nonsensicality

Also found in: Thesaurus, Medical, Legal.

non·sen·si·cal

(nŏn-sĕn′sĭ-kəl)

adj.

1. Lacking intelligible meaning: a nonsensical jumble of words.

2. Foolish; absurd: nonsensical ideas.

non·sen′si·cal′i·ty (-kăl′ĭ-tē), non·sen′si·cal·ness (-kəl-nĭs) n.

non·sen′si·cal·ly adv.

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright © 2016 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

ThesaurusAntonymsRelated WordsSynonymsLegend:

Switch to new thesaurus

Noun

nonsensicality - a message that seems to convey no meaning

hokum, meaninglessness, nonsense, bunk

subject matter, content, message, substance - what a communication that is about something is about

absurdity, absurdness, ridiculousness - a message whose content is at variance with reason

amphigory, nonsense verse - nonsensical writing (usually verse)

balderdash, fiddle-faddle, piffle - trivial nonsense

buzzword, cant - stock phrases that have become nonsense through endless repetition

cobblers - nonsense; "I think that is a load of cobblers"

crock - nonsense; foolish talk; "that's a crock"

fa la, fal la - meaningless syllables in the refrain of a partsong

gibber, gibberish - unintelligible talking

unintelligibility, incoherence, incoherency - nonsense that is simply incoherent and unintelligible

jabberwocky - nonsensical language (according to Lewis Carroll)

mummery, flummery - meaningless ceremonies and flattery

empty talk, empty words, hot air, palaver, rhetoric - loud and confused and empty talk; "mere rhetoric"

rigamarole, rigmarole - a set of confused and meaningless statements

schmegegge, shmegegge - (Yiddish) baloney; hot air; nonsense

hooey, poppycock, stuff and nonsense, stuff - senseless talk; "don't give me that stuff"

baloney, bilgewater, boloney, bosh, drool, humbug, tommyrot, tosh, twaddle, taradiddle, tarradiddle - pretentious or silly talk or writing

Mentioned in ?

References in periodicals archive ?

US Foreign Policy under Donald Trump has thus so far veered from routine practicability to outright nonsensicality, all with major repercussions for the entire world.

America's mood swing diplomacy

Pointing to Waugh's fondness for Carroll's work, Cooke identifies a Carrollian influence in both in Brideshead Revisited's fantastical characterisation of Oxford as a wonderland, and Vile Bodies's pervading nonsensicality and chaos.

"City of Aquatint"? Evelyn Waugh's Oxford

Batty, homemade contraptions that spout surprising, and surprisingly harmonious, not-quite-musical sounds--a computer-sequenced chorus of electronically activated, analog bird whistles, for instance--these ridiculously charming noise machines circumfused the gallery with a comical dusting of Dadaist nonsensicality. But the most profound and affecting works for me were the Devo music videos and associated props and documentation.

Mark Mothersbaugh: GREY ART GALLERY, NEW YORK UNIVERSITY

The nonsensicality of the debauchees' reaction to "Deeth," then, is not just ironic but might be displaced by the absurdity of personification as such.