bourgeois

1 of 2

adjective

bour·​geois ˈbu̇rzh-ˌwä 

 also  ˈbu̇zh-,

 or  ˈbüzh-,

or

bu̇rzh-ˈwä 

1

: of, relating to, or characteristic of the social middle class

2

: marked by a concern for material interests and respectability and a tendency toward mediocrity

3

: dominated by commercial and industrial interests : capitalistic

bourgeoisification

ˌbu̇(r)zh-ˌwä-zə-fə-ˈkā-shən 

noun

bourgeoisify

bu̇(r)zh-ˈwä-zə-ˌfī 

verb

bourgeois

2 of 2

noun

bour·​geois ˈbu̇rzh-ˌwä 

 also  ˈbu̇zh-,

 or  ˈbüzh-,

or

bu̇rzh-ˈwä 

plural bourgeois

ˈbu̇rzh-ˌwä(z),

 also  ˈbu̇zh-,

 or  ˈbüzh-,

or

bu̇rzh-ˈwä(z) 

1

a

: a middle-class person

b

: burgher

2

: a person with social behavior and political views held to be influenced by private-property interest : capitalist

3

plural : bourgeoisie

Examples of bourgeois in a Sentence

Adjective

Indignation about the powers that be and the bourgeois fools who did their bidding—that was all you needed … You were an intellectual. —Tom Wolfe, Harper's, June 2000

Even before the 19th century was over, successive waves of collection mania had rolled across Europe and America, submerging country homes and bourgeois town houses in ferns and faux-Grecian ruins … —Liesl Schillinger, New York Times Book Review, 7 Feb. 1999

Or is Sartre's existentialism to be understood as only a way station in his transit from a bourgeois intellectual to a Marxist ideologue? —Walker Percy, "The State of the Novel," 1977, in Signposts in a Strange Land,  1991

… the United States … was the bourgeois nation par excellence, in which, it might be said, the values of trade were transmogrified into ideals of freedom. —Robert Penn Warren, Democracy and Poetry, 1975

Noun

For many, Nietzsche has always been a bugaboo, though some regard him as an heroic destroyer of idols, the invigorating voice of skepticism, and a revealer of those embarrassing actualities that the pieties and protestations of the bourgeois have customarily concealed. —William H. Gass, Harper's, August 2005

With exceptions like Rousseau, the philosophes were elitists. They enlightened through noblesse oblige in company with noblemen, and often with a patronizing attitude toward the bourgeois as well as the common people. —Robert Darnton, The Kiss of Lamourette, 1990

Recent Examples on the Web

Adjective

Jude Law, Vanessa Kirby, Ana de Armas Film festivals: Toronto Release date: TBA Awards potential: The film is described as a survivalist thriller among a set of bourgeois European expats in the Galapagos in the 1920s. —Joe Reid, Vulture, 10 Sep. 2024

More recently, a bourgeois elite, which feels besieged by the increasingly assertive have-nots, has begun casting around for sturdier leaders to replace its tainted idol, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, whose economic reforms, once much loved, are now widely regarded as populist sops to the poor. —Pankaj Mishra, Foreign Affairs, 15 Oct. 2013

Noun

At Celine, Slimane sought to update the brand’s French bourgeois aesthetic for a younger audience, with ad campaigns featuring model Kaia Gerber in cropped tops and faded jeans, accessorised with a baseball cap and small, leather purse. —Reuters, CNN, 2 Oct. 2024

With increasing agitation, Estela relates the family’s dark dramas and her own mounting feelings of detachment, creating an outsider’s portrait of bourgeois unravelling, deftly entwined with reflections on class and oppression. —The New Yorker, 7 Oct. 2024

Word History

Etymology

Adjective and Noun

Middle French, from Old French burgeis townsman, from burc, borg town, from Latin burgus

First Known Use

Adjective

1761, in the meaning defined at sense 1

Noun

1604, in the meaning defined at sense 1b

Phrases Containing bourgeois

• anti-bourgeois
• petit bourgeois
• petty bourgeois

Kids Definition

bourgeois

1 of 2 adjective

bour·​geois ˈbu̇(ə)rzh-ˌwä 

bu̇rzh-ˈwä

1

: of or relating to townspeople or members of the middle class

2

: marked by a concern for comfort, wealth, and what is respectable

bourgeois

2 of 2 noun

plural bourgeois

-ˌwä(z),

-ˈwä(z)

: a person of the middle class of society

Etymology

Noun

from early French bourgeois "a resident of a town," from earlier burgeis (same meaning), from burc "town," from Latin burgus "fortified place" — related to burgess

Biographical Definition

Bourgeois 1 of 2

biographical name (1)

Bour·​geois bu̇rzh-ˈwä 

ˈbu̇rzh-ˌwä

Léon-Victor-Auguste 1851–1925 French statesman

Bourgeois

2 of 2

biographical name (2)

Louise 1911–2010 American (French-born) sculptor