MEANING
1. An issue or piece of information that distracts attention from the central matter being considered.
2. A herring preserved by drying and smoking until it has a reddish color.
3. An initial securities-offering document whose information may change before the final version is issued.
Use it for
identifying an irrelevant diversion; bringing an argument back to the main issue; distinguishing distraction from a relevant objection; analyzing a misleading clue in a narrativeIdentifies a diversion from the central question without confusing it with a direct counterargument. Writing functions: Distraction from the issue.
Words that belong together
- introduce a red herring
- a distracting red herring
- dismiss something as a red herring
On the page
The debate over the logo was a red herring when the real issue was access to the service.
The novelist places a convincing red herring in the opening chapter.
The market stall offered red herrings beside jars of pickled vegetables.
The recipe called for a red herring to be soaked before serving.
The analyst consulted the red herring but waited for the final prospectus before confirming the figures.
Word forms
- Base
- red herring
Usage notes
Count noun phrase: red herring/red herrings. The food and preliminary-prospectus senses are separate from the figurative distraction. Register: neutral. Commonness: common in the figurative sense (qualitative editorial estimate, informed by dictionaries/corpus).
Practice this word in a sentenceYour margin notes
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