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brown belt

American  

noun

Martial Arts.
brown belts plural
  1. a brown cloth waistband conferred upon a participant in one of the martial arts, as judo or karate, to indicate an intermediate rank.

  2. a person who has attained this rank.

  3. the rank itself.


Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

Etymology

Origin of brown belt

First recorded in 1965–70

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.

Sy earned a brown belt in karate, and Cardoza, who does indeed do the crane kick, was a competitive figure skater for 15 years.

From New York Times • Jun. 1, 2022

Born and raised on Manhattan’s Upper East Side, she has degrees in law and theoretical physics, a pilot’s license, and a brown belt from an elite judo institute in Japan.

From Slate • Nov. 23, 2020

A black belt in judo and brown belt in Brazilian jiu jitsu, the 27-year-old former amateur European and world champion in MMA quickly got over the excitement of being elevated to the main event.

From Reuters • Feb. 21, 2020

The self-improvement obsessive earned a brown belt in karate, dabbled in Slovak and wrote screenplays before he committed fully to politics.

From Los Angeles Times • Jan. 17, 2020

He was a brown belt, or as he put it, a “junior black belt.”

From "As Brave As You" by Jason Reynolds

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