Via Bookslut, here is an article on that topic. Some contenders:
pulchritude
chillax
hubby
no-brainer
webinar
staycation
any word starting with "mommy"
What can you add to this list?
Which words make you wince?
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Does the phrase “moving forward” count?
For the list:
synergy
cosmeceuticals
I wanna “share” with you. Urgh.
Profanity used incorrectly or too frequently.
Impactful.
At least pulchritude is a “real” word. Ugly though it may be (isn’t that ironic?)…
Bailout!
“moist”, “wet”, and body part beginning with the letter “p”
[anything scandalous]-gate
Tyler, no offense buddy, but:
infovore
folksonomy
“hot mess”
po-faced
fellow travelers on First Great Western may wince at the sibilant sounds of: “a selection of snacks, sandwiches, crisps and pastries”
tasty
“surfeit” and “limn” both reasonable words I suppose, but ones that are never encountered outside of the printed word. I always think of them as sort of mental speed bumps because they don’t “flow” particularly well
I don’t know how I feel about it yet, having
come across it just yesterday. On a horse farm
in Kentucky some of the paintings on the walls
are called “Moneighs”: created by retired
thoroughbreds with a flick of the tail
and a touch of the nose.
sustainable (and sphincter)
albeit
Book Slut
I +1 ‘hubby’ and ‘chillax’. I would also like to add ‘foodie’, ‘comfy’, and other such ‘-ies’. However, these are words that would fit into the ‘slang’ category, and that might be one of the reasons for them making me wince.
bewail
“irregardless”
“tipping point”
“problematize” (I like “problematics” though)
“first!”
“organic”
“fair trade”
commonly overused 15 cent words: “expedite”, “asinine”, ascertain”
I also second “progressive” and “green”
Molybdenum.
And then there’s “pseudo-intellectual”.
No, wait a minute. . .It’s the pseudo-intellectuals themselves that make me cringe.
“utilization” incorrectly used as a fancy synonym for use
“overarching” (the contexts I read it in it just sounds pretentious)
1. delish (delicious derivative)
2. yummy (as in, ‘Mmm, this foie gras is so yummy!)
3. Any other food words used by grown men. (Yes, that includes ‘tasty.’)
4. kibble
5. nook
6. plethora (For people trying to show off their SAT vocabulary)
more awkward sounding words: “Promulgate”, “yoga”, “snit”.
I think all the words except “hubby” are useful and don’t really bother me.
The word gift, when used as a verb.
Wouldn’t it be cool if your browser could just automagically convert silly words like cyber-whatever, blogorhea, and other words you can’t stand into plain English?
“drank”, “chairperson”.
“goldenrod” sounds weird to me, i have no clue why.
splurge
“take that offline”
creative used as a noun
All those “catchy” terms used in blog after blog.
Teh intratubes (or some other silly variation)
The spousal unit
this humble blogger
Avant-garde
“humanure”
“basically”
“happy” when used to describe something other than people
Incent, incentivize, incentivise, and derivations thereof.
“Mouthfeel.” Ew ew blech too personal!
Incentivize
twebinar? is that for real? that might be the worst word ever, considering how it capitalizes on webinar, already possibly my least-favorite.
Wow. Does nobody else hate “tweet”? I didn’t realize that it drove me nuts before everyone started using it all the time, and not to refer to the sound that a baby bird might make. It sounds completely out of place in a conversation which takes place between adults. Hearing things like “oh, by the way, did you catch my tweet about that?” is probably the largest single reason that I don’t use twitter, and yes, I realize how crazy that sounds.
“Monetize” used in the sense of “cash in on.”
“How do we monetize this idea?” Ugh.
libeltarian
Are all the problems with “moist” because it immediately draws to mind a moist vagina?
“preso” (annoying abbreviation of “presentation”)
“hella”
I hate “upskilling”, a popular word in advertising copy designed to sell training services to corporations. For example, “do your associates need upskilling?”
The ______ “experience”
I’ve always had a particular dislike for “de-plane” (what’s wrong with disembark?) and “happenstance” (coincidence or serendipity are much nicer words).
electroconvulsive
All of them. And pls add ‘tweet’ and ‘google (v.)’ to that list.
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