Researchers combed through a variety of British books, blogs, magazines and broadcast transcripts to compile a database of words and phrases in current overuse/misuse, and then chose the worst offenders. Among their top picks were bad grammar ("shouldn't of," #8), redundant verbal tics ("I personally," #3) and regular old overused terms ("24/7," #9).
The rest of the Oxford list: "It's not rocket science" (#10), "It's a nightmare" (#7), "Absolutely" (#6), "With all due respect" (#5), "At this moment in time" (#4), and "Fairly unique" (#2). Their top pick? "At the end of the day," gratingly popular (and totally meaningless) with politicians, athletes, pundits, and management types. It's basically a glimpse at what it will sound like in hell.
Cliches from 2006: best.[something].ever, I just threw up in my mouth, going green, [blank] is the new [blank], tween, douche, rad, drama, blogosphere, ginormous, bajillion, totes, bro, bra, bromance.
Faux Ghetto Slang: killin it, for real/for reals/on the real/keepin' it real, hit me up, oh snap!, chillaxing.
Unnecessary Conjunctions and Transitions: no offense but ..., all of the sudden, basically, ironically, actually, honestly, totally, hopefully, as to whether, I swear to God, you know.
Misused/Mispronounced Phrases: irregardless (for "regardless"), aggravate (for "irritate"), anyways/towards (anyway, toward), for all intensive purposes (for "for all intents and purposes"), suppose to (for "supposed to"), could of (for "could have"), analyzing/analyzation (for "analysis"), literally (when meant figuratively).
Internet acronyms/LOLCat slang (Even When Used Ironically): OMG, i can haz, LOLz, teh Internets, Oh noes!, Obvs, PWN.
Re: The Most Irritating Phrases in the English Language
Selam aleykum, here's my pet peves words/sentences:
Synergy, brain storm/mind shower, game plan, thinking outside of the box
Also, n00b is not the same as newbie. A newbie is somebody new, but a noob can be an oldtimer. Noob does not refer to the amount of time a person has been on a forum/community/game/whatever. But rather refers to his/her attitude. If a person is not only completely clueless, but also appears reluctant to find out things by himself, and just asks and expects people to explain every last little detail, then that makes him a noob, even if he's already been there for a while.
Re: The Most Irritating Phrases in the English Language
format_quote Originally Posted by Abdul Fattah
Selam aleykum, here's my pet peves words/sentences:
Synergy, brain storm/mind shower, game plan, thinking outside of the box
Also, n00b is not the same as newbie. A newbie is somebody new, but a noob can be an oldtimer. Noob does not refer to the amount of time a person has been on a forum/community/game/whatever. But rather refers to his/her attitude. If a person is not only completely clueless, but also appears reluctant to find out things by himself, and just asks and expects people to explain every last little detail, then that makes him a noob, even if he's already been there for a while.
I use the word synergistic all the time -- it actually has alot of good value-- especially with certain antibiotics.. or using alcohol and acetaminophen .. or ASA and coumadin .. I really don't want to be without that word.. or the word augment .. both great..
brainstorming isn't half bad either but I don't see much value to it..
Thinking outside the box, well that is great too.. is it just me?
Text without context is pretext If your opponent is of choleric temperament, seek to irritate him
Re: The Most Irritating Phrases in the English Language
was conscious of my conversation with my friend today, we each had to catch ourselves using one of those filler statement where an awkward gap moment of silence would usually be.. but I think we all collectively use them to cut down on the (ah ah ah um um ah ah) while you connect your thoughts..
unless your speech is written in advance and you have no questions from the audience you won't be able to help some of them..
Today I have noticed more annoying ones
'I have my plate full at the moment'
'boiler plate'
'this and that'
'You know what I mean'
'honestly', 'I kid you not'
'so you see'
'kinda like' well which is it?
another one of my personal peeves is folks who write lieing for lying.. there is no such word as lieing yet I find folks with PhD's and higher education using it all the time as if no one is spared.. (lied, lying,lies) folks 'there ain't no' such a word as lieing so stop it STOP IT.
anyhow.. thanks for your participation if you have more, I'll be glad of it..
Text without context is pretext If your opponent is of choleric temperament, seek to irritate him
Re: The Most Irritating Phrases in the English Language
^I know!!! When in actual fact nothing that they're talking about is so basic!
I picked up a habit of saying "incidently..." and "essentially..." from my physiology lecturer. But the habit only manifests itself when I'm studying physiology. strange huh?
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It's 2008, and we're pretty sure we recently had a conversation that didn't involve a single catchphrase from "Clueless." Progress, right? Eh, kinda. Oxford University -- home to the wordsmiths responsible for adding "bootylicious" to the most comprehensive dictionary of the English language -- recently released a list of the top 10 most irritating phrases in current use, and it doesn't give us much hope for humanity.
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I agree!
strange huh?
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