Editing Shibboleth (section)

{{Short description|Custom or tradition that distinguishes one group from another}}
{{Other uses}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=July 2023}}
[[File:Celebrate Taking Them Down (34400658742).jpg|thumb|upright=1.3|A [[New Orleans]] resident challenges out-of-towners who had come to protest against the 2017 [[Removal of Confederate monuments and memorials|removal]] of the [[Robert E. Lee Monument (New Orleans)|Robert E. Lee Monument]]. The out-of-towners' inability to pronounce "[[Tchoupitoulas Street]]" according to the local fashion would be a ''shibboleth'' marking them as outsiders.]]

A '''shibboleth''' ({{IPAc-en|audio=GT Shibboleth.ogg|ˈ|ʃ|ɪ|b|əl|ɛ|θ|,_|-|ɪ|θ}};<ref>{{Citation |last=Jones |first=Daniel |title=English Pronouncing Dictionary |page=485 |year=2003 |editor=Roach |editor-first=Peter |url=https://archive.org/details/englishpronounci0000unse_d4y7/page/484/mode/2up?q=shibboleth |place=Cambridge |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=3-12-539683-2 |author-link=Daniel Jones (phonetician) |editor2=Hartmann |editor2-first=James |editor3=Setter |editor3-first=Jane |orig-year=1917}}</ref><ref name=":2">{{MerriamWebsterDictionary|shibboleth}}</ref> {{langx|he|שִׁבֹּלֶת|šībbōleṯ}}) is any [[Convention (norm)|custom]] or tradition, usually a choice of phrasing or single word, that distinguishes one group of people from another.<ref>{{Cite book |last1=Allen |first1=R. E. |url=https://archive.org/details/conciseoxforddic00real/mode/2up?q=shibboleth |title=The Concise Oxford dictionary of current English |last2=Fowler |first2=H. W. |last3=Fowler |first3=F. G. |publisher=Clarendon Press |year=1990 |isbn=978-0-19-861200-1 |edition=8th |location=Oxford |page=1117 |via=Internet Archive}}</ref><ref name=":2" /><ref>{{Cite web |title=SHIBBOLETH definition and meaning |url=https://www.collinsdictionary.com/dictionary/english/shibboleth |access-date=2024-09-09 |website=[[Collins English Dictionary]]}}</ref> Historically, shibboleths have been used as [[password]]s, ways of self-identification, signals of loyalty and affinity, ways of maintaining traditional segregation, or protection from threats. It has also come to mean a moral formula held tenaciously and unreflectingly, or a [[taboo]].<ref>Oxford English Dictionary Online, ''Shibboleth'', Additional sense.</ref>