mumbo jumbo

American  

[muhm-boh juhm-boh] / ˈmʌm boʊ ˈdʒʌm boʊ /

noun

plural

mumbo jumbos

1. meaningless incantation or ritual.

2. senseless or pretentious language, usually designed to obscure an issue, confuse a listener, or the like.

3. an object of superstitious awe or reverence.

4. (initial capital letters) the guardian of western Sudan villages symbolized by a masked man who combats evil and punishes women for breaches of tribal laws.

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mumbo jumbo British  

/ ˈmʌmbəʊ /

noun

1. foolish religious reverence, ritual, or incantation

2. meaningless or unnecessarily complicated language

3. an object of superstitious awe or reverence

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Usage

More context on mumbo jumbo When someone isn’t making any sense, we might joke that they’re talking mumbo jumbo. However, it may not originally mean “a whole lot of mumbling.”Mumbo jumbo may come from maamajomboo, the Mandinka (a West African language) word for a masked male dancer who was involved in some arcane rituals. The potential problem with mumbo jumbo, though, is that it may have historically likened the speech or customs of African peoples to “nonsense,” as if unintelligible or amusing in some way to the European colonists who introduced or modified maamajomboo into the English language. If knowing the history of mumbo jumbo has got you reflecting on your word choices, this slideshow, "These Common Words Have Offensive Histories," discusses many other words whose place in your vocab you may want to reconsider. 

Etymology

Origin of mumbo jumbo

First recorded in 1730–40; of disputed origin

Example Sentences

Instead, they’re saying, ‘Oh, we’re not recommending testing—hand-wave gesture mumbo jumbo science. … Oh, but you can test if you want to.’

From Slate • Mar. 21, 2022

The Fremen will move front and center in Part 2, and frankly there’s lots of weird mumbo jumbo to wade through in the coming chapters.

From Seattle Times • Oct. 20, 2021

Hootie is the chairman of the National and the obvious person to see about the membership and the mumbo jumbo.

From Golf Digest • Apr. 9, 2020

But he also shows a limited knowledge of operations, acknowledging that the amount of fuel used on take-off was quite a lot more than he expected and that some instructions to him were "mumbo jumbo".

From BBC • Aug. 11, 2018

Through her reverie of mumbo jumbo she heard the court-appointed lawyer lean over to Richie and offer two words of legal advice: “Plead guilty.”

From "The Color of Water: A Black Man's Tribute to His White Mother" by James McBride