as in hick
an awkward or simple person especially from a small town or the country
a lame comedy about the misadventures of yokels in the big city
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Recent Examples of yokel
Florida yokels versus the elite Hollywood movie-star kind of group.
—
Bilge Ebiri, Vulture, 26 July 2024
Ben’s refusal to stand down for a middle-aged white man seeking to wrest power from him was radical, as was the film’s ending, in which the hero was shot by yokels failing to distinguish him from the zombies previously described as animals.
—Richard Newby, The Hollywood Reporter, 23 Oct. 2024
John Elway would sooner crowd surf with the yokels in Oakland’s Black Hole than tank a season.
—Sean Keeler, The Denver Post, 1 Sep. 2024
Their argument could really be rephrased thusly: If stunts got an Oscar, these ignorant yokels will maim and kill themselves breathlessly racing each other for a fancy gold statue.
—Bilge Ebiri, Vulture, 30 May 2024
Trujillo reimagines the sentimental yokels of Grover’s Corners, New Hampshire, as fervent, travel-ready fundamentalists.
—oregonlive, 5 Sep. 2023
And, with perhaps the canniest remark on the design’s yokel-ness, someone else claimed to have seen the new logo wandering around Rockefeller Center asking for the Christmas tree.
—Adam Gopnik, The New Yorker, 23 Mar. 2023
The team brings up a yokel from the minor leagues, Shane (Michael Oberholtzer), to relieve him, and Shane’s gruesome, heartfelt (and English-language) bigotry finally shakes the team to its roots.
—Helen Shaw, Vulture, 4 Apr. 2022
The first comic, Charles F. Browne, hit the lecture circuit in 1861 and adopted the pseudonymous persona of a country yokel named Artemus Ward.
—Harry Bruinius, The Christian Science Monitor, 29 Nov. 2021
Bilge Ebiri, Vulture, 26 July 2024
Ben’s refusal to stand down for a middle-aged white man seeking to wrest power from him was radical, as was the film’s ending, in which the hero was shot by yokels failing to distinguish him from the zombies previously described as animals.
—Richard Newby, The Hollywood Reporter, 23 Oct. 2024
John Elway would sooner crowd surf with the yokels in Oakland’s Black Hole than tank a season.
—Sean Keeler, The Denver Post, 1 Sep. 2024
Their argument could really be rephrased thusly: If stunts got an Oscar, these ignorant yokels will maim and kill themselves breathlessly racing each other for a fancy gold statue.
—Bilge Ebiri, Vulture, 30 May 2024
Trujillo reimagines the sentimental yokels of Grover’s Corners, New Hampshire, as fervent, travel-ready fundamentalists.
—oregonlive, 5 Sep. 2023
And, with perhaps the canniest remark on the design’s yokel-ness, someone else claimed to have seen the new logo wandering around Rockefeller Center asking for the Christmas tree.
—Adam Gopnik, The New Yorker, 23 Mar. 2023
The team brings up a yokel from the minor leagues, Shane (Michael Oberholtzer), to relieve him, and Shane’s gruesome, heartfelt (and English-language) bigotry finally shakes the team to its roots.
—Helen Shaw, Vulture, 4 Apr. 2022
The first comic, Charles F. Browne, hit the lecture circuit in 1861 and adopted the pseudonymous persona of a country yokel named Artemus Ward.
—Harry Bruinius, The Christian Science Monitor, 29 Nov. 2021
Recent Examples of Synonyms for yokel
Noun
-
Sorrentino may also be exorcising some conflicting feelings about his birthplace, which is portrayed as a vulgar, crude place populated by crooks and hicks and photographed like its paradise.—
David Fear,
Rolling Stone,
7 Feb. 2025
-
In first grade, when a teacher called him a hick, Ciotti threw an inkwell at her.—
D. T. Max,
The New Yorker,
23 Sep. 2024
Noun
-
In his lecture at the Traditions festival, Dugin moved from peasants to a survey of modern Russian intellectual history.—
James Verini,
The New Yorker,
1 Mar. 2025
-
This cotton peasant blouse may be simple, but it’s also guaranteed to become one of the most versatile pieces in your closet.—
Merrell Readman,
Travel + Leisure,
19 Mar. 2025
Noun
-
Mantle was the voluble hayseed from Oklahoma who could hit anything but was corrupted by the big city, and wound up undone by alcohol and knee injuries.—
Adam Gopnik,
The New Yorker,
21 June 2024
-
Today, the variety shows’ wise-clown hayseeds (overalls, prosthetic teeth, silly hats, no shoes) are the ones who get all the good lines, whose material is distinctive in its political sensibility and cultural hobbyhorses.—
Rafil Kroll-Zaidi,
Harper's Magazine,
30 Mar. 2024
Noun
-
Going to the Ron Burgundy–Ricky Bobby idiot well one time too many, Ferrell plays Cam Brady, a lazy, cynical longtime congressman running against a local bumpkin (Galifianakis).—
Tim Grierson,
Vulture,
4 Feb. 2025
-
Carter, perhaps the most decent man to ever occupy the Oval Office, was long written off as a country bumpkin, one who perhaps unsurprisingly left office as a one-term anomaly.—
Philip Elliott,
TIME,
9 Jan. 2025
Noun
-
This removed one of the last obstacles preventing poor provincials from governing the empire.—
Jeffrey E. Schulman / Made by History,
TIME,
20 Dec. 2024
-
While early imperial aristocrats saw provincials as subject nations with their own cultures, their working-class replacements considered Romans a single people and expected all to share the same values.—
Jeffrey E. Schulman / Made by History,
TIME,
20 Dec. 2024
Noun
-
The latest scheme is to create a 2.5% business-to-business tax, a tax hidden in the costs of businesses so that those rubes also known as voters may not notice it.—
Reader Commentary,
Baltimore Sun,
18 Mar. 2025
-
Walsh’s male fantasists—the nameless rubes of Ballyturk, the desperate suitors of Penelope, even the heartbroken father at the center of Grief Is the Thing With Feathers—get to strut and bluster and scream into the wind.—
Sara Holdren,
Vulture,
23 Feb. 2025
Noun
-
Parsons called him a jealous clown, in so many words.—
Troy Renck,
The Denver Post,
15 Mar. 2025
-
Who was the biggest Death of a Unicorn class clown?—
Jack Smart,
People.com,
14 Mar. 2025
Cite this Entry
“Yokel.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/yokel. Accessed 5 Apr. 2025.
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