rhetorical

1 marked by the use of impressive-sounding but mostly meaningless words and phrases you can skip over the rhetorical passages and still get the gist of the essay Synonyms of rhetorical bombastic, flatulent, fustian, gaseous, gassy, grandiloquent, oratorical, orotund, windy Words Related to rhetorical bloated, elevated, florid, flowery, grandiose, highfalutin (also hifalutin), high-flown, high-sounding, inflated, lofty, ornate, pompous, pontifical, pretentious, stilted, tumid, turgid; overdone, verbose, wordy Near Antonyms of rhetorical eloquent, well-spoken; bald, direct, matter-of-fact, plain, plainspoken, simple, stark, straightforward, unadorned, unaffected, unpretentious Antonyms of rhetorical unrhetorical

2 full of fine words and fancy expressions the new governor delivered a long rhetorical speech about our state's bright future but laid out no specific programs for ensuring it Synonyms of rhetorical aureate, florid, grandiloquent, highfalutin (also hifalutin), high-flown, high-sounding, magnific, ornate, purple, flowery (also rhetoric)Words Related to rhetorical affected, bloated, fancy-pants, grandiose, inflated, pompous, pretentious, stilted; excessive, flattering, fulsome; boastful, bombastic; elevated, eloquent, lofty; bookish, inkhorn, learnedNear Antonyms of rhetorical prosaic, unpoetic; bald, direct, lean, matter-of-fact, plain, plainspoken, simple, spare, stark, straightforward, unadorned; natural, unaffected, unpretentious

3 of or relating to words or language the next war that those two nations fight won't be rhetorical—it will be with bombs and bullets Synonyms of rhetorical lexical, linguistic (also linguistical), verbal (also rhetoric), vocabular, wordyWords Related to rhetorical communicative, conversationalAntonyms of rhetorical nonlexical, nonlinguistic, nonverbal