what does "rat hole" mean?

[emy]

Is "rat hole" an idiom or should I take it literally.

[matilda]

please mention the whole paragraph that this sentense is from. the teachers can decide better if they have the whole text

[BobK]

Is "rat hole" an idiom or should I take it literally.

I've heard it used idiomatically, to refer to a very detailed/specific discussion between a small number of people at a business meeting:

Let's not pursue that rat-hole and waste everyone else's time. Perhaps you three could stay on after the end of the meeting.

Informally, people in a meeting might just say 'Rat-hole!' to identify such a discussion when it starts.

(Of course, matilda's right though - in some contexts it might not be used figuratively at all.)

Another rat-related idiom that you meet (in BE at least) is 'rat-run' - a series of residential roads where traffic goes dangerously fast (often with sharp corners, junctions and narrow roads) during rush-hour to avoid hold-ups on the main roads:

Since the roadworks started, the road where I live has become a rat-run between the bypass and the motorway junction.

b

[Tdol]

I had never heard the term before the arrest of Saddam Hussein.

[Geron]

A 'Rat Hole' is just an undesirable place, and generally small and dirty...