First World
Americannoun
Etymology
Origin of First World
First recorded in 1970–75
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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.
A French machine-gun officer in the trenches during the First World War.
From Los Angeles Times • Jun. 22, 2026
“Cuba had a First World military in a Third World country,” Mora said.
From The Wall Street Journal • May 22, 2026
As the poet William Butler Yeats observed after the end of the First World War, the center is not holding, while the best lack all conviction.
From Salon • Nov. 10, 2025
Related: I have a ‘mundane’ First World problem: Should I buy a $30,000 bracelet?
From MarketWatch • Oct. 10, 2025
The nova of 1572 was not the cause of the Scientific Revolution, any more than the bullet which killed Archduke Franz Ferdinand on 28 June 1914 was the cause of the First World War.
From "The Invention of Science" by David Wootton
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.
