Word.ws English Dictionary

pushmepullyou

pushmepullyou is the alternative form of pushmi-pullyu.

Meaning of pushmi-pullyu

Adjective

pushmi-pullyu (not comparable)

  1. Conflicting or contradictory.
    • It's one of the most characteristic behavior patterns of human beings, this pushmepullyou approach to life. We say one thing and do another […]1998, B. J. Wylie, Enough: Lifestyle and Financial Planning for Simpler Living, Northstone Publishing
  2. in teleosemantics, being a representation with both indicative and imperative content.
    • What […] are the steps from […] the sort of inarticulate pushmi-pullyu comprehensions the bee has and the dim sort of pushmi-pullyu comprehension that mediates responses to behavior releasers, to articulate, well-differentiated, and uncommitted human beliefs and desires […]?2004, R. G. Millikan, “On Reading Signs: Some Differences Between Us and Others”, in D.K. Oller, U. Griebel, editors, Evolution of Communication Systems, MIT Press, page 22

See all 3 meanings of pushmi-pullyu

Questions about pushmepullyou

What is pushmepullyou the alternative form of?
Pushmepullyou is the alternative form of pushmi-pullyu.

Words near pushmepullyou in the dictionary

  1. pushlets
  2. Pushmataha
  3. Pushmataha County
  4. pushme-pullyou
  5. pushme-pullyous
  6. pushmepullyou
  7. pushmi-pullyu
  8. pushmi-pullyus
  9. pushmobile
  10. pushmobiles
  11. pushmow

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: pushmepullyou (page history and authors); pushmi-pullyu (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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Cite this entry: “pushmepullyou.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/pushmepullyou. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.