1
as in ambiguity
deliberate evasion in speech
rather than answering the question directly, he resorted to circumlocution, which made her suspect that he was hiding something
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Antonyms & Near Antonyms
2
as in repetition
the use of too many words to express an idea
your papers have to be five pages long, but that's five pages of substance, not circumlocution
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Antonyms & Near Antonyms
Example Sentences
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Recent Examples of circumlocution
Here, instead, she’s swayed by a dead Diana softly squeezing her hand and kindly hinting — the dead Diana is an ace at tactful circumlocution — that now is the time to show a mourning nation some emotion.
—
Tom Gliatto, Peoplemag, 16 Nov. 2023
By condensing Balzac’s opus to a few paragraphs, Barthelme was having a laugh not just at his predecessor’s genteel circumlocution—his tendency to describe buildings and manufacturing procedures and family trees in lavish detail—but also at the conventions of novelistic mimesis itself.
—Giles Harvey, The New York Review of Books, 23 Apr. 2020
This year, House Republicans unveiled a new Conservative Climate Caucus that, in a fascinating circumlocution, sort of recognizes that fossil fuels are causing the planet to warm.
—Robinson Meyer, The Atlantic, 2 Nov. 2022
Powell’s statement yesterday (September 22) is the masterpiece of its type, building upon fifteen months of this playful circumlocution, downshifting into bureaucratic blandness.
—George Calhoun, Forbes, 23 Sep. 2021
But the national crisis in policing and the response to it isn’t a matter of arid elite debate or familiar political circumlocution and compromise anymore.
—David Roth, The New Republic, 11 June 2020
These circumlocutions are meant to emphasize the fact that Africans traded like chattel were not, in their essence, slaves but human beings.
—Lionel Shriver, Harper's magazine, 25 Nov. 2019
Although incredibly popular, with 60% approval ratings, Ahok was considered by many to be a divisive figure, by virtue both of his minority status and of his bluntness, which ran counter to Javanese traditions of deference and circumlocution.
—The Economist, 12 Apr. 2018
Mungiu, like many Romanian directors, has a sadistic streak for circumlocution.
—Jordan Hoffman, VanityFair.com, 6 Apr. 2017
Tom Gliatto, Peoplemag, 16 Nov. 2023
By condensing Balzac’s opus to a few paragraphs, Barthelme was having a laugh not just at his predecessor’s genteel circumlocution—his tendency to describe buildings and manufacturing procedures and family trees in lavish detail—but also at the conventions of novelistic mimesis itself.
—Giles Harvey, The New York Review of Books, 23 Apr. 2020
This year, House Republicans unveiled a new Conservative Climate Caucus that, in a fascinating circumlocution, sort of recognizes that fossil fuels are causing the planet to warm.
—Robinson Meyer, The Atlantic, 2 Nov. 2022
Powell’s statement yesterday (September 22) is the masterpiece of its type, building upon fifteen months of this playful circumlocution, downshifting into bureaucratic blandness.
—George Calhoun, Forbes, 23 Sep. 2021
But the national crisis in policing and the response to it isn’t a matter of arid elite debate or familiar political circumlocution and compromise anymore.
—David Roth, The New Republic, 11 June 2020
These circumlocutions are meant to emphasize the fact that Africans traded like chattel were not, in their essence, slaves but human beings.
—Lionel Shriver, Harper's magazine, 25 Nov. 2019
Although incredibly popular, with 60% approval ratings, Ahok was considered by many to be a divisive figure, by virtue both of his minority status and of his bluntness, which ran counter to Javanese traditions of deference and circumlocution.
—The Economist, 12 Apr. 2018
Mungiu, like many Romanian directors, has a sadistic streak for circumlocution.
—Jordan Hoffman, VanityFair.com, 6 Apr. 2017
Recent Examples of Synonyms for circumlocution
Noun
-
Director Flanagan handles the escalating insanity with suggestive ambiguity, nothing too bombastic for as long as the story allows.—
Michael Phillips,
Chicago Tribune,
6 June 2025
-
Leading in ongoing ambiguity demands emotional endurance, narrative agility and the strength to stay grounded while evolving at speed.—
Expert Panel®,
Forbes.com,
6 June 2025
Noun
-
Lifting heavier weights or successfully completing more repetitions are other signs of muscle gain.—
Jennifer Steinhoff,
Verywell Health,
6 June 2025
-
Disjointed communication between interviewers often leads to repetition and confusion.—
Nadia Edwards-Dashti,
Forbes.com,
6 June 2025
Noun
-
John Cena walked into WrestleMania 41 in Las Vegas with the polite shuffle of a man reporting for overtime.—
Oliver Bateman,
The Washington Examiner,
30 May 2025
-
Hours later, the shuffle within the agency was announced.—
Dan Gooding
Gabe Whisnant,
MSNBC Newsweek,
29 May 2025
Noun
-
The equivocation over the ground invasion reflects Mr. Netanyahu’s need to satisfy far-right cabinet ministers, who are pushing for the full re-occupation of Gaza, and Israel’s top generals, who believe such a move would be difficult to sustain and dangerous to hostages held in Gaza.—
Patrick Kingsley,
New York Times,
19 May 2025
-
The very title of the exhibition, the first Conceptualist project to use photocopy as a medium, signals a deliberate equivocation over nothing less than the ontology of the art object.—
Jeffrey Weiss,
Artforum,
1 May 2025
Noun
-
But Sieh is the standout, emitting a complex blend of sardonic acceptance, cynical verbosity and submerged emotional longing.—
Chris Jones,
Chicago Tribune,
14 May 2025
-
Coogler can let his characters’ verbosity get the better of story momentum.—
Michael Phillips,
Chicago Tribune,
15 Apr. 2025
Noun
-
The color, the pizzazz, the spectacle is what has drawn so many of us to the handiwork of the LLM in a diffusion model, where the program adds noise, prior to de-noising into a novel, coherent result.—
John Werner,
Forbes.com,
29 May 2025
-
Nvidia should be using its success around the world to work hard to compete against China in other markets and stop focusing on its diminishing market share in China, especially after Trump gave the company the gift of repelling the AI diffusion rule.—
Dewardric L. McNeal,
CNBC,
29 May 2025
Noun
-
Just as the limitless space of web text tempts writers to indulge their logorrhea, the blinking, ever-transmuting, cartoonish interface of web browsers prevents would-be readers from paying attention to anything for longer than about 7 seconds.—
Barton Swaim,
WSJ,
19 Sep. 2022
-
Nor has Musk kept his Twitter logorrhea in check in other respects.—
Michael Hiltzik,
Los Angeles Times,
28 Apr. 2022
Noun
-
On their website, the three yellow stripes are prominently featured on the website under the Black Lives Matter wordage, and used on their social media accounts.—
Amritpal Kaur Sandhu-Longoria,
USA TODAY,
29 Mar. 2023
-
Reached by the Union-Tribune Wednesday morning, Lindsey differed with McGillis’ wordage.—
Don Norcross,
San Diego Union-Tribune,
22 Mar. 2023
Cite this Entry
“Circumlocution.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/circumlocution. Accessed 10 Jun. 2025.
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