Meaning & use
shoptalk
Last updated
Meaning
noununcountable
Conversation about one's work or profession, especially when it dominates a social occasion.
Grammar: Uncountable: use it without 'a' or 'an', and with words like 'some' or 'much'.
Patterns
- talk shoptalk
- avoid shoptalk
- a lot of shoptalk
At the party, the doctors fell into shoptalk about hospital politics.
I try to avoid shoptalk when I'm having dinner with friends.
There was so much shoptalk at the reunion that I felt left out.
Common combinations
- talk shoptalk
- They talked shoptalk for hours after the meeting.
- avoid shoptalk
- Let's avoid shoptalk tonight and just relax.
- a lot of shoptalk
- There was a lot of shoptalk at the conference dinner.
- fall into shoptalk
- We accidentally fell into shoptalk about the new project.
Synonyms and how they differ
- work talk
- More neutral and literal; it doesn't carry the same suggestion of boring or inappropriate conversation.
- business talk
- Focuses on commercial matters rather than any profession's jargon.
Opposites
Commonly confused: shoptalk or small talk?
shoptalk vs small talk
Small talk is light, social conversation about unimportant topics; shoptalk is about work. They are almost opposites.
Practice
At the family dinner, my uncle started ______ about his law cases.
Choose one answer.
'Shoptalk' is uncountable, so it is used without an article. 'A shoptalk' and 'shoptalks' are wrong because the noun has no plural form and cannot take 'a'.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “shoptalk”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.