A survey carried out by a US university on the usage of words and phrases has found that grammarians would like some of them to be removed from the English language.

The university published its annual list of hundreds of words, phrases and sayings that it would like banned, based on the nominations from linguists from around the world.

The list included phrases like 'bailout' and 'going green', which are prominent in the language, and also 'brainstorming', 'friendly fire', 'dude' and 'metrosexual'.

But this year the words that appear more prominently refer to the economy and environment.

'Going green', 'carbon footprint' and 'carbon offsetting' upset the grammarians at Michigan's Lake Superior State University.

They were also frustrated by the choice of the word 'bailout' to describe the use of emergency funds to remove banks' toxic assets.

"When your cousin calls you from jail in the middle of the night, he wants a bailout," the Australian quoted an irate voter as saying.

Pauline Bryant, a visiting fellow at the Australian National University's linguistic program, said that she would not like to see any words banned but there were some phrases she would "quite happily see not used again".

Bryant said that the misuse of the word 'literally', as in 'I literally exploded', should be forbidden.

She would also like to see the end of cliches like 'the reality is' and 'a level playing field'.