small talk

Definition

Idle conversation, typically regarding innocuous or unimportant subjects, usually engaged in at social gatherings out of politeness.

Example Sentences

• "[T]o the credit of the lady it may be added, that […] without any of the arts of flattery or the gaieties of small talk, he began to be agreeable to her."
• "If he had a fault as a conversationalist, it was a certain tendency to monotony, a certain lack of sparkle and variety in his small-talk."
• "Yet for so public a figure, Jackson was socially awkward, inept at small talk and terrified when the distant audience became an adoring mob."