Word.ws English Dictionary

How to use platitude in a sentence

22 example sentences · noun

Platitude means an often-quoted saying that is supposed to be meaningful but has become unoriginal or hackneyed through overuse. Example: “He tossed off a few platitudes and then ignored any further questions.”

Examples of platitude by meaning

nounAn often-quoted saying that is supposed to be meaningful but has become unoriginal or hackneyed through overuse.

  • It is a platitude, of course.1918, Algernon Blackwood, chapter XI, in The Garden of Survival
  • And Ivor, suddenly cheered by laughing at his absurd platitudes, and finding himself by the door, was going from the room.1922, Michael Arlen, “2/1/2”, in “Piracy”: A Romantic Chronicle of These Days
  • If discussed at all, it was with platitudes about the need to save polar bears and tigers.2019 August 30, Jonathan Watts, “Amazon fires show world heading for point of no return, says UN”, in The Guardian

nounA claim that is trivially true, to the point of being uninteresting.

  • The synthesis which he helped to effect was so successful that this aspect of his work escaped notice in the last century: all that Britomart stands for was platitude to our fathers.1963, James R. Kreuzer, Lee Cogan, Modern Writings on Major English Authors, Ardent Media, page 109
  • After explaining myself sufficiently, I now offer my own platitude: I believe that the institution of the cabaret has the right to exist only so long as it bears the character of dilettantism and improvisation.1993, Harold B. Segel, The Vienna Coffeehouse Wits, 1890-1938, Purdue University Press, →ISBN, page 210

nounFlatness; lack of change, activity, or deviation.

  • The former figures the typical prairie landscape-poet who stops at the correction line (which itself literally denies the platitude of flatness) to notice the ever-present wind.1992, Ed Jewinski, Andrew Stubbs, The Politics of Art: Eli Mandel's Poetry and Criticism, page 31
  • One day, leaving one of my classes, someone said to me with disdain, "You talk about death very flatly." — As if the horror of Death were not precisely its platitude!2001, Elissa Marder, Dead Time: Temporal Disorders in the Wake of Modernity, page 87
  • This reflects the platitude behind correspondence, but the Tarskian appartatus gives the platitude more substance.2013, Ernest Lepore, Kirk Ludwig, A Companion to Donald Davidson

nounUnoriginality; triteness.

  • seemly platitude, flat-footed ordinariness, and well-enacted upper working class respectability cancel out any turpitude, exhilarating tension or satanic glamour a casino might be expected to have.1978, Seven Cities of Australia, page 45
  • After a passage of what we feel to be true poetry, there follows, inevitably, a passage of platitude which no critical pre-judgment can force us to admire;1984, Library of America, Edgar Allan Poe, Gary Richard Thompson, Essays and Reviews, page 71
  • More damning, this 'flat-pack kit' causes us to decline into platitude and predictability, denies us from real political intellectual purchase and, as result, standard theoretical ideas become our ideological comforters.2014, Hester du Plessis, Jeffrey Sehume, Leonard Martin, Concept and Application of Transdisciplinarity in Intellectual Discourse and...

More sentences with platitude

  • He tossed off a few platitudes and then ignored any further questions.From the entry toss off
  • The sermon was full of hackneyed phrases and platitudes.From the entry hackneyed
  • The laity utter theological platitudes, especially in the wake of mystery.2011, James C. Howell, The Beauty of the Word: The Challenge and Wonder of Preaching, page 150. From the entry counterpreach
  • Members today are familiar with this –to utter a few, well-chosen platitudes.1989, Great Britain. Parliament. House of Commons, Parliamentary Debates (Hansard)., page 189. From the entry howling
  • They abhor empty platitudes and know in an instant when a writer is "throwing the bull." Pretentiousness turns them off completely.2004, George Ehrenhaft, Robert L. Lehrman, Allan Mundsack, Fred Obrecht, Barron's How to Prepare for the ACT Assessment, 13th edition…. From the entry throw the bull
  • What we saw was cute-'n'-cuddly Willow, takin' care of her girl and spouting nauseating platitudes like "You're my always."2001 May 6, Lord Usher, “I hate Willow. ("Tough Love" spoilers)”, in alt.tv.buffy-v-slayer (Usenet), archived from the original on 07 Dec…. From the entry always
  • I insisted on how his opinion mattered, and developed and construed his platitudes into aperçus he was far from entertaining himself.1988, Alan Hollinghurst, chapter 7, in The Swimming-Pool Library, paperback edition, London: Penguin Books, →ISBN, page 143. From the entry aperçu
  • But the mystagogues hide a thing in darkness and secrecy, and when you find it, it's a platitude.1926, Gilbert Keith Chesterton, “The Arrow of Heaven”, in The Incredulity of Father Brown. From the entry mystagogue
  • I am often amazed to learn of apparently sensible people solemnly taking in the soothing platitudes of politicians, whether Republocrat or Demopublican.1999, Peter J. Boettke, The Legacy of Friedrich Von Hayek: Philosophy, page 435. From the entry Republocrat
  • Such philistinism pleases the misoneism of the mediocre, whence the enthusiasm over platitudes and the reign of the philistine in newspaper art, literature and science.1923 May, “Pornolagny and Realism”, in The Urologic and Cutaneous Review, volume XXVII, number 5, St. Louis, Mo.: Urologic and Cutaneous…. From the entry misoneism
  • 'This you' reminds them that a little infographic or a hashtag doesn’t absolve them of past transgressions, and we see through the empty platitudes and insincere expressions of solidarity.2020 June 3, Jumi Akinfenwa, “'This You?' – How Black Twitter Turned Accountability Into an Art Form”, in VICE. From the entry this you

Meaning of platitude

  1. noun An often-quoted saying that is supposed to be meaningful but has become unoriginal or hackneyed through overuse.
  2. noun A claim that is trivially true, to the point of being uninteresting.
  3. noun Flatness; lack of change, activity, or deviation.

Full definition of platitude

Questions about platitude in a sentence

How do you use platitude in a sentence?
Platitude is used as a noun. For example: “He tossed off a few platitudes and then ignored any further questions.”
What is a short sentence with platitude?
“It is a platitude, of course.”
What does platitude mean?
Platitude means an often-quoted saying that is supposed to be meaningful but has become unoriginal or hackneyed through overuse.

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: platitude (page history and authors) and the entries each sentence comes from. Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws chose the sentences, left out offensive ones and quotations older than 1900, and marked the word in each. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this page: “How to use platitude in a sentence.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/sentences/platitude. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.