Entry Word: rhetoric

Function: noun

Meaning: 1 language that is impressive-sounding but not meaningful or sincere <the mayorʼs promise to fight drugs was just rhetoric, since there was no money in the city budget for a drug program>

Synonyms bombast, gas, grandiloquence, hot air, oratory, wind

Related Words claptrap, drivel, gibberish, hogwash, humbug, jabberwocky, jazz, moonshine, nonsense; affectedness, floweriness, grandiosity, loftiness, pomposity, pretension, pretentiousness; verboseness, verbosity, windiness, wordiness

2 the art or power of speaking or writing in a forceful and convincing way <great leaders have often been masters of rhetoric, which they have used for both good and ill> — see eloquence