As we ended 2008 with the most over-used words of the year and picked our own choice words for 2009, we will thus begin the new year with a review of what the “word experts” are saying.

Climate porn and fanta pants

A report in the Sydney Morning Herald, titled “The year of climate porn and fanta pants”, quotes the Macquarie Dictionary’s online edition as saying the past year was one of flashpacking and toxic debt, of wellness tourism and the GFC (Global Financial Crisis). A total of 91 other words and phrases were added last year.

Les Murray, the poet and Macquarie committee member, said: "There were two big things that happened in 2008. One you can't use because it's a proper noun, and that's Obama. The second was subprime."

Editor Susan Butler said the influence of America was again large on the list of words she selected. “But the British fanta pants" from the orange-coloured soft drink … with reference to pubic hair as the indicator of hair colour “was a notable exception.”

The big trend – the growth of environmental language: of ecocentrism, referring to the philosophy in which the ecosphere is more important than an organism or human activity; of plastic soup, referring to a mass of plastic on an ocean gyre; and of climate porn, referring to alarmist predictions about the progress of global warming.

Murray singled out two other words – lifestreaming (the online recording of one's daily life) sounded better than what it meant. Uberveillance (omnipresent electronic surveillance through devices embedded in the body) had more future than present.

Readers of the Macquarie vote online for their favourite word, from which a people's choice will be announced in February.

The pick from 2007 was password fatigue.

Banished Words of 2009

Meanwhile, Lake Superior State University in Sault Ste. Marie has published its annual list of Words to Be Banished from the Queen’s English for Mis-use, Over-use and General Uselessness.

This year’s losers

1. Green
2. Carbon Footprint
3. Maverick
4. First Dude – “Skateboard English is not an appropriate way to refer to the spouse of a high-ranking public official.”
5. Bailout – “Use of emergency funds to remove toxic assets from banks’ balance sheets is not a bailout. When your cousin calls you from jail in the middle of the night, he wants a bailout.”
6. Wall Street/Main Street
7. -monkey (all-purpose internet suffix)
8. Icon/iconic
9. Game changer
10. Staycation (stay-at-home-vacation)
11. Desperate Search
12. Not so much
13. Winner of Five Nominations
14. It’s that time of year again - “When is it not ‘that time of year again?”

One millionth word

By the way, did you know that on April 29, 2009, the English language is expected to acquire its millionth word? The prediction comes from Global Language Monitor, based in Austin, Texas.