From Longman Dictionary of Contemporary Englishventriloquistven‧tril‧o‧quist /venˈtrɪləkwɪst/ noun [countable] APsomeone who entertains people by speaking without moving their lips and making it seem that the words are spoken by a model of a person called a dummy —ventriloquism noun [uncountable]
Examples from the Corpus
ventriloquist• When I grew up I became a ventriloquist, and at that I was very well trained by a great master.• Frank shows himself to be the only ventriloquist to move his lips but not his teeth.• Beware the ventriloquist, the dark horse, whose thrown voice juggles the truth.• Just occasionally, one could be forgiven for thinking that the dummy had overtaken the ventriloquist.Origin ventriloquist (1700-1800) Late Latin ventriloquus “ventriloquist”, from Latin venter (VENTRAL) + loqui “to speak”; from the belief that the voice comes from the ventriloquist's stomach 