bourgeois
/bʊɹʒˈwɑː/
Word Rarity
Rare
Frequency: Zipf frequency 3.40 in modern English
12
Scrabble Score
9
Letters
2
Syllables
8
Unique Chars
Meaning
adj
Of or relating to the middle class (often derogatory), and their presumed overly conventional, conservative, and materialistic values.
adj
Of or relating to the bourgeoisie, the third estate of the French Ancien Regime.
adj
Of or relating to the capitalist class, (usually derogatory) the capitalist exploitation of the proletariat.
noun
A person of any class with bourgeois (i.e., overly conventional and materialistic) values and attitudes.
Derogatory; Uncountable
noun
An individual member of the bourgeoisie, the third estate of the French Ancien Regime.
Uncountable
Example Sentences
- "bourgeois opinion"
- "It's impossible to tell the story of flamenco without talking about Lorca, who found in it a source of inspiration in a lifelong political-cultural-sexual struggle against bourgeois philistinism."
- "The increasing social interactions between the two nations through religion, court and commerce would expose differences in speech too and would soon deepen bourgeois Scots’ deteriorating perception of their own tongue."
- "Bogdanov did not explain what proletarian astronomy or integral calculus would be like, but he declared that if workers had difficulty in mastering the various sciences without long, specialized study it was chiefly because bourgeois scientists had erected artificial barriers of method and vocabulary so that the workers should not learn their secrets."
- "Der Bourgeois sieht in seiner Frau ein bloßes Produktionsinstrument. Er hört, daß die Produktionsinstrumente gemeinschaftlich ausgebeutet werden sollen, und kann sich natürlich nichts anderes denken, als daß das Los der Gemeinschaftlichkeit die Weiber gleichfalls treffen wird."
- "Нет ничего характернее для буржуа, как перенесение черт современных порядков на все времена и народы."
Etymology
Unadapted borrowing from French bourgeois (“a class of citizens who were wealthier members of the Third Estate”), from Old French burgeis (“town dweller”), from Frankish *burg, ultimately from Proto-Germanic *burgz (“stronghold; city”) (whence borough). Doublet of burgess; compare also burgish.
Origin
- Source language: Old French
Word Breakdown
Regional Pronunciation
- American English: /bʊɹʒˈwɑː/
- British English: /ˈbɔːʒ.wɑː/
Usage
Inflected Forms
more bourgeois (comparative)
most bourgeois (superlative)
burgeois (alternative)
bourgeoises (present, singular)
bourgeoising (participle, present)
bourgeoised (participle, past)
bourgeoised (past)