Definitions
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun A
wave of thehand . - noun A
glib statement or explanation that glosses over important details. - verb rhetoric To explain something superficially, skipping over important details, perhaps appealing to intuition instead.
Etymologies
Sorry, no etymologies found.
Support
Help support Wordnik (and make this page ad-free) by adopting the word handwave.
Examples
-
So you see why it pisses me off when people try to call rape solely a women's issue, or handwave away the experiences of male survivors.
Valentines, part the first mllelaurel 2009
-
I understand they had a science consultant to handwave something plausible, and I read an article about this, and still thought it was totally dumb.
-
No amount of complaining about the president lacking “political courage” can handwave away the fact that it is illegal for the president to bring the former prisoners here.
-
I'm not being pedantic here: dismissing entire cultures with a magnificent handwave as "barbaric" reduces the notion of "culture" to a handful of abhorrent practices carried out by some members of the culture in question.
Archive 2009-11-01 2009
-
That is not, however, a small political issue that you can handwave away as no big deal.
-
A sudden handwave caught my attention as Charlie gestured me over to her table.
Brush of Darkness Allison Pang 2011
-
Of course, you can always handwave away anything that doesn't meet your definition of "major".
-
Of course, you can always handwave away anything that doesn't meet your definition of "major".
-
Your middle ear is the same thing – a group of similar structures arranged to imply progression with no real mechanism – other than the handwave "variation and selection" to connect them.
-
A sudden handwave caught my attention as Charlie gestured me over to her table.
Brush of Darkness Allison Pang 2011
Comments
Log in or sign up to get involved in the conversation. It's quick and easy.