Backward countries,
which became undeveloped countries,
which became underdeveloped countries,
which became less-developed countries,
which became developing countries,
are now to be known as low-income countries under stress,
according to the World Bank.

Any thoughts or examples of the prgressive march of euphemism or of the politically correct terminology? (from milum, for example)

I'm reminded of the famous question/answer of a reporter to Ghandi: "Mr. Ghandi, what do you think of Western civilization?" Ghandi" "I think it would be a good idea."

well, apparently the old term ESL (English as a Second Language) has now been replaced - at least in Aus - by CALD (Culturally & Liguistically Diverse), which to me is nowhere near the same thing... after all, you could and should say that Britain is CALD, but many/most wouldn't fit the ESL criteria...

alexis

Good morning, archedbrow. "Milum" is a poster on this board who, I'd bet, would have something characteristically informative and amusing to say on the subject.

http://wordsmith.org/board/showthreaded.pl?Cat=&Board=miscellany&Number=58672 exemplifies his jaw-dropping creativity.