straw-splitting in English

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{
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "-"
      },
      "expansion": "straw-splitting (uncountable)",
      "name": "en-noun"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "noun",
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [],
      "examples": [
        {
          "bold_text_offsets": [
            [
              16,
              31
            ]
          ],
          "ref": "1936, Norman Lindsay, The Flyaway Highway, Sydney: Angus and Robertson, page 76:",
          "text": "‘Enough of this straw-splitting and let us get on to business.’",
          "type": "quotation"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "The act of making overly fine, petty, or unnecessary distinctions during an argument or discussion."
      ],
      "id": "en-straw-splitting-en-noun-LtPAJ~tY",
      "links": [
        [
          "fine",
          "fine"
        ],
        [
          "petty",
          "petty"
        ],
        [
          "distinction",
          "distinction"
        ]
      ],
      "tags": [
        "uncountable"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "word": "straw-splitting"
}

{
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "-"
      },
      "expansion": "straw-splitting (not comparable)",
      "name": "en-adj"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "adj",
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        {
          "_dis": "65 35",
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "English entries with incorrect language header",
          "parents": [],
          "source": "w+disamb"
        },
        {
          "_dis": "72 28",
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "Pages with 1 entry",
          "parents": [],
          "source": "w+disamb"
        },
        {
          "_dis": "73 27",
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "Pages with entries",
          "parents": [],
          "source": "w+disamb"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "That frequently makes overly fine distinctions."
      ],
      "id": "en-straw-splitting-en-adj-p-pBTCfU",
      "tags": [
        "not-comparable"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "word": "straw-splitting"
}

[Show JSON for raw wiktextract data ▼] [Hide JSON for raw wiktextract data ▲]

{
  "categories": [
    "English adjectives",
    "English entries with incorrect language header",
    "English lemmas",
    "English multiword terms",
    "English nouns",
    "English uncomparable adjectives",
    "English uncountable nouns",
    "Pages with 1 entry",
    "Pages with entries"
  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "-"
      },
      "expansion": "straw-splitting (uncountable)",
      "name": "en-noun"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "noun",
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        "English terms with quotations"
      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "bold_text_offsets": [
            [
              16,
              31
            ]
          ],
          "ref": "1936, Norman Lindsay, The Flyaway Highway, Sydney: Angus and Robertson, page 76:",
          "text": "‘Enough of this straw-splitting and let us get on to business.’",
          "type": "quotation"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "The act of making overly fine, petty, or unnecessary distinctions during an argument or discussion."
      ],
      "links": [
        [
          "fine",
          "fine"
        ],
        [
          "petty",
          "petty"
        ],
        [
          "distinction",
          "distinction"
        ]
      ],
      "tags": [
        "uncountable"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "word": "straw-splitting"
}

{
  "categories": [
    "English adjectives",
    "English entries with incorrect language header",
    "English lemmas",
    "English multiword terms",
    "English nouns",
    "English uncomparable adjectives",
    "English uncountable nouns",
    "Pages with 1 entry",
    "Pages with entries"
  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "-"
      },
      "expansion": "straw-splitting (not comparable)",
      "name": "en-adj"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "adj",
  "senses": [
    {
      "glosses": [
        "That frequently makes overly fine distinctions."
      ],
      "tags": [
        "not-comparable"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "word": "straw-splitting"
}

This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2026-09-16 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2026-09-02 using wiktextract (d6fca27 and 65e1673). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.

If you use this data in academic research, please cite Tatu Ylonen: Wiktextract: Wiktionary as Machine-Readable Structured Data, Proceedings of the 13th Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation (LREC), pp. 1317-1325, Marseille, 20-25 June 2022. Linking to the relevant page(s) under https://kaikki.org would also be greatly appreciated.

"straw-splitting" meaning in English

Adjective

Noun