Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. The use of equivocal language.
- n. An equivocal statement or expression.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. In logic, a fallacy depending upon the double signification of some one word: distinguished from amphibology, which depends upon the doubtful interpretation of a whole sentence.
- n. Ambiguity of speech; specifically, the use, with a view to mislead, of words or expressions susceptible of a double signification; prevarication.
- n. Synonyms Prevarication, etc. (see evasion); shuffling, quibbling, quibble, equivoke.
Wiktionary
- n. logic A logical fallacy resulting from the use of multiple meanings of a single expression.
- n. The use of expressions susceptible of a double signification, possibly intentionally and with the aim of misleading.
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. The use of expressions susceptible of a double signification, with a purpose to mislead.
WordNet 3.0
- n. intentionally vague or ambiguous
- n. a statement that is not literally false but that cleverly avoids an unpleasant truth
- n. falsification by means of vague or ambiguous language
Etymologies
- c. 1380, from Old French equivocation, from Medieval Latin aequivocātiōnem, accusative singular of aequivocātiō, from aequivocō, from Late Latin aequivocus ("ambiguous, equivocal"), from Latin aequus ("equal") + vocō ("call"); a calque of Ancient Greek ὁμωνυμία (homōnumia). (Wiktionary)
Examples
“The second mode is by an _æquivocatio_, which is not equivalent to the English word "equivocation," but means sometimes a _play upon words_, sometimes an _evasion_.”
“Ahhhh, the sweet sound of equivocation from a marginalized political opponent.”
Matthew Yglesias » Conservatives’ Unhinged Attacks on Nancy Pelosi
“IOW Nick Matzke is engaging in equivocation by saying evidence for evolution is evidence for blind, undirected chemical processes.”
“The sexual and moral equivocation is handled with cool assurance.”
Winter In Madrid: Summary and book reviews of Winter In Madrid by C.J. Sansom.
“Notice that once the equivocation is removed, the argument becomes a non sequiter.”
“And I was hoping that you were going to acknowledge the elephant in the polling station and convince me that all of this apparent equivocation is tactical and not real.”
“The equivocation is that it was financed from profits made from the manufacture of, among other chemical products such as artificial rubber, leather, silk and precious stone, chemical explosives which were invented and manufactured by Alfred Nobel, a Swedish chemist and industrialist.”
“A) I agree there was no equivocation on your part, but equivocation is a frequently employed tactic in the cultural war.”
“All evidence shows it is the evolutionists who engage in equivocation.”
“One of these, and the best known, is equivocation, which is non-formal but has a massive influence on the validity of arguments -- an argument can only be valid on the presupposition that it does not equivocate.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘equivocation’.
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This is not a list
you know that thing where the Eskimos have 50 words for snow?
little white lie, big lie, the Big Lie, economical with t..., muddy the waters, fabrication, deception, lies, damned lies..., façade, slander, omission, web of lies and 159 more...
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Words build meanings from origins( et...
These come from gamma meditation ,I think.
discursive, exogenous, machinations, purportedly, sumptuous, congruity, cantankerous, incongruous, festoon, hessian, ratiocinative, stratigraphic and 2046 more...
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jaydrox's list
Mah list!
mediocracy, captivatingly, devastatingly, dazedly, heavenly, flawless, copious, conviction, synoptic, amalgamation, prefatory, precursory and 150 more...
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GRE
predilection, explicit, appeal, supplication, appealing, enchanting, ovation, pertinent, apropos, opportunely, applicable, germane and 381 more...
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Philosophic , etymology
every major discipline has uniquely developed esoteric nomenclature to facilitate interdisciplinary dissemination
quale , qualia, elegy, tacet, lexicon, annunciate, caste, eros, contrive, purlicue, irony, venacular, dilapidate and 567 more...
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Untruisms
confabulation, factitious disorder, Münchhausen by proxy, Münchausen syndrome, pseudologia fanta..., pseudology, fabrication, equivocation, dysmorphophobia, chicane, counterfactual, pseudograph and 13 more...
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Logical Fallacies
I know it's been done before, but I just couldn't resist having my own list--I'll be borrowing from Amberley's list of Fallacies (and others).
petitio principii, begging the question, post hoc ergo pro..., logical fallacy, ignoratio elenchi, non sequitur, amphiboly, fallacy of accent, amphibology, hypostatization, equivocation, reification and 12 more...
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GRE
GRE words from Princeton Review guide, ETS GRE Book from 2010 (for revised test), New Yorker/NY Times articles.
sycophant, obsequious, volubility, equanimity, enervate, effrontery, impertinent, platitude, impudence, quiescent, propitiate, equivocate and 124 more...
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A Refined Lexicon
ambivalence, ambivalent, equivocal, equivocation, equivocate, prevaricate, prevarication, quietude, quiescent, quiescence, vanquish, pluviosity and 137 more...
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five syllables
ontogenesis, phylogenesis, concatenation, androgenesis, extra textual, inexorably, spagyrically, apophenia, iatrochemist, monocotyloid, morphological, parthenogenic and 941 more...
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Good for Academics
Gahh!! Study!
supplant, usurp, finagle, winnow, draconian, abut, collude, swindle, objectify, incite, decadent, obstinate and 327 more...
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Macbeth
ambivalence, prescient, omniscient, equivocation, soliloquy, discourse, antithesis, allusion, analogy, anthropomorphism, dramatic irony, juxtaposition and 18 more...
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NTDW1
template, modal, sublingual, tandem, polycentric, septuagenarian, token, irrevocable, denotive, augural, aberrant, phlebotomy and 1188 more...
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My GRE word list
polemic, ad hominem, fallacious, comity, paucity, contrite, prosaic, veracious, laconic, pugnacious, alacrity, gregarious and 176 more...
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JLaughWork's Words
sesquipedalian, perspicacity, fervid, onomatopoeia, eschatology, prognostication, pedagogue, expiation, integrity, metamorphosis, supercilious, xenophilia and 229 more...
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GRE
acrimony, verisimilitude, tenebrious, tenebrous, dishabille, unfettered, deplorable, woebegone, credulity, naïveté, mitigate, meliorate and 475 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for equivocation.
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