pigeonhole
Americannoun
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one of a series of small, open compartments, as in a desk, cabinet, or the like, used for filing or sorting papers, letters, etc.
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a hole or recess, or one of a series of recesses, for pigeons to nest in.
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Also called white hole. Also called pigeon hole,. Printing. white space created by setting words or lines too far apart.
verb (used with object)
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to assign to a definite place or to definite places in some orderly system.
to pigeonhole new ideas.
- Synonyms:
- catalog, categorize
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to lay aside for use or reference at some later, indefinite time.
We must pigeonhole this excellent plan until the time is ripe.
- Synonyms:
- file
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to put aside for the present, especially with the intention of ignoring or forgetting, often indefinitely.
to pigeonhole an unwanted invitation.
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to place in or as if in a pigeonhole or pigeonholes.
to pigeonhole papers.
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to fit or provide with pigeonholes.
The desk must be pigeonholed for all my papers.
noun
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a small compartment for papers, letters, etc, as in a bureau
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a hole or recess in a dovecote for pigeons to nest in
-
informal a category or classification
verb
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to put aside or defer
-
to classify or categorize, esp in a rigid manner
Other Word Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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pigeonholesimple
-
pigeonholessimple
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have pigeonholedperfect
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has pigeonholedperfect
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am pigeonholingprogressive
-
are pigeonholingprogressive
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is pigeonholingprogressive
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have been pigeonholingperfect progressive
-
has been pigeonholingperfect progressive
Past
-
pigeonholedsimple
-
had pigeonholedperfect
-
was pigeonholingprogressive
-
were pigeonholingprogressive
-
had been pigeonholingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of pigeonhole
Explanation
A pigeonhole is a small nesting area for a pigeon, or a similarly cozy compartment or alcove. If you feel like you're stuck in a restrictive category — only thought of as someone's sister, for example — that's another kind of pigeonhole. A cubbyhole in your desk is one kind of pigeonhole, and the little box where a domesticated pigeon sleeps is another. These original meanings date from the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. By the 1870s, pigeonhole had also come to mean "an overly simplistic or restrictive category," and also "to assign someone to a rigid category." So when you assume that a circus clown couldn't also be a brilliant mathematician, you have pigeonholed him.
Vocabulary lists containing pigeonhole
The Legislative Branch, Sections 4–6
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Accountable
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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.
See Examples For:
“If we embrace narrow group-based identities too fiercely, we cling to the very cages in which others would seek to trap us. We pigeonhole ourselves.”
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jan. 31, 2026
"Aerospace has something for people with different backgrounds, different qualifications, there's so much variety. So don't pigeonhole yourself, there really is something for everyone here."
From BBC ● Jul. 18, 2025
The Hoover article was what we in the news biz often pigeonhole as “interesting, if true.”
From Los Angeles Times ● Dec. 3, 2024
We wanted to cover a wide range of genres and a wide range of eras because we didn't want to pigeonhole the movie that it was going to be all boy band pop music.
From Salon ● Jun. 2, 2024
This bit of common sense, sometimes termed the pigeonhole or Dirichlet drawer principle, can occasionally be used to derive claims that are not so obvious.
From "Innumeracy: Mathematical Illiteracy and Its Consequences" by John Allen Paulos
Somewhere along the way if you're a young actor coming up, you can bet there are pigeonholes for everyone.
From Salon ● Aug. 24, 2024
His fundamental theme is how social media pigeonholes us and mines our data, a condescending phenomenon that treats us less like human beings than abstractions made up of marketable information.
From New York Times ● Oct. 13, 2022
From left: Withings ScanWatch, Fossil Hybrid HR, Skagen Jorn, Fossil Gen 6 Hybrid What bothers me about the Stella design is how it somewhat pigeonholes your style.
From The Verge ● Jul. 16, 2022
Everything that’s wrong with this place is the way we put everyone in pigeonholes.
From The Guardian ● Feb. 8, 2020
Based on these mini-experiments, modern grammarians have sorted words into grammatical categories that sometimes differ from the traditional pigeonholes.
From "The Sense of Style" by Steven Pinker
“I don’t want to be pigeonholed as the assassin.”
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 18, 2026
Sometimes pigeonholed as just a goalscorer, Haaland has 24 assists in three seasons for Manchester City in the Premier League and Europe, compared with 26 at Bayern for Kane.
From BBC ● Jul. 9, 2026
As a college student, you have more imagination and idealism than a burned-out professional who feels pigeonholed into a particular industry.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Mar. 18, 2026
So think outside the box, don’t be complacent or feel pigeonholed that you have to write in a bunch of magic tricks.
From Los Angeles Times ● Apr. 22, 2025
Second, developmental sequences are not invariant, so examples pigeonholed under the same stage are inevitably heterogeneous.
From "Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies" by Jared M. Diamond
Raphael Benza, head of Johannesburg-based record label Vth Season, says the very name Best African Performance goes against pigeonholing.
From BBC ● Feb. 1, 2025
He no longer felt like the “Baby” singer everyone was so hellbent on pigeonholing him as.
From Salon ● Dec. 21, 2024
I was intrigued then when the pollster YouGuv, in combination with The Economist magazine, decided to take pigeonholing to a whole different level.
From Seattle Times ● Apr. 13, 2024
Initially lumped in with a market-driven frenzy for young abstract painters, Auerbach resisted pigeonholing.
From New York Times ● Mar. 16, 2023
It offers no nifty formulas for pigeonholing people or decoding folkways and manners.
From "Class Matters" by The New York Times
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.
