Shoehorning

Turn of phrase

"Shoehorning" has come to mean, mostly in American English, the act of coercing or pressuring an individual into a situation which does not leave enough room, either literally or figuratively. Shoehorning in a conversational context means to force someone to take one of a limited number of positions, neither of which may adequately express what the individual wants to say (a "For me or against me"-scenario). Shoehorning in a more literal sense can express itself as pushing a number of individuals into an overfilled enclosure of space, such as a theater or a bus ("the usher shoehorned us into the back of the crowded theater").