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Britain's most irritating expressions

Researchers at Oxford University have compiled a top ten of the most irritating expressions. Top of the list was “at the end of the day”, followed by “fairly unique”, reports the Daily Telegraph.

“I personally” - a phrase described by Radio 4 presenter John Humphreys as “the linguistic equivalent of having chips with rice” was third. Also making the top ten is the grammatically incorrect “shouldn’t of”, instead of “shouldn’t have”.

The phrases appear in a book called Damp Squid, named after the mistake of confusing a squid with a squib.

The researchers who compiled the list monitor the use of phrases in a database called the Oxford University Corpus, which comprises books, papers, magazines, broadcast, the internet and other sources.

The book’s author Jeremy Butterfield says many annoyingly over-used expressions actually began as office lingo, such as 24/7 and “synergy”. He said: “We grow tired of anything that is repeated too often - an anecdote, a joke, a mannerism - and the same seems to happen with some language.”

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Ruth Mitchell .