pretextual
pretextual adjective: having a false, contrived or assumed purpose; characterized by pretense.
Adjective (1)
pretextual (comparative more pretextual, superlative most pretextual)
- Having a false, contrived or assumed purpose; characterized by pretense.
- "If you're accused of profiling or pretextual stops, you can bring your daily logbook to court and document that pulling over motorists for 'stickler' reasons is part of your customary pattern," Remsberg writes, "not a glaring exception conveniently dusted off in the defendant's case."2019, Malcolm Gladwell, Talking to Strangers
- Synonyms:
- pretextuous
Adjective (2)
pretextual (not comparable)
- Before the existence of a text.
- They maintained that while historical critics sought to get behind the text to its pretextual and early textual origins (a “diachronic” approach), literary critics concentrated on the final product, the text as it now stands (a “synchronic” approach).2016, Adele Berlin, “Literary Approaches to the Hebrew Bible”, in Stephen B. Chapman, Marvin A. Sweeney, editors, The Cambridge Companion to the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament, New York: Cambridge...
Synonyms of pretextual
Forms of pretextual
| comparative | more pretextual |
|---|---|
| superlative | most pretextual |
Origin of pretextual
From pretext + -ual.
From pre- + textual.
Words formed from pretextual
Phrases with pretextual
Questions about pretextual
- What does pretextual mean?
- Pretextual means having a false, contrived or assumed purpose; characterized by pretense.
- What part of speech is pretextual?
- Pretextual is an adjective.
Words near pretextual in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: pretextual (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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