Bourgeois Definition

bo͝or-zhwä, bo͝orzhwä
noun
A freeman of a medieval town.
Webster's New World
A self-employed person, as a shopkeeper or businessman.
Webster's New World
A member of the bourgeoisie, or middle class.
Webster's New World
A person whose beliefs, attitudes, and practices are conventionally middle-class.
Webster's New World
In Marxist theory, a member of the property-owning class; a capitalist.
American Heritage
Synonyms:
adjective
Of, relating to, or typical of the middle class, especially in holding conventional attitudes and materialistic values.
American Heritage
Of or characteristic of a bourgeois or the bourgeoisie; middle-class; also used variously to mean conventional, smug, materialistic, etc.
Webster's New World

Of or relating to the middle class, especially its attitudes and conventions.

Wiktionary

Origin of Bourgeois

  • Borrowed from French bourgeois (“a class of citizens who were wealthier members of the Third Estate”), from Anglo-Norman burgeis (“town dweller”), from Old French borjois, from borc (“town”), from Proto-Germanic *burgz (“fortress”), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰrgʰ- (“fortified elevation”). The path from Proto-Germanic to Old French is unclear. Perhaps via Frankish *burg or Late Latin *burgus, or possibly both. See also the related word burgess.

    From Wiktionary

  • French from Old French burgeis citizen of a town from bourg bourg bourg

    From American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition

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