IE 11 is not supported. For an optimal experience visit our site on another browser.

'Plutoed' chosen as '06 Word of the Year

Pluto is finally getting some respect — not from astronomers, but from wordsmiths.
An artist's conception shows Pluto which has been stripped of its status as a planet
An artist's conception created at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics shows Pluto and its moon Charon as seen from the surface of one of Pluto's newly discovered candidate satellites. Pluto was stripped of its status as a planet August 24, 2006.Reuters file
/ Source: The Associated Press

Pluto is finally getting some respect — not from astronomers, but from wordsmiths.

"Plutoed" was chosen 2006's Word of the Year by the American Dialect Society at its annual meeting Friday.

To "pluto" is "to demote or devalue someone or something," much like what happened to the former planet last year when the General Assembly of the International Astronomical Union decided Pluto didn't meet its definition of a planet.

"Our members believe the great emotional reaction of the public to the demotion of Pluto shows the importance of Pluto as a name," said society president Cleveland Evans. "We may no longer believe in the Roman god Pluto, but we still have a sense of personal connection with the former planet."

"Plutoed" won in a runoff against "climate canary," defined as "an organism or species whose poor health or declining numbers hint at a larger environmental catastrophe on the horizon."

Month in Space: January 2014

Slideshow  12 photos

Month in Space: January 2014

From a launch out of the weeds to a special delivery in orbit, see the best space offerings from January 2014.

Other words considered: murse (man's purse), flog (a fake blog that promotes products) and macaca (an American citizen treated as an alien).

Republican former Sen. George Allen was ahead in his re-election campaign when he said "macaca," which some regard as a racial slur, and "welcome to America" in referring to a U.S.-born man of Indian descent who was volunteering for Allen's opponent. Allen lost to Democrat Jim Webb.

The 117-year-old American Dialect Society comprises linguists, grammarians, historians and independent scholars, among others. Members conduct the vote for fun and not in an official capacity to induct words into the English language.

The society chose "truthiness" as its top word last year. The word is credited to Comedy Central satirist Stephen Colbert, who defined it as "truth that comes from the gut, not books."

Last month, an online survey by dictionary publisher Merriam-Webster declared "truthiness" the word of the year for 2006.