platitude: difference between revisions

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===Etymology===
===Etymology===
From {{bor|en|fr|platitude}}, from {{m|fr|plat||flat}}, from {{der|en|VL.|*plattus}}, from {{der|en|grc|πλᾰτῠ́ς}}.
Borrowed from {{bor|en|fr|platitude}}, from {{m|fr|plat||flat}}.


===Pronunciation===
===Pronunciation===
* {{a|RP}} {{IPA|en|/ˈplatɪtjuːd/|/ˈplatɪtʃuːd/}}
* {{IPA|en|/ˈplatɪtjuːd/|/ˈplatɪtʃuːd/|a=RP}}
* {{a|GA}} {{IPA|en|/ˈplætɪt(j)ud/}}
* {{IPA|en|/ˈplætɪt(j)ud/|a=GA}}
** {{audio|en|en-us-platitude.ogg|Audio (US)}}
* {{audio|en|en-us-platitude.ogg|a=US}}
* {{audio|en|en-au-platitude.ogg|Audio (AU)}}
* {{audio|en|en-au-platitude.ogg|a=AU}}


{{wikipedia}}
{{wikipedia}}
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{{en-noun|~}}
{{en-noun|~}}


# {{lb|en|countable}} An often-[[quoted]] [[saying]] that is supposed to be meaningful but has become [[unoriginal]] or [[hackneyed]] through overuse; a [[cliché]].
# {{senseid|en|hackneyed saying}} {{lb|en|countable}} An often-[[quoted]] [[saying]] that is supposed to be meaningful but has become [[unoriginal]] or [[hackneyed]] through overuse.
⚫
#: {{syn|en|cliché|Thesaurus:saying}}
#* {{quote-book|en|year=1918|author=[[w:Algernon Blackwood|Algernon Blackwood]]|title=''[[s:The Garden of Survival|The Garden of Survival]]''|chapter=XI|passage=Beauty, I suppose, opens the heart, extends the consciousness. It is a '''platitude''', of course.}}
#* {{quote-book|en|year=1922|author=[[w:Michael Arlen|Michael Arlen]]|title=“Piracy”: A Romantic Chronicle of These Days|chapter=2/1/2|url=http://openlibrary.org/works/OL1519647W|passage=Semiramis was the first woman to invent eunuchs and women have had sympathy for them ever since; {{...}} and women can tell them what they can't tell other men. And Ivor, suddenly cheered by laughing at his absurd '''platitudes''', and finding himself by the door, was going from the room.}}
#* {{quote-book|en|year=1918|author=w:Algernon Blackwood|title=''[[s:The Garden of Survival|The Garden of Survival]]''|chapter=XI|passage=Beauty, I suppose, opens the heart, extends the consciousness. It is a '''platitude''', of course.}}
#* {{quote-book|en|year=1922|author=w:Michael Arlen|title=“Piracy”: A Romantic Chronicle of These Days|chapter=2/1/2|url=http://openlibrary.org/works/OL1519647W|passage=Semiramis was the first woman to invent eunuchs and women have had sympathy for them ever since; {{...}} and women can tell them what they can't tell other men. And Ivor, suddenly cheered by laughing at his absurd '''platitudes''', and finding himself by the door, was going from the room.}}
#* {{quote-journal|en|author=Jonathan Watts|title=Amazon fires show world heading for point of no return, says UN|journal=The Guardian|url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/aug/30/amazon-fires-biodiversity-united-nations|date=August 30, 2019|text=For most of the past three decades, the natural world was treated almost as an afterthought by world leaders. If discussed at all, it was with '''platitudes''' about the need to save polar bears and tigers.}}
#* {{quote-journal|en|author=Jonathan Watts|title=Amazon fires show world heading for point of no return, says UN|journal=The Guardian|url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/aug/30/amazon-fires-biodiversity-united-nations|date=August 30, 2019|text=For most of the past three decades, the natural world was treated almost as an afterthought by world leaders. If discussed at all, it was with '''platitudes''' about the need to save polar bears and tigers.}}
# {{lb|en|countable}} A claim that is trivially true, to the point of being uninteresting.
# {{senseid|en|truism}} {{lb|en|countable}} A claim that is trivially true, to the point of being uninteresting.
#: {{syn|en|truism}}
#* {{quote-book|en|year=1963|author=James R. Kreuzer|author2=Lee Cogan|title=Modern Writings on Major English Authors|publisher=Ardent Media|page=109
#* {{quote-book|en|year=1963|author=James R. Kreuzer; Lee Cogan|title=Modern Writings on Major English Authors|publisher=Ardent Media|page=109
|text=The synthesis which he helped to effect was so successful that this aspect of his work escaped notice in the last century: all that Britomart stands for was '''platitude''' to our fathers. It is '''platitude''' no longer.}}
|text=The synthesis which he helped to effect was so successful that this aspect of his work escaped notice in the last century: all that Britomart stands for was '''platitude''' to our fathers. It is '''platitude''' no longer.}}
#* {{quote-book|en|year=1993|author=Harold B. Segel|title=The Vienna Coffeehouse Wits, 1890-1938|publisher=Purdue University Press|isbn=9781557530332|page=210
#* {{quote-book|en|year=1993|author=Harold B. Segel|title=The Vienna Coffeehouse Wits, 1890-1938|publisher=Purdue University Press|isbn=9781557530332|page=210
Line 28: Line 30:
#* {{quote-book|en|date=2012-09-16|author=Mathias Risse|title=On Global Justice|publisher=Princeton University Press|isbn=9781400845507|page=149
#* {{quote-book|en|date=2012-09-16|author=Mathias Risse|title=On Global Justice|publisher=Princeton University Press|isbn=9781400845507|page=149
|text=Indeed, in the ownership scenario the idealization is supported in a much thinner manner: we start with a '''platitude''' that characterizes individuals as coowners (that they are de facto seen as either property holders themselves or otherwise as {{...}}}}
|text=Indeed, in the ownership scenario the idealization is supported in a much thinner manner: we start with a '''platitude''' that characterizes individuals as coowners (that they are de facto seen as either property holders themselves or otherwise as {{...}}}}
# {{lb|en|uncountable}} [[flatness|Flatness]]; lack of [[change]], [[activity]], or [[deviation]].
# {{senseid|en|flatness or stasis}} {{lb|en|uncountable}} [[flatness|Flatness]]; lack of [[change]], [[activity]], or [[deviation]].
#* {{quote-book|en|year=1992| title=The Politics of Art: Eli Mandel's Poetry and Criticism |author=Ed Jewinski, Andrew Stubbs | page=31| passage=The former figures the typical prairie landscape-poet who who stops at the correction line (which itself literally denies the '''platitude''' of flatness) to notice the ever-present wind.}}
#* {{quote-book|en|year=1992| title=The Politics of Art: Eli Mandel's Poetry and Criticism |author=Ed Jewinski; Andrew Stubbs | page=31| passage=The former figures the typical prairie landscape-poet who who stops at the correction line (which itself literally denies the '''platitude''' of flatness) to notice the ever-present wind.}}
#* {{quote-book|en|year=2001| title=Dead Time: Temporal Disorders in the Wake of Modernity |author=Elissa Marder | page=87| passage=With the photograph, we enter into ''flat death''. One day, leaving one of my classes, someone said to me with disdain, "You talk about death very flatly." — As if the horror of Death were not precisely its '''platitude'''!}}
#* {{quote-book|en|year=2001| title=Dead Time: Temporal Disorders in the Wake of Modernity |author=Elissa Marder | page=87| passage=With the photograph, we enter into ''flat death''. One day, leaving one of my classes, someone said to me with disdain, "You talk about death very flatly." — As if the horror of Death were not precisely its '''platitude'''!}}
#* {{quote-book|en|year=2013| title=A Companion to Donald Davidson|author=Ernest Lepore, Kirk Ludwig | page=| passage=Though we do not have a traditional correspondence theory, which sets up a structural similarity relation between statements and facts, we have the truth of sentences determined by word-to-world relations, in particular, relations between linguistic items and objects. This reflects the '''platitude''' behind correspondence, but the Tarskian appartatus gives the '''platitude''' more substance.}}
#* {{quote-book|en|year=2013| title=A Companion to Donald Davidson|author=Ernest Lepore; Kirk Ludwig | page=| passage=Though we do not have a traditional correspondence theory, which sets up a structural similarity relation between statements and facts, we have the truth of sentences determined by word-to-world relations, in particular, relations between linguistic items and objects. This reflects the '''platitude''' behind correspondence, but the Tarskian appartatus gives the '''platitude''' more substance.}}
# {{lb|en|uncountable}} [[unoriginality|Unoriginality]]; [[triteness]].
# {{senseid|en|unoriginality}} {{lb|en|uncountable}} [[unoriginality|Unoriginality]]; [[triteness]].
#* {{quote-book|en|year=1978| title=Seven Cities of Australia |author=| page=45| passage=seemly '''platitude''', flat-footed ordinariness, and well-enacted upper working class respectability cancel out any turpitude, exhilarating tension or satanic glamour a casino might be expected to have.}}
#* {{quote-book|en|year=1978| title=Seven Cities of Australia |author=| page=45| passage=seemly '''platitude''', flat-footed ordinariness, and well-enacted upper working class respectability cancel out any turpitude, exhilarating tension or satanic glamour a casino might be expected to have.}}
#* {{quote-book|en|year=1984| title=Essays and Reviews |author=Library of America, Edgar Allan Poe, Gary Richard Thompson | page=71| passage=After a passage of what we feel to be true poetry, there follows, inevitably, a passage of '''platitude''' which no critical pre-judgment can force us to admire; }}
#* {{quote-book|en|year=1984| title=Essays and Reviews |author=Library of America, Edgar Allan Poe, Gary Richard Thompson | page=71| passage=After a passage of what we feel to be true poetry, there follows, inevitably, a passage of '''platitude''' which no critical pre-judgment can force us to admire; }}
#* {{quote-book|en|year=2001| title=On the study of celtic literature |author=Daniel R. Davis, Matthew Arnold | page=127| passage=Of the true steady-going German nature the bane is, as I remarked, flat commonness; there seems no end to its capacity for '''platitude'''; it has neither the quick perception of the Celt to save it from '''platitude''', nor the strenuousness of the Norman; }}
#* {{quote-book|en|year=2001| title=On the study of celtic literature |author=Daniel R. Davis; Matthew Arnold | page=127| passage=Of the true steady-going German nature the bane is, as I remarked, flat commonness; there seems no end to its capacity for '''platitude'''; it has neither the quick perception of the Celt to save it from '''platitude''', nor the strenuousness of the Norman; }}
#* {{quote-book|en|year=2014| title=Concept and Application of Transdisciplinarity in Intellectual Discourse and Research |author=Hester du Plessis, Jeffrey Sehume, Leonard Martin | page=29| passage=More damning, this 'flat-pack kit' causes us to decline into '''platitude''' and predictablity, denies us from real political intellectual purchase and, as result, standard theoretical ideas become our ideological comforters.}}
#* {{quote-book|en|year=2014| title=Concept and Application of Transdisciplinarity in Intellectual Discourse and Research |author=Hester du Plessis; Jeffrey Sehume; Leonard Martin | page=29| passage=More damning, this 'flat-pack kit' causes us to decline into '''platitude''' and predictability, denies us from real political intellectual purchase and, as result, standard theoretical ideas become our ideological comforters.}}


====Quotations====
====Quotations====
* {{seeCites|en}}
* {{seeCites|en}}

====Synonyms====
⚫
* {{l|en|cliché}}
* See also [[Thesaurus:saying]]


====Related terms====
====Related terms====
Line 64: Line 62:
* Armenian: {{t|hy|ծեծված արտահայտություն|sc=Armn}}
* Armenian: {{t|hy|ծեծված արտահայտություն|sc=Armn}}
* Bulgarian: {{t|bg|изтъркана фраза|f}}
* Bulgarian: {{t|bg|изтъркана фраза|f}}
* Catalan: {{t|ca|vacuïtat|f}}
* Chinese:
* Chinese:
*: Mandarin: {{t+|cmn|老生常談|tr=lǎoshēngchángtán}}, {{t+|cmn|陳詞濫調|tr=chéncílàndiào}}
*: Mandarin: {{t+|cmn|老生常談|tr=lǎoshēngchángtán}}, {{t+|cmn|陳詞濫調|tr=chéncílàndiào}}
Line 72: Line 71:
* French: {{t+|fr|platitude|f}}
* French: {{t+|fr|platitude|f}}
* Galician: {{t|gl|tópico|m}}
* Galician: {{t|gl|tópico|m}}
* German: {{t+|de|Plattitüde|f}}
* German: {{t+|de|Plattitüde|f}}, {{t+|de|Gemeinplatz|m}}, {{t+|de|Klischee|n}}, {{t+|de|Floskel|f}}
* Greek: {{t+|el|κοινοτυπία|f}}
* Greek: {{t+|el|κοινοτυπία|f}}
* Hungarian: {{t+|hu|közhely}}, {{t+|hu|frázis}}, {{t+|hu|klisé}}, {{t+|hu|szólam}}
* Hungarian: {{t+|hu|közhely}}, {{t+|hu|frázis}}, {{t+|hu|klisé}}, {{t+|hu|szólam}}
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* Italian: {{t+|it|luogo comune}}
* Italian: {{t+|it|luogo comune}}
* Japanese: {{t|ja|[[陳腐]]な[[言葉]]|tr=chinpu na kotoba}}, {{t|ja|[[在り来り]]の[[発言]]|tr=arikitari no hatsugen}}
* Japanese: {{t|ja|[[陳腐]]な[[言葉]]|tr=chinpu na kotoba}}, {{t|ja|[[在り来り]]の[[発言]]|tr=arikitari no hatsugen}}
* Maori: {{t|mi|(kupu) rārahu}}
* Norwegian:
* Norwegian:
*: Bokmål: {{t+|nb|platthet|m|f}}, {{t|nb|alminnenlighet|m|f}}
*: Bokmål: {{t+|nb|platthet|m|f}}, {{t|nb|alminnenlighet|m|f}}
Line 96: Line 96:
* Esperanto: {{t|eo|banaleco}}
* Esperanto: {{t|eo|banaleco}}
* Finnish: {{t+|fi|latteus}}
* Finnish: {{t+|fi|latteus}}
* German: {{t+|de|Plattitüde|f}}, {{t+|de|Binsenweisheit|f}}, {{t+|de|Banalität|f}}, {{t+|de|Plattheit|f}}, {{t|de|Flachheit|f}}, {{t+|de|Floskel|f}}, {{t+|de|Binse|f}}, {{t+|de|Binsenwahrheit|f}}, {{t|de|Abgedroschenheit|f}}
* German: {{t+|de|Plattitüde|f}}
* Greek: {{t+|el|κοινοτυπία|f}}
* Greek: {{t+|el|κοινοτυπία|f}}
* Hungarian: {{t+|hu|banalitás}}, {{t|hu|laposság}}, {{t|hu|elkoptatottság}}
* Hungarian: {{t+|hu|banalitás}}, {{t+|hu|laposság}}, {{t|hu|elkoptatottság}}
* Italian: {{t+|it|banalità}}
* Italian: {{t+|it|banalità}}
* Portuguese: {{t+|pt|platitude|f}}, {{t+|pt|banalidade|f}}
* Portuguese: {{t+|pt|platitude|f}}, {{t+|pt|banalidade|f}}
* Russian: {{t+|ru|бана́льность|f}}
* Russian: {{t+|ru|бана́льность|f}}, {{t+|ru|трюи́зм|m}}
* Spanish: {{t+|es|obviedad|f}}, {{t|es|trivialidad}}
* Spanish: {{t+|es|obviedad|f}}, {{t+|es|trivialidad}}
* Swedish: {{t+|sv|plattityd}}, {{t+|sv|banalitet}}
* Swedish: {{t+|sv|plattityd}}, {{t+|sv|banalitet}}
{{trans-bottom}}
{{trans-bottom}}
Line 113: Line 113:


===Etymology===
===Etymology===
From {{der|nl|fr|platitude}}.
Borrowed from {{bor|nl|fr|platitude}}.


===Pronunciation===
===Pronunciation===
* {{IPA|nl|/plaːtiˈtydə/}}
* {{IPA|nl|/plaːtiˈtydə/}}
* {{audio|nl|Nl-platitude.ogg|Audio}}
* {{audio|nl|Nl-platitude.ogg}}


===Noun===
===Noun===
Line 127: Line 127:


===Etymology===
===Etymology===
{{af|fr|plat|-itude|t1=flat}}
From {{af|fr|plat|-itude|t1=flat}}.


===Pronunciation===
===Pronunciation===
* {{fr-IPA}}
* {{fr-IPA}}
* {{audio|fr|LL-Q150 (fra)-Lepticed7-platitude.wav|Audio}}
* {{audio|fr|LL-Q150 (fra)-Lepticed7-platitude.wav}}


===Noun===
===Noun===
{{fr-noun|f|-}}
{{fr-noun|f|~}}


# [[flatness]]
# [[flatness]]
#* {{quote-book|fr|year=1921|author={{w|Henri-René Lenormand}}|title=Le Simoun|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=mmdVAAAAYAAJ&pg=RA1-PA62
#* {{quote-book|fr|year=1921|author=w:Henri-René Lenormand|title=Le Simoun|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=mmdVAAAAYAAJ&pg=RA1-PA62
|passage=La chebka. Une immense '''platitude''' de pierres. Une sorte de néant jaunâtre, sous un ciel sulfureux.|t=The Sebkha. A vast '''expanse''' <!-- plain?--> of rocks. A sort of yellowish nothingness under a sulfurous sky.}}
|passage=La chebka. Une immense '''platitude''' de pierres. Une sorte de néant jaunâtre, sous un ciel sulfureux.|t=The Sebkha. A vast '''expanse''' <!-- plain?--> of rocks. A sort of yellowish nothingness under a sulfurous sky.}}
# {{lb|fr|figuratively}} [[blandness]]; lack of [[originality]]
# {{lb|fr|uncountable|figuratively}} [[blandness]], [[triteness]], [[unoriginality]]
# {{lb|fr|countable|figuratively}} [[#English|platitude]], [[banality]]
#: {{syn|fr|banalité}}


===Further reading===
===Further reading===
Line 145: Line 147:


==Portuguese==
==Portuguese==

===Etymology===
Borrowed from {{bor|pt|fr|platitude}}.

===Pronunciation===
{{pt-IPA}}
* {{hyph|pt|pla|ti|tu|de}}


===Noun===
===Noun===

Revision as of 11:41, 25 July 2024

See also: Platitüde

English

WOTD – 8 January 2007

Etymology

Borrowed from French platitude, from plat (“flat”).

Pronunciation

English Wikipedia has an article on:
Wikipedia

Noun

platitude (countable and uncountable, plural platitudes)

  2. (countable) An often-quoted saying that is supposed to be meaningful but has become unoriginal or hackneyed through overuse.
    Synonyms: cliché; see also Thesaurus:saying
    • 1918, Algernon Blackwood, chapter XI, in The Garden of Survival:
      Beauty, I suppose, opens the heart, extends the consciousness. It is a platitude, of course.
    • 1922, Michael Arlen, “2/1/2”, in “Piracy”: A Romantic Chronicle of These Days‎[1]:
      Semiramis was the first woman to invent eunuchs and women have had sympathy for them ever since; […] and women can tell them what they can't tell other men. And Ivor, suddenly cheered by laughing at his absurd platitudes, and finding himself by the door, was going from the room.
    • 2019 August 30, Jonathan Watts, “Amazon fires show world heading for point of no return, says UN”, in The Guardian‎[2]:
      For most of the past three decades, the natural world was treated almost as an afterthought by world leaders. If discussed at all, it was with platitudes about the need to save polar bears and tigers.
  4. (countable) A claim that is trivially true, to the point of being uninteresting.
    Synonym: truism
    • 1963, James R. Kreuzer, Lee Cogan, Modern Writings on Major English Authors, Ardent Media, page 109:
      The synthesis which he helped to effect was so successful that this aspect of his work escaped notice in the last century: all that Britomart stands for was platitude to our fathers. It is platitude no longer.
    • 1993, Harold B. Segel, The Vienna Coffeehouse Wits, 1890-1938, Purdue University Press, →ISBN, page 210:
      After explaining myself sufficiently, I now offer my own platitude: I believe that the institution of the cabaret has the right to exist only so long as it bears the character of dilettantism and improvisation.
    • 2012 September 16, Mathias Risse, On Global Justice, Princeton University Press, →ISBN, page 149:
      Indeed, in the ownership scenario the idealization is supported in a much thinner manner: we start with a platitude that characterizes individuals as coowners (that they are de facto seen as either property holders themselves or otherwise as […]
  6. (uncountable) Flatness; lack of change, activity, or deviation.
    • 1992, Ed Jewinski, Andrew Stubbs, The Politics of Art: Eli Mandel's Poetry and Criticism, page 31:
      The former figures the typical prairie landscape-poet who who stops at the correction line (which itself literally denies the platitude of flatness) to notice the ever-present wind.
    • 2001, Elissa Marder, Dead Time: Temporal Disorders in the Wake of Modernity, page 87:
      With the photograph, we enter into flat death. One day, leaving one of my classes, someone said to me with disdain, "You talk about death very flatly." — As if the horror of Death were not precisely its platitude!
    • 2013, Ernest Lepore, Kirk Ludwig, A Companion to Donald Davidson:
      Though we do not have a traditional correspondence theory, which sets up a structural similarity relation between statements and facts, we have the truth of sentences determined by word-to-world relations, in particular, relations between linguistic items and objects. This reflects the platitude behind correspondence, but the Tarskian appartatus gives the platitude more substance.
  8. (uncountable) Unoriginality; triteness.
    • 1978, Seven Cities of Australia, page 45:
      seemly platitude, flat-footed ordinariness, and well-enacted upper working class respectability cancel out any turpitude, exhilarating tension or satanic glamour a casino might be expected to have.
    • 1984, Library of America, Edgar Allan Poe, Gary Richard Thompson, Essays and Reviews, page 71:
      After a passage of what we feel to be true poetry, there follows, inevitably, a passage of platitude which no critical pre-judgment can force us to admire;
    • 2001, Daniel R. Davis, Matthew Arnold, On the study of celtic literature, page 127:
      Of the true steady-going German nature the bane is, as I remarked, flat commonness; there seems no end to its capacity for platitude; it has neither the quick perception of the Celt to save it from platitude, nor the strenuousness of the Norman;
    • 2014, Hester du Plessis, Jeffrey Sehume, Leonard Martin, Concept and Application of Transdisciplinarity in Intellectual Discourse and Research, page 29:
      More damning, this 'flat-pack kit' causes us to decline into platitude and predictability, denies us from real political intellectual purchase and, as result, standard theoretical ideas become our ideological comforters.

Quotations

Translations

References

Dutch

Etymology

Borrowed from French platitude.

Pronunciation

Noun

platitude f (plural platitudes, diminutive platitudetje n)

  1. platitude, cliché

French

Etymology

From plat (“flat”) +‎ -itude.

Pronunciation

Noun

platitude f (countable and uncountable, plural platitudes)

  1. flatness
    • 1921, Henri-René Lenormand, Le Simoun‎[3]:
      La chebka. Une immense platitude de pierres. Une sorte de néant jaunâtre, sous un ciel sulfureux.
      The Sebkha. A vast expanse of rocks. A sort of yellowish nothingness under a sulfurous sky.
  2. (uncountable, figuratively) blandness, triteness, unoriginality
  3. (countable, figuratively) platitude, banality
    Synonym: banalité

Further reading

Portuguese

Etymology

Borrowed from French platitude.

Pronunciation

 
  • (Brazil) IPA(key): /pla.t͡ʃiˈtu.d͡ʒi/
    • (Southern Brazil) IPA(key): /pla.t͡ʃiˈtu.de/

  • Hyphenation: pla‧ti‧tu‧de

Noun

platitude f (plural platitudes)

  1. platitude (an overused saying)
    Synonym: clichê
  2. platitude; triteness; unoriginality
    Synonym: banalidade
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