sambo
a term used to refer to a Black person, especially a male.
Also zam·bo [zam-boh] /ˈzæm boʊ/ .Archaic. a term used to refer to a Latin American of Black and Native American ancestry, or a person of Black and white ancestry.
Origin of sambo
1usage note For sambo
Words Nearby sambo
Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2024
How to use sambo in a sentence
My understanding is that this artwork came first and was soon replaced with the “sambo as a baby genie” motif.
Pancakes and Pickaninnies: The Saga of ‘Sambo’s,’ The ‘Racist’ Restaurant Chain America Once Loved | Andrew Romano | June 30, 2014 | THE DAILY BEASTIn 1950, Peter Pan Records released an audio version of the story with the racially neutral title Little Brave sambo.
Pancakes and Pickaninnies: The Saga of ‘Sambo’s,’ The ‘Racist’ Restaurant Chain America Once Loved | Andrew Romano | June 30, 2014 | THE DAILY BEASTSo all three of those might have been in the general Jungle-Bunny/sambo family.
The ‘Tennessee Crackers’ Would Have Never Happened | Michael Tomasky | November 30, 2013 | THE DAILY BEASTSome will remember that there used to be a restaurant chain in this country called sambo's.
Obama and the Washington Football Club and (Of Course!) Lanny Davis | Michael Tomasky | October 6, 2013 | THE DAILY BEASTOf course the cook sought to counteract such tendencies, but he had to be very circumspect, for sambo resented insults fiercely.
The Floating Light of the Goodwin Sands | R.M. Ballantyne
sambo, our guard, for some reasons best known to himself, made no objections to the proceeding.
Hurricane Hurry | W.H.G. KingstonThey are put on a tray of pure white wood with legs called sambo—a dumb waiter, if you like.
A Fantasy of Far Japan | Baron Kencho Suyematsusambo could speak a little English, having wrought for several years on the coffee plantation of a Yankee settler.
Martin Rattler | R.M. Ballantyne“Hi–i; you is fuss rate,” said sambo, as he and his comrades returned and busied themselves in cutting up the dead alligators.
Martin Rattler | R.M. Ballantyne
British Dictionary definitions for sambo (1 of 2)
/ (ˈsæmbəʊ) /
slang an archaic and taboo word for a Black person: once used as a term of address
archaic the offspring of a Black person and a member of another race or a mulatto
Origin of sambo
1British Dictionary definitions for sambo (2 of 2)
sambo wrestling
/ (ˈsæmbəʊ) /
a type of wrestling based on judo that originated in Russia and now features in international competitions
Origin of sambo
2Derived forms of sambo
- sambo wrestler, noun
Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012
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