Word.ws English Dictionary

mansplanation

mansplanation noun: a condescending explanation given by a male explainer to a female listener, especially to explain something the listener already knows, presuming that she has an inferior understanding of it because she is a woman.

Noun

mansplanation (plural mansplanations)

  1. (informal) A condescending explanation given by a male explainer to a female listener, especially to explain something the listener already knows, presuming that she has an inferior understanding of it because she is a woman.
    • Like I said, I can see how a person can take the song as a mansplanation of an issue primarily pertaining to women, but was that Lupe’s intention?2012, Ameer Hasan Loggins, "Bitch Bad: Misogyny, Misappropriated Anger & 'Me-ism'", Onyx Express (University of California, Berkeley), Volume 18, Issue 1, Spring 2012, page 9
    • English physician Samuel Farr was pretty certain women couldn't get pregnant without an orgasm. The Guardian quotes the mansplanation from his 1814 Elements of Medical Jurisprudence: "For without an excitation of lust, or the enjoyment of pleasure in the venereal act, no conception can probably...2012 August, Erika Eichelberger, “Men Defining Rape: A History”, in Mother Jones

Forms of mansplanation

pluralmansplanations

Origin of mansplanation

From mansplain and explanation.

Questions about mansplanation

What does mansplanation mean?
Mansplanation means a condescending explanation given by a male explainer to a female listener, especially to explain something the listener already knows, presuming that she has an inferior understanding of it because she is a woman.
What part of speech is mansplanation?
Mansplanation is a noun.
What is the plural of mansplanation?
The plural of mansplanation is mansplanations.

Words near mansplanation in the dictionary

  1. mansplainer
  2. mansplainers
  3. mansplaining
  4. mansplains
  5. mansplainy
  6. mansplanation
  7. mansplanations
  8. mansplay
  9. mansplayed
  10. mansplaying
  11. manspread

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: mansplanation (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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