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Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
claptrap
noun
EXAMPLES FROM CORPUS
▪ But what happens when the right-wing minority decides that they've had enough of this liberal claptrap about integration?
▪ Sentimental claptrap, Luce scolded herself.
▪ The rest of the claptrap is just social control.
▪ What is all this claptrap about a classless society and a citizens charter?
▪ Yet in the face of this particular story such sentiments can seem like pious claptrap.
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Claptrap

Claptrap \Clap"trap`\ (kl[a^]p"tr[a^]p`), n.

  1. A contrivance for clapping in theaters. [Obs.]

  2. A trick or device to gain applause, especially pretentious but empty rhetoric; humbug.

Claptrap

Claptrap \Clap"trap`\, a. Contrived for the purpose of making a show, or gaining applause; deceptive; unreal. [1913 Webster] ||

Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
claptrap

c.1730, "trick to 'catch' applause," a stage term; from clap (v.) + trap (n.). Extended sense of "cheap, showy language" is from 1819; hence "nonsense, rubbish."

Wiktionary
claptrap

n. 1 A contrivance for clapping in theaters. 2 A trick or device to gain applause; humbug. 3 Empty verbiage or nonsense. (from early 19th c.)

WordNet
claptrap

n. pompous or pretentious talk or writing [syn: bombast, fustian, rant, blah]

Usage examples of "claptrap".

Going too far Christina, probably never occurred to the old man the way he felt about these sentimental tributes and all your mealymouthed claptrap about the resurrection and the life just trying to spare everybody the embarrass.

I took these so-called revelations with calm, since my respect for the invisible world did not go so far as to give credence to such divine claptrap: ten years before, soon after my accession to power, I had ordered the closing of the oracle of Daphne, near Antioch, which had foretold my rule, for fear that it might do the same for the first pretender who should appear.

A collection of drivel and claptrap designed to turn women into brainless, sniveling idiots.

If the Russians ever decide to bomb us, this particular stretch of suburban claptrap is where they'll start.

It must be my elven blood that finds this stiff-necked barbarian pride a lot of claptrap and folderol.

The restaurant was down the High Street, a small, cheerfully claptrap place, dim in the gray afternoon, its small wooden tables scattered with abandoned newspapers and overflowing ashtrays.

How does it differ from Radicalism, the most contemptible claptrap of politics, except in wanting to hurry a little the rule of the mob?

For her sake I bucked up a bit in the early 19905 and began to sell residential properties with a modicum of successmy years of renovating claptraps left me with a good instinct for the true value of a house.

As dictated by Verden himself, Yaz's role in life for the forseeable future was to memorize the book and be ready to advise the Norsemen on what to do when one of their submersible claptraps broke down.

As he was merely repeating all the claptrap about mystical training in Par Asia from the public announcement, Tiria did not start to translate it until Bilala hissed at her to earn her fee.

No bond, no auditing, none of that claptrap - a written power of attorney if you want it.

He limped away in this claptrap oolt' posol, fit only for a scout, and if he could not find a oolt' Posleen to bind to he would be left in the system to be hunted down like an abat.

I know quite a detailed version of Hari Seldon's psycho-historical claptrap, and your eventual plans of aggression against the Empire.

Unfortunately we have to remember we're scientists, not writers of popular semifictional archaeological claptrap.