If you have both gigantic and enormous available to describe really big things, why would you need to create "ginormous" out of the two of them? But enough people have used it that Merriam-Webster has included it on the list of 100 new words in this year's edition. Also making the cut were Bollywood, sudoko, speed dating, IED, crunk, DVR and telenovela. Not everyone is impressed:
One of those naysayers is Allan Metcalf, a professor of English at MacMurray College in Jacksonville, Illinois, and the executive secretary of the American Dialect Society.
«A new word that stands out and is ostentatious is going to sink like a lead balloon,» he said. «It might enjoy a fringe existence.
Pretentious + ostentatious = pretatious
Comments
SO much for my coining the term "Environmangelist" when referring to Al Gore then, eh?
(Darn...so close)
;)
B.G.
Reminds me of a great B-movie title -
The Giant Behemoth
(which would make a nice companion movie at a drive-in, along with Attack of the 50 Foot Woman)