SO PROBLEMATIC: 13 Words and Phrases Are Hereby Banished from the Queen’s English
By CNSNews.com Staff | January 2, 2016 | 11:34 AM EST
White House Spokesman Josh Earnest at a presser (AP Photo/Susan Walsh)
Thirteen words and phrases—including “so” and "problematic"--have been banished from the English language because of their mis-use, over-use and general uselessness.
The banishment was pronounced by a committee at Lake Superior State University, which has been banning words from English for forty-one years.
“The tongue-in-cheek Banishment List began as a publicity ploy for little-known LSSU,” says a history of the list posted by the university.
“In 1977, one year after Lake Superior State University Public Relations Director W.T. (Bill) Rabe released the first ‘banished words list,’ he said that the international reaction from news media and the public told him ‘it would go on forever.”
“Forever may be stretching it, but the annual List of Words Banished from the Queen's English for Mis-Use, Over-Use and General Uselessness has been going strong since New Year's Day 1976 and shows no signs of stopping,” says the history. “People from around the world have nominated hundreds of words and phrases such as ‘you know,’ ‘user friendly,’ ‘at this point in time,’ and ‘have a nice day,’ to be purged from the language.”
LSSU hopes this year’s list will also be immortal.
“Compilers hope this year's list will be so popular that it will break the Internet,” said a statement put out by the university.
The statement went on: “Overused words and phrases are ‘problematic’ for thousands of Queen's English ‘stakeholders,’” said an LSSU spokesperson while ‘vaping’ an e-cigarette during a ‘presser.’ “Once something is banished, there's no ‘walking it back;’ that's our ‘secret sauce,' and there’s no ‘price point’ for that.”
The 2016 list of banished words includes:
--“So”
--“Conversation”
--“Problematic”
--“Stakeholder”
--“Prince Point”
--“Secret Sauce”
--‘Break the Internet”
--‘Walk It Back”
--“Presser”
--“Manspreading”
--“Vape”
--‘Giving Me Life”
--‘Physicality”
The 2015 list included:
--“BAE”
--‘Polar Vortex”
--“Hack”
--“Skill Set”
--“Swag”
--“Foodie”
--“Curate/Curated”
--“Friend-Raising”
--“CRA-CRA”
--‘Enhanced Interrogation”
--“Takeaway”
--”-Nation”
To see the full list of annual banishment lists click here.
http://cnsnews.com/blog/cnsnewscom-staff/so-problematic-13-words-and-phrases-are-hereby-banished-queens-english
