wishy-washy
/ˈwɪʃ.iˌwɑ.ʃi/
Word Rarity
Very rare
Frequency: 2.30 in modern English
28
Scrabble Score
10
Letters
2
Syllables
6
Unique Chars
Meaning
adj
Wavering; lacking in commitment, certainty, support, and (often) clarity; namby-pamby.
Example Sentences
- "Near-synonyms: vacillating, vacillatory"
- "Not wanting to be pressed for details, public relations gave a wishy-washy answer."
- "I’m not about to vote Conservative myself (I’m a wishy-washy centrist who liked Tony Blair’s early work and has since mostly voted Labour, with an occasional swing to the Liberal Democrats and Greens)[…]"
- "Near-synonyms: watered-down, diluted, dilute"
- "The wishy-washy orange juice served by the cafeteria not only failed to be sweet; it was barely orange."
- "Usually the quality of the liquor is judged by the "bite" of it. The hotter the better. A drink of first class, aged whisky would be ridiculed in most parts of Maine as a wishy-washy beverage fit only for mollycoddles. The Down East "soak" wants something that stings and burns all the way, and usually he gets it[…]"
Etymology
Reduplication of washy; more at Wikipedia under ablaut reduplication. The wish portion of the term is explained much more by the ablaut reduplication than by any coincidental semantic appropriateness (such as that wishy-washy people wish that they could have it both ways), although the latter effect may play some nonzero cognitive role in word-finding. Compare also swish, swash, splish, and splash regarding any possible sound symbolism.
Regional Pronunciation
- American English: /ˈwɪʃ.iˌwɑ.ʃi/
- British English: /ˈwɪʃ.iˌwɒʃ.i/
Inflected Forms
wishy-washier (comparative)
more wishy-washy (comparative)
wishy-washiest (superlative)
most wishy-washy (superlative)