word salad

noun

1

psychology : unintelligible, extremely disorganized speech or writing manifested as a symptom of a mental disorder (such as schizophrenia)

Damage to Wernicke's area can result in the loss of semantic associations. … Trying to speak results in garbled, nonsensical juxtapositions that neuroscientists call "word salad".

—Duncan Graham-Rowe

2

: a string of empty, incoherent, unintelligible, or nonsensical words or comments

In the moments when the debate wasn't in circus form it seemed very conventional and very one-sided, with one candidate who could give complete, coherent and informed answers about issues and the other who specialized in word salad.

—Robert Schlesinger

… composed an essay that was a word salad of solemn academic jargon.

—George Will

Examples of word salad in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

This time, the challenger offered concrete answers instead of word salads. — Gustavo Arellano, Los Angeles Times, 20 Aug. 2026

Instead of standing up for her player, Stephanie White ducked behind a wall of corporate word salad. — Alejandro Avila Outkick, FOXNews.com, 17 Aug. 2026

Margaret, what the president said is just goofy word salad. — CBS News, 28 June 2026

With its collaborations now stretching to Japan, via Nintendo, a globalization defines Illumination — fitting given the international word salad gibberish of the Minions. — ABC News, 19 June 2026

Word History

First Known Use

1904, in the meaning defined at sense 1

Rhymes for word salad

• ballad
• pallid
• valid

Medical Definition

word salad

noun

word sal·​ad -ˌsal-əd 

: a jumble of extremely incoherent speech as sometimes observed in schizophrenia