Words of the Year - 2005
Stephen Colbert Wins 2005 Word of the Year
Every year the American Dialect Society votes on the best new/newly prominent words/phrases of the year. They vote for different categories such as “Most Outrageous,” “Most Useful,” “Most Creative,” and “Most Euphemistic.” Previous winners have been words such as “red/blue/purple states”, “santorum”, “metrosexual”, “blog”, “google” (verb), “chad”, “muggle”, “dot-com”, prefix e- for “electronic”, “World Wide Web”
This year’s overall winner was a word that Stephen used on his show The Colbert Report (the "t's" are silent!):
Truthiness: refers to the quality of preferring concepts or facts one wishes to be true, rather than concepts or facts known to be true. As Stephen Colbert put it, “I don't trust books. They're all fact, no heart.” - You can check out a very funny clip of him explaining truthiness here (under videos > bottom of Colbert Report's video list).
Other words/phrases on the list were:
Hurricane Katrina related words/phrases
Heck of a job: catch phrase coined by President Bush.
Brown-out: the poor handling of an emergency.
Disaster industrial complex: the array of businesses which make profit from providing emergency services, especially those that result from no-bid government contracts.
Fashion words/phrases
Whale tail: the appearance of thong or g-string underwear above the waistband of pants, shorts, or a skirt. Also known as a longhorn.
Muffin top: the bulge of flesh hanging over the top of low-rider jeans.
Tom Cruise related words/phrases
Jump the couch: to exhibit strange or frenetic behavior. Inspired by the couchbouncing antics of Tom Cruise on Oprah Winfrey’s talk show in May. It derives from an earlier term, jump the shark, meaning to (irretrievably) diminish in quality; to outlast public interest or popular support.
Cruisazy: crazy in the manner of Tom Cruise.
Computer related words/phrases
Cyber Monday: the Monday after Thanksgiving, purported to be the day that most online shopping takes place.
Podcast: a digital feed containing audio or video files for downloading to a portable MP3player. From the brand name MP3 player iPod + broadcast.
Misc. words/phrases
Crotchfruit: a child; children. Perhaps inspired by the expression the fruit of
one’s loins, this term began among proponents of child-free public spaces, but has since spread to parents who use it jocularly.
Every year the American Dialect Society votes on the best new/newly prominent words/phrases of the year. They vote for different categories such as “Most Outrageous,” “Most Useful,” “Most Creative,” and “Most Euphemistic.” Previous winners have been words such as “red/blue/purple states”, “santorum”, “metrosexual”, “blog”, “google” (verb), “chad”, “muggle”, “dot-com”, prefix e- for “electronic”, “World Wide Web”
This year’s overall winner was a word that Stephen used on his show The Colbert Report (the "t's" are silent!):
Truthiness: refers to the quality of preferring concepts or facts one wishes to be true, rather than concepts or facts known to be true. As Stephen Colbert put it, “I don't trust books. They're all fact, no heart.” - You can check out a very funny clip of him explaining truthiness here (under videos > bottom of Colbert Report's video list).
Other words/phrases on the list were:
Hurricane Katrina related words/phrases
Heck of a job: catch phrase coined by President Bush.
Brown-out: the poor handling of an emergency.
Disaster industrial complex: the array of businesses which make profit from providing emergency services, especially those that result from no-bid government contracts.
Fashion words/phrases
Whale tail: the appearance of thong or g-string underwear above the waistband of pants, shorts, or a skirt. Also known as a longhorn.
Muffin top: the bulge of flesh hanging over the top of low-rider jeans.
Tom Cruise related words/phrases
Jump the couch: to exhibit strange or frenetic behavior. Inspired by the couchbouncing antics of Tom Cruise on Oprah Winfrey’s talk show in May. It derives from an earlier term, jump the shark, meaning to (irretrievably) diminish in quality; to outlast public interest or popular support.
Cruisazy: crazy in the manner of Tom Cruise.
Computer related words/phrases
Cyber Monday: the Monday after Thanksgiving, purported to be the day that most online shopping takes place.
Podcast: a digital feed containing audio or video files for downloading to a portable MP3player. From the brand name MP3 player iPod + broadcast.
Misc. words/phrases
Crotchfruit: a child; children. Perhaps inspired by the expression the fruit of
one’s loins, this term began among proponents of child-free public spaces, but has since spread to parents who use it jocularly.