Comments on all things journalism and answers to questions from readers about news coverage and operations at the Tracy Press.

Friday, December 08, 2006

Word of the Year

This just in: Top 10 words of 2006, according to Merriam-Webster. Heard any of these words lately?

1. truthiness
2. google
3. decider
4. war
5. insurgent
6. terrorism
7. vendetta
8. sectarian
9. quagmire
10. corruption

Here's part of the Associated Press report:
After 12 months of naked partisanship on Capitol Hill, on cable TV and in the blogosphere, the word of the year for 2006 is — "truthiness."

The word — if one can call it that — best summed up 2006, according to an online survey by dictionary publisher Merriam-Webster.

"Truthiness" was credited to Comedy Central satirist Stephen Colbert, who defined it as "truth that comes from the gut, not books.

4 comments:

Glenn Moore said...

I had no idea this was based on a comdian's routine. That is too funny!

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20061208/ap_on_re_us/word_of_the_year_2

Dr. Mike McLellan said...

"Truthiness" is what the slideshow from Hertitage Place is all about. What an intelligent and caring group of responses! What wisdom about the needs of ths world!

95377_guy said...

I first thought "Yet another sign of the impending apocalypse." Could a respectable organization such as Merriam-Webster have created this list? Then I looked at the actual web link provided. The list is "based on votes from visitors to our Web site", according to M-W. Whew, I can breathe again.

Anonymous said...

Hello Cheri!

I hope you and your family have a wonderful Christmas and the hoppiest of New Years!

I must add to your list that wonderful new verb coined by Senator Lincoln Chafee (R-RI) earlier this year: to pombo-ize, meaning to make extreme or unpalatable. As in "a pombo-ized version of this bill will never make it through the Senate."

Unfortunately for Mr Chafee, he (like Pombo) was defeated in November. Maybe he'll be looking to get a job with Mirriam-Webster...

All the best, Bahbby