As you probably have seen in the threads I linked you to in the other thread over there in the VC++ section, it's not really advisable to use the STL/CLR containers without really good reasons. In particular I recommend against using them as a mere convenience feature for native C++ developers who add C++/CLI to their repertoire.

Yes, the List<T> you used in your second code snippet is the .NET container of choice for this purpose. (Actually, when I was new to C++/CLI and looking for an equivalent to std::vector, I failed to consider it at all because its name reminded me to std::list which, as we know, is something completely different. I ended up not only using cliext::vector but also other STL/CLR containers which got me into considerable trouble, and that's what http://www.codeguru.com/forum/showthread.php?t=503117 is about. I only did that in that single program ever... )

However, note that what you've created in your snippet is a thing called implicitly dereferenced variable. (That's because you used that syntax for a reference type. If you'd have used it for a value type like int it wold actually be an ordinary local variable like it would be in native C++.) Implicitly dereferenced variables pretty much have the look and feel of ordinary local variables, yet they still represent an instance of a reference type behind the scenes. In particular, the instance gets implicitly default-constructed (unless you provide construction parameters) when the declaration is reached during execution. Also, and that's what I like most about them, they implicitly get deleted (in .NET speak: disposed) when the variable goes out of scope.

I really like them and use them every now and then in my code, but I try to avoid them in code I intend to post here on the forum. That's because AFAIK they're a speciality of C++/CLI (the only comparable construct I kow of is the using statement in C#, but that looks different) and tend to obscure the reference type semantics going on behind the scenes. For these reasons I'm afraid they can be confusing for programmers new to C++/CLI, perhaps especially when they already know another .NET language where AFAIK they always need to explicitly create reference type instances using the new operator (C# in this case) or something equivalent.

So, for comparison, your snippet expressed in the "usual" reference type syntax looks like this:

Code:
			System::Collections::Generic::List<String^> ^word = gcnew System::Collections::Generic::List<String^>;
			word->Add("Hello!");
			word->Add("Goodbye!");