diatribe
Americannoun
noun
Etymology
Origin of diatribe
1575–85; < Latin diatriba < Greek diatribḗ pastime, study, discourse, derivative of diatríbein to rub away ( dia- dia- + tríbein to rub)
Explanation
It's pretty overwhelming when you ask your friend a seemingly innocuous question, like "Do you like hot dogs?" and she unleashes a diatribe about the evils of eating meat. A diatribe is an angry, critical speech. This noun has its roots in the Greek diatribē, "pastime or lecture," from diatrībein, "to waste time or wear away," combining dia-, "thoroughly," and trībein, "to rub." So the origin of the word diatribe is connected to both serious study and the spending or wasting of time. With most diatribes, the speaker thinks he's well informed and knows something the listener doesn't, while to most listeners the diatribe is so angry and unhinged that it's just a waste of time.
Vocabulary lists containing diatribe
100 SAT Words Beginning with "D"
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Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
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"The Ransom of Red Chief" by O. Henry
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Then, he satirizes conservatives’ discomfort with his Blackness by sitting silently as Martin Short, playing a nervous young Republican delivering a hackneyed diatribe, shudders in his presence before scampering offstage to fall apart.
From Salon • Feb. 22, 2026
"I am aware of the diatribe the commentator directed towards the Israeli bobsled team on the Swiss Olympic broadcast today," he wrote.
From Barron's • Feb. 17, 2026
Altman was about to launch into a diatribe about the commercials that Anthropic, the maker of ChatGPT competitor Claude, rolled out for the Super Bowl.
From Slate • Feb. 10, 2026
Staying close to her family in the Mediterranean city of Tartus during the Covid-19 pandemic, she sent him a voice message, playing back a piece of his diatribe that had been secretly recorded.
From The Wall Street Journal • Dec. 29, 2025
Her mother told her not to worry and launched into a diatribe about the medical technologies of the seventies until Alma interrupted her.
From "The Other Wes Moore: One Name, Two Fates" by Wes Moore
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
