"Supergirls" made the list. So did "Shenzhou VI."

But topping the general list of buzzwords in the Chinese lexicon for 2005 was the phrase "maintaining advancement of Party members." That means the Chinese Communist Party must have succeeded in keeping its self-education campaign in the public consciousness.

The list, released on Thursday, was compiled by the Application Linguistics Institute of Beijing Language and Culture University. The idea is to suggest what the nation was thinking about last year and in which direction it's heading.

Zhang Pu, president of the institute, said previous lists have shown a clear path of social reform. "New phrases are born to discriminate the year from the others, such as 'super-girls,' " he said.

"And the popularizing of some names symbolizes society's emphasis on personal values."

He cited Ding Junhui, the 18-year-old snooker gold medallist at last year's China Open, as an example, saying his presence on the list promotes a new concept of success in people's minds.

Divided into eight categories such as sports and entertainment, the list is the seventh of its kind since it was introduced in 2002.

All the phrases were selected out of a database of 500 million words and phrases compiled from 15 mainstream media ranging from the People's Daily to the Yangcheng Evening News, following a strict process of assessment by a consortium of language-monitoring agencies and media associations.

"Maintaining advancement of Party members," beat out "11th Five-Year Plan (2006-10)" and "Shenzhou VI" on the general list.

"Supergirls" topped the entertainment list. Some top phrases in the other categories were "personal income tax reform," "manned flight" and the "Five Friendlies," the newly publicized Olympic mascots.

Source: China Daily