Bunburying
- noun
- /ˈbʌnbəriɪŋ/
- Archaic
:
Bunburying
- He perfected the art of Bunburying to avoid attending boring parties.
Examples
-
Rather than admit he was busy, Jake resorted to Bunburying with a fake dinner invitation.
-
This Bunburying, as you call it... has not been a great success for you.
-
Tomorrow, Lane... I'm going Bunburying.
-
Her talent for Bunburying made it easy to escape unwanted social commitments.
Synonyms
19
9.5
A trick or excuse to hide the real reason
3
5.7
Making facts or numbers seem better than they are
3
9.9
Hiding your true feelings or intentions by pretending
2
7.9
Pretending to be someone else online to trick people
1
7.4
Pretending to have an illness or feeling to trick others
1
9.6
Pretending to be someone else or making up a false reason to get private information
1
9.1
Pretending to be someone else to trick people
1
9.7
Dishonest words or actions that try to trick people
A dishonest change of facts or numbers to hide the truth
Dishonest actions that try to trick people
Antonyms
How Deceptive
Surface Forms
Morphology
Bunburying = Bunbury (opaque) = Bunbury + ing
Formed from a literary proper name plus -ing; the meaning relies on a cultural reference and cannot be predictably derived by typical morphological rules.
Etymology
Bunburying comes from the made-up name Bunbury, a fictional friend created by a character in Oscar Wilde's play The Importance of Being Earnest as an 'imaginary friend' to avoid boring social duties. So Bunburying means making up a fake person or excuse to skip social obligations.