barrio
Americannoun
plural
barrios-
(in Spain and countries colonized by Spain) one of the divisions into which a town or city, together with the contiguous rural territory, is divided.
-
a part of a large U.S. city, especially a crowded inner-city area, inhabited chiefly by a Spanish-speaking population.
noun
-
a Spanish-speaking quarter in a town or city, esp in the US
-
a Spanish-speaking community
Etymology
Origin of barrio
First recorded in 1890–95; from Spanish: literally, “district, neighborhood,” from Arabic barrī “of open country” (equivalent to barr “outside, open country” + -i adjective suffix) + -o Spanish noun suffix
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
In that same barrio, Flores raised three children with her first husband, Walter Gavidia, a police detective.
From The Wall Street Journal • Mar. 29, 2026
It was a tough start though as he left his family's home in a barrio in Colombia's second-largest city Medellin to pursue that dream.
From BBC • Sep. 30, 2024
Then there was Maria, whom I met via a mutual friend in the working-class barrio of Tepito in Mexico City.
From Los Angeles Times • Nov. 14, 2023
She also made attempts to pass herself and her children off as Spanish or French as they moved from barrio to barrio, living what Mr. Belafonte would call an “underground life.”
From Washington Post • Apr. 25, 2023
For extra money women in the barrio took in laundry or ironing or cooked for men with no wives.
From "When I Was Puerto Rican" by Esmeralda Santiago
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
