different between platitude vs platitudinize

English

Etymology

From French platitude, from plat (“flat”), from Vulgar Latin *plattus, from Ancient Greek ??????? (platús).

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /?plat?tju?d/, /?plat?t?u?d/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /?plæt?t(j)ud/

Noun

platitude (countable and uncountable, plural platitudes)

1. (countable) An often-quoted saying that is supposed to be meaningful but has become unoriginal or hackneyed through overuse; a cliché.
2. (countable) A claim that is trivially true, to the point of being uninteresting.
3. (uncountable) Flatness; lack of change, activity, or deviation.
4. (uncountable) Unoriginality; triteness.

Quotations

• For quotations using this term, see Citations:platitude.

Synonyms

• cliché
• See also Thesaurus:saying

Related terms

Translations

References

• platitude at OneLook Dictionary Search
• platitude in The Century Dictionary, New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911.

Dutch

Etymology

From French platitude.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /pla?ti?tyd?/

Noun

platitude f (plural platitudes, diminutive platitudetje n)

1. platitude, cliché

French

Etymology

plat (“flat”) +? -itude

Noun

platitude f (uncountable)

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. (figuratively) blandness; lack of originality

Further reading

• “platitude” in Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).

Portuguese

Noun

platitude f (plural platitudes)

1. platitude (an overused saying)

   Synonym: clichê

2. platitude; triteness; unoriginality

   Synonym: banalidade

English

Alternative forms

• platitudise

Verb

platitudinize (third-person singular simple present platitudinizes, present participle platitudinizing, simple past and past participle platitudinized)

1. (intransitive) To utter one or more platitudes; to make obvious, trivial, or clichéd remarks concerning a topic.
   • 1894 July 24, "An Undenominational Mission: Outspokenness in the Pulpit," The Age (Australia), p. 5 (retrieved 7 Oct 2011):

     He does not attempt lofty flights of eloquence or try to disguise thought under ponderous platitudinising sentences.

   • 1928, R. Austin Freeman, As a Thief in the Night (2001 House of Stratus edition), ?ISBN, p. 139:

     If we keep our knowledge strictly to ourselves we know exactly how we stand, and that if there has been any leakage, it had been from some other source. But I need not platitudinize to an experienced and learned counsel.

   • 2008 Feb. 20, Maxie Zeus, "Glass Fleet," www.tunezone.net (retrieved 7 Oct 2011):

     The people in this show don't talk like normal people—they lecture, they argue, they negotiate, they strategize, they philosophize, they platitudinize, they deliver speeches about destiny, liberty, and bravery.

2. (transitive) To express as or reduce to one or more clichés or truisms.
   • 1842, Solomon Ludwig Steinheim, "On the Perennial and the Ephemeral in Judaism" in The Jewish Philosophy Reader (2000), edited by Daniel H. Frank et al., ?ISBN, p. 402:

     Mendelssohn had misunderstood, platitudinized, and misinterpreted the holy concept of revelation.

   • 1962, Philip Roth, Letting Go (1997 Random House edition), ?ISBN [1]:

     “It's better to have to struggle when you're young, I think, than when you're older,” she platitudinized.

   • 2008 April 25, Simon Jenkins, "The White House race is a catalogue of misspeaking," The Guardian (UK) (retrieved 7 Oct 2011):

     A modern campaign, not just in America, is so fine-tuned, so honed and platitudinised, that mistakes are the only way of bringing it into focus.

Synonyms

• (transitive: express as a cliché): trivialize

Derived terms

• platitudinization
• platitudinizer

References

• platitudinize at OneLook Dictionary Search