Afro-American

American  

[af-roh-uh-mer-i-kuhn] / ˌæf roʊ əˈmɛr ɪ kən /

Sometimes Aframerican

noun

1. African American.

---

Afro-American British  

noun

1. another word for African-American

---

Usage

See African American, Black ¹.

This word has been replaced in general use by African-American

Etymology

Origin of Afro-American

An Americanism dating back to 1850–55; Afro- ( def. ) + American ( def. )

Example Sentences

“They started doing these large Afro-American surveys,” he once remarked.

From The Wall Street Journal • Mar. 31, 2026

Gospel music emerged from Afro-American culture in the 18th and 19th centuries - meaning it's rooted in the experiences of the conversion of enslaved African people to Christianity.

From BBC • Mar. 6, 2026

Numerous testimonies, as well as reporting by the Baltimore newspaper the Afro-American, detail the terrible conditions in which these children were incarcerated and made to work in fields.

From Barron's • Feb. 27, 2026

Fitzgerald, who died in 1996, tended to let her guard down a little with reporters from the Baltimore Afro-American, the Pittsburgh Courier and other Black publications that thrived through much of the century.

From Los Angeles Times • Dec. 1, 2023

Being Afro-American, or black, was being imposed on me by people who had their own ideas of what those terms meant.

From "Bad Boy" by Walter Dean Myers