parrotize

English

Alternative forms

parrotise

Etymology

From parrot +‎ -ize.

Verb

parrotize (third-person singular simple present parrotizes, present participle parrotizing, simple past and past participle parrotized)

1. To parrot; to repeat what one has been told.
   • 1820, John Flavel, The whole works of John Flavel:

     How often is the nonsense and error of the common translation, the rudeness and dulness of the metre of some Psalms, as Psal. vii. 13, as also the cold formality with which that ordinance is performed by many who do but parrotize?

   • 1838, Female efforts in the Saviour's Cause defended and encouraged.:

     Children learn to parrotize on the subject; and young people imagine that the superstructure of their religion is complete, when even the first stone of the building is not firmly laid.

   • 1843, Nathaniel Ward, The Simple Cobler of Aggawam in America:

     Gray Gravity it selfe can well beteam, That Language be adapted to the Theme. He that to Parrots speaks, must parrotize: He that instructs a foole, may act th' unwise.

   • 1950, Clifford Holmes Prator, Language Teaching in the Philippines: A Report, page 17:

     Thinking and speaking thus demand an unduly prolonged effort and, subconsciously, he would rather fall back on his old habit and parrotize than do any thinking at all, much less think originally.

   • 1957, William Frank Buckley, National Review - Volume 3, page 555:

     Although you "know" you know this subject, you may at times be guilty of talking some of the same parrotized nonsense (of either the right or the left) of which you sometimes accuse your friends.

2. (transitive) To cause to behave like a parrot.
   • 1842, The Athenaeum, page 187:

     To deal, then, in verbal abstractions, and to attempt the communication of ideas to children who have yet to become acquainted with their prototypes in nature, is, indeed, (in the language of our author) to parrotize them.