rhetorical question in English

Forms: rhetorical question [singular], rhetorical questions [plural] [Show additional information ▼] [Hide additional information ▲]

Etymology: rhetorical + question Etymology templates: {{multiword term|rhetorical|question}} rhetorical + question Head templates: {{noun}} [POS TABLE]

[Show JSON for postprocessed kaikki.org data shown on this page ▼] [Hide JSON for postprocessed kaikki.org data shown on this page ▲]

{
  "categories": [],
  "etymology_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "rhetorical",
        "2": "question"
      },
      "expansion": "rhetorical + question",
      "name": "multiword term"
    }
  ],
  "etymology_text": "rhetorical + question",
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "rhetorical question",
      "tags": [
        "singular"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "rhetorical questions",
      "tags": [
        "plural"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "expansion": "[POS TABLE]",
      "name": "noun"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "noun",
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [],
      "glosses": [
        "A rhetorical question is a question that is asked only for the purpose of dramatic or persuasive effect."
      ],
      "id": "simple-rhetorical_question-en-noun-65AYuUKH",
      "raw_tags": [
        "countable"
      ]
    },
    {
      "categories": [
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "Colloquial",
          "parents": [],
          "source": "w"
        }
      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "text": "Are you nuts? Don't answer that – it's a rhetorical question."
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "A rhetorical question is a question which the person asking it doesn't expect an answer to."
      ],
      "id": "simple-rhetorical_question-en-noun-iLHbzd0l",
      "raw_tags": [
        "countable",
        "informal"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "word": "rhetorical question"
}

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

{
  "categories": [
    "Multiword terms"
  ],
  "etymology_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "rhetorical",
        "2": "question"
      },
      "expansion": "rhetorical + question",
      "name": "multiword term"
    }
  ],
  "etymology_text": "rhetorical + question",
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "rhetorical question",
      "tags": [
        "singular"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "rhetorical questions",
      "tags": [
        "plural"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "expansion": "[POS TABLE]",
      "name": "noun"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "noun",
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        "Countable nouns"
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "A rhetorical question is a question that is asked only for the purpose of dramatic or persuasive effect."
      ],
      "raw_tags": [
        "countable"
      ]
    },
    {
      "categories": [
        "Colloquial",
        "Countable nouns"
      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "text": "Are you nuts? Don't answer that – it's a rhetorical question."
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "A rhetorical question is a question which the person asking it doesn't expect an answer to."
      ],
      "raw_tags": [
        "countable",
        "informal"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "word": "rhetorical question"
}

This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2024-12-21 from the simplewiktionary dump dated 2024-12-20 using wiktextract (d8cb2f3 and 4e554ae). 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.

"rhetorical question" meaning in English

Noun