Meaning & use
Pseudointellectual
Last updated
A person who claims or appears to have intellectual interests or abilities that they do not genuinely possess.
See it in a sentence
Critics dismissed the film as pseudointellectual, dressing up shallow ideas in pretentious language.
He was mocked at parties for being a pseudointellectual who namedropped philosophers he'd never actually read.
A note on using this word
Combines the Greek prefix 'pseudo-,' meaning 'false,' with 'intellectual,' and is used as both a disparaging noun and an adjective.
Words with a similar meaning
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Words with an opposite meaning
scholarintellectual
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