What is circumlocution?

Circumlocution is the ability to talk around a word that you don’t know. There may be a more straightforward way to express meaning, but if you don’t know it, you will need to substitute another word or perhaps define the thing or idea that you are trying to say. 

For example, let’s say that I don’t know the word skydiving. I could instead say: “It is an activity for people who like adventure and adrenaline. You are in an airplane, and you jump out. You have a device that helps you to land safely.”

You’d likely understand that I meant skydiving if I said the above without me having to stop and look up the word or think for a long time.

Strategies for circumlocation

Circumlocution is an important language skill. The people you are talking to won't always know the word in your native language, so you can't ask them to translate. While you often will have access to technology to help you, there are times when it would be disruptive or time consuming to translate. 

When we practice circumlocution, there are three main strategies.

The first strategy is to think of synonyms. A synonym is a word with a similar meaning. Most words do not have the exact same meaning, but a word that is close can help the listener understand what you are trying to say.

For example, I could say, "It's like a tree but smaller." The listener can think of a synonym to help me out. The listener will probably say, "Oh, a bush." Or show that that they understand your meaning even without the exact word.

The second strategy is to use examples or categories. Most of the time when we can't think of a specific word, there is a more general word for the category. Using the more general word can be helpful, but there are often many other words in that category. You could also name something else in that category.

For example, imagine that I say, "It's a flower." The listener is going to have too many options to choose from, so this won't really help me. However, I could be more specific and say, "It's a popular garden flower." Now the speaker has fewer options. It will be much faster for the listener to find peony as the word. Another option would be to say, "It's like a rose."

The third strategy is to describe using the senses. The five senses (sight, sound, taste, touch, and smell) can help a lot with circumlocution, especially if you use it together with the other strategies.

For example, I could say, "It's a sour fruit." This uses a category and a sense word. However, there are still many fruits that can be described like this. I can add another sense to make it more clear it's a sour green fruit. Now the listener would probably guess grape or lime.