Dictionary

BANANA en · NOUN

Pronunciation

• /bəˈnɑːnə/ (Received-Pronunciation)
• /bəˈnænə/ (General-American)
• (Received-Pronunciation) audio
• bə-näʹnə (Received-Pronunciation)
• (General-American) audio
• bə-năʹnə (General-American)

Etymology

Contrived acronym of build absolutely nothing anywhere near anyone (or anything), as a play on "bananas" meaning "crazy, mad"

Meanings

1. (attributive, derogatory, humorous, informal, often) One who objects to the building of any structure in their neighbourhood or a certain type of structure anywhere, especially in public policy debate.
   • They don’t support bike lanes, sidewalks, traffic calming measures, or traffic widening measures. They complain about the lack of communication from city hall but also shout down the mayor and city staff whenever they attempt to explain their policy. You can summarize their views on zoning and new buildings as BANANAs: Build Absolutely Nothing Anywhere Near Anything. 2022 October 7, Arthur Augustyn, “Opinion: Stamford is a cultural hellhole. What do the people want?”, in Stamford Advocate, archived from the original on 14 Apr 2024:
   • Unfortunately, in some areas you can expect the NIMBY fervor to grow into BANANAs—Build Absolutely Nothing Anywhere Near Anybody. The ultimate result? Unless national security and economic issues intervene, we'll continue to rely more and more on imported fuel and the price of energy is most apt to climb higher. The high price of BANANAs, in the end, will not only be our dependence on foreign oil, but our economic vulnerability. 2002, Shirley J. Hansen, “Making the Most of Dereg”, in Manual for Intelligent Energy Services, Lilburn, Ga.: Fairmont Press, →ISBN, page 256:
   • Opposition to these projects is increasingly the norm as opposed to the exception and is not simply limited to a few environmentaly sensitive and wealthy areas such as Southern California. Cynics have observed that the NIMBY movement is evolving into a BANANA (build absolutely nothing anywhere near anyone) or even a NOPE (nowhere on planet Earth) movement with regard to controversial infrastructure siting. 2007, Michael D. Tusiani, Gordon Shearer, “Import-related Project Siting and Regulatory Issues”, in LNG: A Nontechnical Guide, Tulsa, Okla.: PennWell Corporation, →ISBN, pages 367–368:
   • David Taylor (Letters, January 23) does not appear to be aware that the NIMBY syndrome, with all its parochial overtones, has been superseded by the all embracing BANANA syndrome – Build Absolutely Nothing Anywhere Near Anyone. 1991 January 31, David Williams, “Nowhere, no time [letter]”, in The Sydney Morning Herald, Sydney, N.S.W., page 10:
   • Communities have gone far beyond the NIMBY, or not-in-my-backyard, syndrome. Jeff Langholtz, of EPA's Hazardous Site Control Division said, "Right now they don't want us to build them anywhere." Langholtz called the latest in public thinking "BANANA" – build-absolutely-nothing-anywhere-near-anything. Those opposed to incinerators are more organized than ever, he added. 1992, Environment Reporter, volume 23, Washington, D.C.: Bureau of National Affairs, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 2028, column 1:

Forms

Deriveds

BANANA principle

Relateds

LULU

Synonyms

NIMBY