How to remove anchor tag from text when it prints in php / wordpress

I'm trying to figure out how tor remove the anchor tag that wraps开发者_运维技巧 a printed word to the html page. Suchas:

<a href="something">blog</a>

instead to be just simply:

blog

I reckon it has something to do with both this:

%1$s

and mostly this part of my code:

    // Prints the string, replacing the placeholders.
    printf(
        $posted_in,
        get_the_category_list( ', ' ),
        $tag_list,
        get_permalink(),
        the_title_attribute( 'echo=0' )
    );

I made a new function.

Now just trying to figure out why %1$s produces the anchor tag version of the category name instead of just the plain text format instead?

I'm thinking it partly has to do with this as well: = __

Not too sure. Cause the normal Category reference: %s does not work either in place of %1$s.

if ( ! function_exists( 'designconcepts_posted_under' ) ) :
/**
 * Prints HTML with title information for the current single post (category title).
 *
 * @since Design Concepts 1.0
 */
function designconcepts_posted_under() {
    // Retrieves tag list of current post, separated by commas.
    $tag_list = get_the_tag_list( '', ', ' );
    if ( $tag_list ) {
        $posted_in = __( '%1$s', 'designconcepts' );
    } elseif ( is_object_in_taxonomy( get_post_type(), 'category' ) ) {
        $posted_in = __( '%1$s', 'designconcepts' );
    } else {
        $posted_in = __( '%1$s', 'designconcepts' );
    }
    // Prints the string, replacing the placeholders.
    printf(
        $posted_in,
        get_the_category_list( ', ' ),
        $tag_list,
        get_permalink(),
        the_title_attribute( 'echo=0' )
    );
}
endif;

Have you tried "strip_tags"? http://php.net/manual/en/function.strip-tags.php