to Dutch translations of swing, sway and sweep plus German words for tail and penis." [UPI] More »

Researchers at Oxford University have compiled...

Hortense Smith — Sun, 09 Nov 2008 15:15:00 EST

Researchers at Oxford University have compiled a list of the Top 10 most irritating phrases in the English language. The most irritating phrase? "At the end of the day." Also making the top 10: "Absolutely," "With all due respect," and "I personally." The phrases will appear in a compilation titled Damp Squid , which was "named after the mistake of confusing a squid with a squib, a type of firework." As author Jeremy Butterfield explains, "We grow tired of anything that is repeated too often – an anecdote, a joke, a mannerism – and the same seems to happen with some language." Butterfield's picks include overused phrases, grammatically incorrect words, and corporate lingo. Surprisingly, "irregardless" didn't make the list, nor did two of Jezebel's least favorite expressions, "I'm sorry, but..." and "Um..." [Telegraph] More »

Recessionistance

Sadie Stein — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 18:40:00 EDT

To heck with Descartes: nowadays, it's more like, "I am on Wikipedia, therefore I am." So how is it then that the most topical and relevant of all neologisms, "Recessionista," does not have its own Wikipedia entry? In our estimation, the omission of this handy "Recession-Fashionista" hybrid from our virtual Herodotus is glaring indeed. More to the point, does something officially exist before Wikipedia? After all, you generally already know about something's existence before you look it up, just not the details of its history. Like, when is something truly in the lexicon? And by placing something on Wikipedia, is one simply following a natural rhythm of cultural evolution, or manipulating the public knowledge base? Big Questions, kids. More »