noun
wordplay
WURD-play/ˈwɜːrdpleɪ/
Clever or humorous use of words and their meanings.
The joke's wordplay connects the fish called sole with the bottom of a shoe.
Etymology
Wordplay treats words as material for amusement: their meanings become something to play with. The expression “play on words” already meant a pun.
In context
we have puns or play on words. This is just wordplay. It's making funny comments by bending and using the language.
More examples
- The headline's wordplay makes a serious story sound funny.
- Some wordplay loses its humor when translated.
- Her poems use wordplay to suggest several meanings at once.