parlor game
4
3.9
- noun
- /ˈpɑːrlər ɡeɪm/
- US
:
juego de salón
- During the family reunion, we played a fun parlor game that had everyone laughing.
- play parlor games
- favorite parlor game
- popular parlor game
Isn't he just doing sort of a abstract parlor game here, playing around with ideas, engaging in a certain kind of utopianism?
- Isn't he just doing sort of a abstract parlor game here, playing around with ideas, engaging in a certain kind of utopianism?
Examples
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He gets very excited playing parlor games.
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Is this some parlor game where we guess what you're thinking?
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- You got any parlor games?
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This is not some sort of parlor game.
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-Is this some parlor game?
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- It's a parlor game.
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More of a parlor game, really.
Blog text (34) -
What are parlor games?
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This is a parlor game, not a scientific study, so your results may vary, but I've done this dozens of times and heard surprisingly consistent answers.
Blog text (16) -
A European parlor game in the nineteenth century, Klexographie, or "Blotto," involved a set of inkblots from which participants generated words and phrases.
Academic text (2017)
Synonyms
8
1.2
An activity people do with guests to make a social event more fun
How Social
Surface Forms
Morphology
The meaning 'a game played indoors for social amusement' is directly and transparently derived from combining 'parlor' (a room for entertaining guests) with 'game' (a recreational contest). This simple locative/qualifier + noun composition is common and predictable, so a B1 learner who knows both constituents can infer the MWE's meaning.
Etymology
Parlor game comes from old houses where the parlor was the front room for guests and people played small games there for fun. One easy image is a group sitting together in that room playing guessing or word games, so today it means 'an indoor social game'.