Stepford
adj, name ·Rare ·Advanced level
Definitions
- 1 Docile, unthinking and conformist. not-comparable
"“He called you a boring Stepford wife.” A boring Stepford wife, Molly thought. For a moment it seemed to her that she was once more in prison, eating the tasteless food, hearing the click of locks, lying awake for sleepless night after sleepless night."
- 2 Attractive but lacking any character. not-comparable
"The woman seated behind the table looked up at him, smiling a Stepford smile. "Would you like to buy a chance to win a new Blazer? It's only five dollars." Rich shook his head, moved away from the table. "Not today.""
- 1 A surname. countable, uncountable
- 2 A placename countable, uncountable
- 3 A placename:; A locality in Dumfries and Galloway council area, Scotland (OS grid ref NX8681). countable, uncountable
Synonyms
All synonymsExample
More examples"“He called you a boring Stepford wife.” A boring Stepford wife, Molly thought. For a moment it seemed to her that she was once more in prison, eating the tasteless food, hearing the click of locks, lying awake for sleepless night after sleepless night."
Etymology
From step + ford.
From the fictional place name Stepford. After the fictional suburb in the 1972 novel The Stepford Wives by Ira Levin, and in two films of the same name based on the novel.
Related phrases
More for "stepford"
Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.