Word family noun pleasantry pleasure ≠ displeasure adjective pleasant ≠ unpleasant pleased ≠ displeased pleasing ≠ displeasing pleasurable verb please ≠ displease adverb pleasantly ≠ unpleasantly pleasingly pleasurably
From Longman Dictionary of Contemporary Englishpleasantrypleas‧ant‧ry /ˈplezəntri/ noun (plural pleasantries) [countable usually plural] formal FUNNYthings that you say to someone in order to be polite, but which are not very important Stephen and Mr Illing exchanged pleasantries.Examples from the Corpus
pleasantry• If only he could unbend and relax, even give a genuine smile or make a pleasantry.• Word is she and McDermott exchanged pleasantries and greetings and watched the goings-on.• Oblivious, Mr Straw exchanged pleasantries with hand-picked prisoners.• I leave them after exchanging pleasantries, taking the garbage downstairs with me.• After a few pleasantries and the shaking of many hands, I accompanied the column for a short distance along the road.• No one ever caught a glimpse of his furrowed face smiling over innocent pleasantries.• Whereas all else had been a matter of pleasantries, he was ribald.• I stood on the truck, smiling pleasantries, talking about where we were in the war and what the pitch was.exchanged pleasantries• Word is she and McDermott exchanged pleasantries and greetings and watched the goings-on.• She and McDermott exchanged pleasantries.• Oblivious, Mr Straw exchanged pleasantries with hand-picked prisoners. 