The List: What's In and Out

The List: What's In and Out is a U.S. pop culture list published annually by The Washington Post newspaper, on or near New Year's Day in the Style section. It was started by the paper's fashion editor, Nina Hyde, in 1977, and tended to by various former and current Post writers after Hyde's death in 1990, including Martha Sherrill, Cathy Horyn and Robin Givhan. From 2003 to 2009 The List was written by staff writer Hank Stuever. In 2010, Washington Post staff writers Monica Hesse and Dan Zak co-authored The List, which itemizes people, places, things, and even ideas-and rates them as either "out" (not popular, not fun, not recommended) or "in" (popular, fun, and recommended).

The list has been criticized for being mostly or completely subjective. Sometimes a person has been considered both "Out" and "In" (for example, Madonna in 1985 and Al Gore in 2007). At other times, the list makes indirect references to people; also in 2007, listed as "Out" is "Wrestling-coach voice" (this is a veiled reference to out-going Republican House Speaker Dennis Hastert) while listed as "In" is "Mother-of-five voice" (a veiled reference to in-coming Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi).