Stolid
(pronounced stol-id) adjective
Definition
1. having or displaying little or no emotion or sensibility; not easily excited or agitated; impassive; unemotional. 2. reliable; stable; not volatile; imperturbable.
Main Example
- During spot interviews on the street, when Americans are asked what they think of George Washington, typical responses are “statesmanly; old; sleepy eyed; serious; like a lawyer; boring...” Clearly, our first president’s old-fashioned portraits on the dollar bill, postage stamps, and in museums have done their damage, making most Americans regard him as an inert and inanimate American symbol. So, a few years ago, Mount Vernon undertook a multimillion-dollar campaign to help change Washington’s image from that of a Mr. Stolid to one full of life and vigor with whom the people of today can easily connect. For instance, one of the new exhibits includes a life-size wax figure depicting Washington as a very tall, handsome, and debonair 19-year-old surveyor.
Workplace Examples
- In all of these group photos of top management, Al--our CEO--looks so stolid, with an expression that seems to say “This company is my responsibility...I’m the guy who has to make the big decisions around here,” while all of the others are smiling and look sort of relaxed.
- The person at the front desk is often the first point of contact for those unhappy customers who bring in their equipment for repairs. Therefore, that first contact needs to be someone who is empathetic and friendly. I’m afraid that Joel, the guy we have there presently, comes across as insensitive and stolid. One customer told me the other day he felt Joel to be just about as warm-blooded as a robot!
Other Examples
- a colleague saying indignantly: “When I went down to the travel department this morning and showed them my credit card statement to prove I had been overcharged for my trip, they didn’t so much as utter a word of regret or apology. They just stolidly made a copy of my statement and said ‘We’ll get back to you.’”
- a military dictator’s stolid face on the cover of a newsmagazine; a highly risk-averse investor building a portfolio of “boring” and stolid stocks which typically show very little day-to-day movement; a massive new office building which, because of the incredibly unexciting design of its exterior and tiny, square windows, looks bleak and stolid, with some people even referring to it as “the mausoleum”
- Kenneth Feinberg, who has become America’s go-to guy for administering victim assistance funds (including the one just set up for victims of the Boston Marathon bombings) partly because of his stolid disposition--a personal quality that is essential for the fair and dispassionate handling of claimants whose stories are brimming with intense pain and suffering
- praising Glenn Ford in a PBS interview following the legendary actor’s death, USC Professor Howard Rodman saying: “Ford was certainly very good at those kinds of laconic characters who impressed you as much with their being as with what they said. He was slow to anger, slow to move...That kind of stolid, laconic American masculinity served him very well through more than 100 films and a variety of different roles.”
- In 2006, there was a welcome development for India’s common people, especially the poor, whose frustrations in dealing with that nation’s immense, unaccountable, and stolid bureaucracy are legendary. A new law called “Right to Information Act” opened up the closed world of bureaucrats to public scrutiny by forcing government officials to disclose information within 30 days or pay a fine.
