White - Idioms and Expressions

Idioms and Expressions

• To whitewash something is to conceal an unpleasant reality.
• A white lie is an innocent lie told out of politeness.
• White noise is the noise of all the frequencies of sound combined. It is used to cover up unwanted noise.
• A white knight in finance is a friendly investor who steps in to rescue a company from a hostile takeover.
• A white elephant is a possession which was expensive to buy or maintain, but which turns out to have little real value.
• White collar workers are those who work in offices, as opposed to blue collar workers, who work with their hands in factories or workshops.
• A white paper is an authoritative report on a major issue by a team of experts; a government report outlining policy; or a short treatise whose purpose is to educate industry customers. Associating a paper with white may signify clean facts and unbiased information.
• The white feather is a symbol of cowardice, particularly in Britain. It supposedly comes from cockfighting and the belief that a cockerel sporting a white feather in its tail is likely to be a poor fighter. At the beginning of the First World War, women in England were encouraged to give white feathers to men who had not enlisted in the British Army.