Pretextual
adj ·Rare ·Advanced level
Definitions
- 1 Having a false, contrived or assumed purpose; characterized by pretense.
""If you're accused of profiling or pretextual stops, you can bring your daily logbook to court and document that pulling over motorists for 'stickler' reasons is part of your customary pattern," Remsberg writes, "not a glaring exception conveniently dusted off in the defendant's case.""
- 2 Before the existence of a text. not-comparable
"They maintained that while historical critics sought to get behind the text to its pretextual and early textual origins (a “diachronic” approach), literary critics concentrated on the final product, the text as it now stands (a “synchronic” approach)."
Synonyms
All synonymsExample
More examples"He fired me and offered a pretextual rationale for the firing."
Etymology
From pretext + -ual.
From pre- + textual.
Related phrases
More for "pretextual"
Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.