columnist
Americannoun
noun
Etymology
Origin of columnist
Explanation
A columnist writes regularly for a newspaper or magazine, usually expressing opinions or commentary. A columnist might write an article endorsing a candidate for president one week, and a story about a terrible local fire the next week. If you get a job as a newspaper columnist, you'll be expected to publish on a regular basis, maybe once or twice a week. An advice columnist answers letters that ask for help with personal problems and dilemmas, and a political columnist comments on various current events and political figures. The word columnist comes from a newspaper column, which got that name from the "vertical division of a page" meaning.
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.
Among the takeaways from columnist Callum Borchers’s conversations with women who make at least $775,000 a year: Thick skin is overrated and impostor syndrome isn’t always bad.
From The Wall Street Journal • May 6, 2026
Sheinbaum has “her back against the wall,” wrote columnist Denise Dresser on X.
From Los Angeles Times • Apr. 30, 2026
Opinions about what Iran’s new leaders want are all over the map, but in the words of Foreign Policy columnist Michael Hirsh, they now seem to be “calling the shots.”
From Salon • Apr. 26, 2026
Lorna Skinner, for Pearson, said they would have seen the post online prior to their visit and concluded there were grounds to suspect the columnist had committed a crime.
From BBC • Apr. 24, 2026
The day before giving the speech, he’d shown an advance copy to a newspaper columnist, hoping to convince him to write a supportive piece the next day.
From "Boots on the Ground: America's War in Vietnam" by Elizabeth Partridge
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.
