Sunday, January 8, 2012

Apparently, Enough is Enough

For the most part, we all know the more routine clichés—but you should also be on the lookout for some of the newer offenders.

Every year since 1975, Lake Superior State University in Michigan has released a list of overused words/phrases for each year.  And while you may have already seen this, I couldn’t help but pass on this list for 2011.

Realistically, I know this list doesn’t mean much—if you’re going to use the term “baby bump,” there aren’t exactly a ton of alternatives, and I think “ginormous” is a pretty rad word.  But it’s still amusing to see what words the public tends to get sick of.

You can read about the history behind the banished words lists here, by the way.

So, what about you?  Any words or expressions you’d like to kill off?  Any words you have a tendency to overuse?  Because I'll admit, I'm guilty of using "pretty much" and "not exactly" too much.

14 comments:

Anonymous said...

Trickeration sounds like it was banished for a reason!

T.D. said...

I describe everything as being "hysterical" lately...... I should fix that. I latch onto a word for a while and then move to another one o_O

Carolina M. Valdez Schneider said...

I'm guilty of those, too! I also tend to say "except" and "actually a lot. I'm not sure how I manage that. Except I do, actually. Pretty much.

Rusty Carl said...

I'd like to strike the word 'bro' from any language on earth. I heard this 50 year old man in a conversation a few weeks ago dropping it in almost every sentence. I swore to never use it again after that.

Emily R. King said...

I like to use "don't worry" and "sweet!" Not that they have anything in common. : )

Leigh Covington said...

I say "awesome" WAY too much! Its ridiculous! And in my writing I tend to do the whole, "unlike anything she had seen before" ... of felt, or whatever. *sigh*. I'm working on it.

Love this post :)

PK HREZO said...

interesting! I do get tired of cliche words and phrases. I like ginormous too. But sure glad "you go girl" has pretty much phased out. I was so over that.

Misha Gerrick said...

I've got some nasty word habits. Like was/were. Then there's also some words like "after all" and "actually".

As for cliche's, I try to avoid them, so I'm going to check out the list right now.

Thanks for visiting TCoML. :-)

Morgan said...

This was funny! I've never heard of this list! :D

Golden Eagle said...

I'd love to kill off "like". Not when it's used as "I like this" but when it's like, so, like, repeated like.

I tend to overuse "okay", "yup", and "particularly". Particularly is a recent one. :P

Jenna Cooper said...

For writing, my characters seems to nod and shake their heads a lot, as well as shrug shoulders and raise eyebrows. I try to cut all that out when I can.

In my life though I know I overuse phrases like epic fail.

Anonymous said...

I tend to accidentally use the same word twice right after the other. *facepalm* Ugh.

Anonymous said...

I tend to accidentally use the same word twice right after the other. *facepalm* Ugh.

Jenna Blake Morris said...

Anonymous -- Haha, good point! I'd never heard of that one until I read the list.

Director -- Ha, I'm the same way. Right now I'm using "wizard" instead of cool. Bet I'll keep that one awhile.

Carolina -- Ha! I have issues with "actually," too.

Rusty -- I have a cousin in his early twenties who seems addicted to the word "bro," which is pretty wince-worthy in itself. But a 50-year-old? Eesh. That'll probably be my cousin someday.

Emily -- That's funny! The kinds with no correlation are my favorite. It's like, Where did *that* come from?

Leigh -- It's weird, because the only time I have a problem with "awesome" is in emails. I guess gravitate to that one instead of other adjectives...

Pk -- Yeesh. I guess I was never really aware of the "you go girl"s. I'll count myself lucky on that one.

Misha -- Same here on the "actually." And I'm glad I found TCoML! (:

Morgan -- Me neither! Until, you know, I did. I found it from the dictionary.com blog. (:

Golden Eagle -- I hate to admit this, but a lot of the time I have "like" woes. It drives my mom nuts. It drives *me* nuts. So I'm with you on the "let's kill it off" idea. At least "particularly" beats "like!"

Jenna -- Haha, my characters tend to glare a lot. So I have to go through and have editing bouts geared specifically toward glares. It's ridiculous.

Mirriam -- I hate it when I do that! It's one of those things I'll sit for five minutes over, trying to come up with an alternative I like just as much. Probably I should just change the text to red or something and move on, but I never do.