circumlocution

But in terms of its actual content, the statement was pretty thin gruel, bristling with public relations-style circumlocution and vagueness.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jan. 27, 2026

“You’re now a beautiful, strong flower, who must protect your delicate petals and clean them regularly,” she adds, in one of the film’s more hilarious examples of motherly misunderstanding and circumlocution.

From Washington Post ● Mar. 9, 2022

His clumsy circumlocution reflects a desire to wriggle out from answering for the consequences of one’s own choices, a basic inability to make a defense masquerading as a defense.

From The Guardian ● Oct. 2, 2019

So what’s with all the indirection and artful circumlocution and what-the-meaning-of-is-is tightrope walking?

From Salon ● May 30, 2019

He shuddered at his own craven circumlocution, using so meaningless a word to obscure so hideous a truth.

From "Strange the Dreamer" by Laini Taylor

But some are prone to ludicrous circumlocutions like “Johnny faces challenges in the lived experience of interactions with his peer group in educational spaces,” instead of “Johnny doesn’t get along with his classmates.”

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 26, 2026

Their circumlocutions were as entrancing as their ability to find the most precisely ironic words for difficult-to-name realities.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 8, 2025

The story rushes forwards, with dizzying circumlocutions, from there.

From The Guardian ● Mar. 20, 2019

In truth, while Ros’s pathos-filled classic now reads as unintentionally comic, its euphuistic style isn’t that much different from the circumlocutions found in late Henry James.

From Washington Post ● Aug. 21, 2018

The convoluted syntax, multiple negatives, indefinite antecedents, and masterful circumlocutions of this statement defy comprehension.

From "Founding Brothers: The Revolutionary Generation" by Joseph J. Ellis