farmer

¹

[fahr-mer]

noun

1. a person who farms; person who operates a farm or cultivates land.

2. Slang: Disparaging and Offensive.,  an unsophisticated or ignorant person, especially one from a rural area.

3. Archaic.,  a person who undertakes some service, as the care of children or poor people, at a fixed price.

4. Archaic.,  a person who undertakes the collection of taxes, duties, etc., paying a fixed sum for the privilege of retaining them.

5. Cards.

   1. a variety of twenty-one played with a 45-card pack, the object being to obtain cards having a total worth of 16.

   2. the dealer in this game.

Farmer

²

[fahr-mer]

noun

1. Fannie (Merritt) 1857–1915, U.S. authority on cooking.

2. James (Leonard), 1920–1999, U.S. civil rights leader; founder of CORE.

farmer

¹

/ ˈfɑːmə /

noun

1. a person who operates or manages a farm

2. a person who obtains the right to collect and retain a tax, rent, etc, or operate a franchise for a specified period on payment of a fee

3. a person who looks after a child for a fixed sum

Farmer

²

/ ˈfɑːmə /

noun

1. John. ?1565–1605, English madrigal composer and organist

Sensitive Note

The word farmer has been used as a derogatory term for an ignorant or unsophisticated person, especially one from a rural area (whether an actual farmer or not), since the 1800's. A couple of citations illustrate this. One early example is found in Artie by George Ade (1896): “I may be a farmer, but it takes better people than you to sling the bull con into me,” uttered by the title character Artie, who is a young office worker and not a farmer. A book review in The Guardian (August 21, 2001) shows a more recent use: “I worked in a couple of those bars where you hustle champagne. They were businessmen, they weren't naive farmers.”

Other Word Forms

• farmerlike adjective
• profarmer adjective
• underfarmer noun

Word History and Origins

Origin of farmer¹

First recorded in 1350–1400; Middle English fermer, fermour, from Anglo-French, Old French fermier “collector of revenue,” from Medieval Latin firmārius “one who holds lands or tenement for a fixed number of years or for life”; farm, -er ²

Example Sentences

To this point, it has managed to survive by inhabiting artificial waterways like irrigation, canals and rice fields, where it became a familiar sight for local farmers, according to the U.S.

Read more on Los Angeles Times

California’s wine boom changed the fortunes of its farmers and land, too.

Read more on The Wall Street Journal

China has halted its purchases of U.S. soybeans, leaving American farmers without access to one of their most important export markets.

Read more on Barron's

As U.S. farmers harvest a bumper soybean crop, Chinese buyers have disappeared; a bailout is expected.

Read more on Barron's

The orchard’s 16 heirloom varieties, older cultivars passed down by generations of farmers, are fenced to keep out the crowd.

Read more on The Wall Street Journal

Related Words

• grower 
• laborer 
• peasant 
• producer 
• rancher