SHIBBOLETHS Synonyms: 39 Similar and Opposite Words

shibboleths

noun

plural of shibboleth

as in slogans

an attention-getting word or phrase used to publicize something (as a campaign or product) we knew that their claim of giving "the best deal in town" was just a shibboleth

Synonyms & Similar Words

Relevance

as in clichés

an idea or expression that has been used by many people there's a lot of truth in the shibboleth that if you give some people an inch, they'll take a mile

Synonyms & Similar Words

Antonyms & Near Antonyms

profundities

Example Sentences

Examples are automatically compiled from online sources to show current usage. Read More Opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.

Recent Examples of shibboleths The director scores easy laughs off of modern-day progressive shibboleths such as gender-fluid pronouns, trigger warnings and Native American land acknowledgments. — Gustavo Arellano, Houston Chronicle, 25 Mar. 2026

Recent Examples of Synonyms for shibboleths

Noun

This city’s problems aren’t going to be solved with slogans or campaign consultants’ talking points.

— The Editorial Board, Chicago Tribune, 3 Aug. 2026
The attack happened in Kabal, a town in Swat Valley in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, where demonstrators had gathered near a police station, chanting antimilitant slogans and demanding peace, district police chief Omar Khan said.

— CNN Money, CNN Money, 2 Aug. 2026

Definition of slogans

Noun

Spain’s success over the past five years has undermined many long-standing political-economic truisms.

— Rogé Karma, The Atlantic, 1 June 2026
The play isn’t subtle; the final sequence leans hard on truisms about addiction and trauma, which are affecting but overly explicit.

— Sheldon Pearce, New Yorker, 20 Feb. 2026

Definition of truisms

Noun

Leaders must understand grief's unique, individual nature, avoiding assumptions or platitudes.

— Mena Mirhom, Forbes.com, 29 July 2026
The shorter run time also means some themes get reduced into syrup; the platitudes come as fast and furious as Tao and Elle’s breakups and makeups, with too little space to breathe in between.

— Gemma Wilson, Boston Herald, 19 July 2026

Definition of platitudes

Noun

The book pays homage to all your classic romance tropes — fake relationship, enemies to lovers, boy next door — but spins them on their head in this new take on what happily ever after looks like.

— Matt Grobar, Deadline, 31 July 2026
The series premiering on Starz is, more than anything else, blandly familiar, mining all the tropes of several popular genres without finding anything distinctive in the combination.

— Daniel Fienberg, HollywoodReporter, 30 July 2026

Definition of tropes

Noun

The president used similar bromides in private calls to assuage allies, including Steve Bannon and Tucker Carlson, before launching the war in February, according to people familiar with the conversations.

— Vivian Salama, The Atlantic, 3 June 2026
While these songs might appear to be somewhat straightforward EBM that wear their politics on their latex sleeve, there’s a level of ambiguity at work that moves Kissing Luck Goodbye past its own bromides and into deeper artistic territory.

— Sadie Sartini Garner, Pitchfork, 16 Apr. 2026

Definition of bromides

Noun

And yet for God’s sake, just look at the man—at his dispiriting attempts at humor, his weirdly off-putting outfits, his incessant posting of banalities and faux profundities and extreme-right disinformation on social media.

— Mark O’Connell, The New York Review of Books, 4 July 2026
Here, Laura, a magazine writer in London, drifts through old friendships, failed romances, and the gothic banalities of family life.

— Air Mail, Air Mail, 20 June 2026

Definition of banalities

Noun

The next three chapters offer an anthology of sayings from rabbis who were active in the early centuries of the Common Era, including Hillel and Johanan ben Zakkai, among many other tannaim.

— Encyclopedia Britannica, Encyclopedia Britannica, 24 July 2026
Where the most hopelessly corny sayings are painstakingly stitched into the equivalent of cloth graph paper by women who believe in the sayings and give the plaques to people who do not believe in the sayings.

— Padgett Powell, Harpers Magazine, 30 June 2026

Definition of sayings

Browse Nearby Words

shibboleth

shibboleths

shied

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Style

“Shibboleths.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/shibboleths. Accessed 8 Aug. 2026.

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Synonyms of shibboleths

noun

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