Meaning of switcheroo | Babel Free

Definitions

A sneaky, unexpected, or clever swap or exchange.

Canada, US, informal

Equivalents

Examples

“In a corporate merger, it is usually the big company that buys a smaller one. Last⟳ week Boston's up & coming Tracerlab, Inc. pulled a switcheroo. Tracerlab, which grossed only $1,700,000 last⟳ year, bought the much bigger ($8,000,000 gross) Kelley-Koett Mfg. Co.”

“When you are dealing with American presidents, you always have⟳ to watch⟳ for the old switcheroo. Lyndon Johnson opposed Barry Goldwater's "extremism" on Vietnam, then proceeded to try⟳ to bomb Hanoi back into the stone age. Richard Nixon opposed price and wage controls, until he suddenly adopted them.”

“Elsewhere, it’s a ‘switcheroo’ ([Kevin] Kelly’s word, not mine) that will lend⟳ technology the working status of a vital force⟳ that, like⟳ ‘nature’, operates outside the reach⟳ of social imperatives.”

“The Manhattan Theater Club has pulled a switcheroo, delaying a planned production of Gone Home, by John Corwin, and replacing it with Four, by the 26-year-old playwright Christopher Shinn.”

CEFR level