Oldest English Words Include 'Two,' 'Three'—But Not 'Four'

Kummerspeck, and other great options

(NEWSER) - The German language is officially richer, thanks to its adoption of the English word "shitstorm." Now that we've given, it's time to take: Cracked argues that the English language is in desperate need of these nine foreign words, for which there is absolutely no English equivalent:

• Kummerspeck: Kicking things off with a word from our German friends, this literally means "grief bacon," or, in Cracked's translation, the extra pounds we pack on thanks to emotional eating.

'Win the future,' 'new normal' also on list of hated words and phrases

(NEWSER) - The compilers of the 37th "List of Words Banished from the Queen's English for Misuse, Overuse, and General Uselessness" say it's amazing that "amazing" didn't make their annual list earlier. With more than 1,500 nominations from around the world, the overused superlative topped this year's list , followed by "baby bump," "shared sacrifice," "occupy," and "blowback," the AP reports. Wrote one "amazing" nominator, "Hair is not 'amazing.' Shoes are not 'amazing.' I saw Martha Stewart use the word 'amazing' six times in the first five minutes of her television show. Help!" More»

Slate writer introduces ranking system for worried linguists

(NEWSER) - Quick, define "disinterested." If you said "impartial" rather than "uninterested," congratulate yourself on knowing the original meaning, albeit one that's eroding. Ben Yagoda at Slate tackles the age-old linguistic issue of knowing when it's OK to let words evolve—and when it's not. But he doesn't just carp about the problem, he provides an algorithm, or at least "a somewhat arbitrary metric," that ranks particular words. More»

'Whatever' is worst; 'like' also highly irritating

(NEWSER) - “Whatever” is, like, the most annoying word in the English language, a poll finds—for the second year in a row, notes Reuters. The Marist survey of more than 1,000 Americans found that almost 39% think “whatever” is the most annoying English word or phrase; runners up were “like,” with 28%, and “you know what I mean,” with 15%. Among 18- to 29-year-olds, “like” was considered the most infuriating. More»

Millions of failed words lie in Oxford room

(NEWSER) - Millions of words that just didn't make the cut according to the editors of the Oxford English Dictionary lie unused in a little-publicized vault owned by the Oxford University Press. The vault—whose existence was uncovered by a research student compiling a "Dictionary of Non-Words"—contains untold numbers of small cards, each bearing a word that was submitted but never approved, some of them centuries old. Newer failed words are digitized. More»