shoehorn
Americannoun
verb (used with object)
noun
verb
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of shoehorn
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:
It is hard to shoehorn this spectacle of mass-integration, this enforced loss of crowns and kingdoms, into the idea of partition.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jan. 30, 2026
“We didn’t want to shoehorn the songs into the story,” he said, nodding in appreciation at Read.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 15, 2025
"These subjects are not the easiest to shoehorn into a three-and-a-half minute song," says Lorde.
From BBC ● Jul. 8, 2025
Galveston’s lawyers, though, say the Black and Latino populations are too dispersed to shoehorn in a specific district for them.
From Washington Times ● Dec. 27, 2023
"That guy David from Rahway? He ever killed anybody with that shoehorn?"
From "Miracle's Boys" by Jacqueline Woodson
Anthropic's advertisement broadcast during last week's Super Bowl showed a man asking advice from a conversational AI, which then shoehorns advertising copy for a dating site into its otherwise relevant response.
From Barron's ● Feb. 15, 2026
The show, unfortunately, shoehorns in too many songs.
From Los Angeles Times ● Dec. 9, 2022
These contrasting views are clearly designed to make a point, but doing so shoehorns him into an argumentative posture that doesn’t always fit his comedy.
From New York Times ● Oct. 13, 2022
It is a shame the film shoehorns so much of the book into two hours.
From Salon ● Jul. 15, 2022
Luckily, I had recently purchased two of your quality shoehorns and was able to finish the exam without missing a beat.
From Washington Post ● Mar. 24, 2022
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.
