A Finnish name for a grammar pendant has been praised by an American website, which picked out the top foreign words that should be assimilated into the English language.
Cracked.com, a humorous website, said ‘pilkunviilaaja’, meaning ‘comma nitpicker’ in Finnish, is one of their all-time favourite foreign nouns.
The website explains the meaning to be: “a person who believes it is their destiny to stamp out all spelling and punctuation mistakes at the cost of popularity, self-esteem and mental well-being.” It adds that the moniker is much less complicated and offensive than ‘grammar Nazi’, commonly used in the UK and US.
Other winning foreign phrases included ‘Neidbau’, a German term for buildings that were constructed only to annoy neighbours, and ‘Pochemuchka’, a Russian expression for someone who asks too many questions.