['xxxxxxn', 'xxxxxxn', 'xxxxxxn', 'xxxxxxn', 'xxxxxx n', 'xxxxxxn', ' xxxxxx n', 'xxxxxx n', 'xxxxxxn', ...] AttributeError: 'list' object has no attribute 'strip' [s.strip().title() for s in my_list] a = ['xxxxxxn', ' xxxxxx n', 'xxxxxx n', 'xxxxxxn', ...] a = [x.strip().title() for x in a] my_list=['xxxxxxn', 'xxxxxxn', 'xxxxxxn', 'xxxxxxn', 'xxxxxx n', 'xxxxxxn', ' xxxxxx n', 'xxxxxx n', 'xxxxxxn'] def format_string_from_list(_str): return _str.strip().title() my_new_list=[format_string_from_list(_str) for _str in my_list] print my_new_list >>> ['Xxxxxx', 'Xxxxxx', 'Xxxxxx', 'Xxxxxx', 'Xxxxxx', 'Xxxxxx', 'Xxxxxx', 'Xxxxxx', 'Xxxxxx']