Jim Crow

American  

Or jim crow

noun

1. a practice or policy of segregating or discriminating against Black people, as in public places, public vehicles, or employment.

2. Disparaging and Offensive. a contemptuous term used to refer to a Black person.

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adjective

1. favoring or supporting a segregationist or discriminatory policy of Jim Crow.

2. for Black people only.

   a Jim Crow school.

jim crow British  

/ ˈdʒɪm ˈkrəʊ /

noun

1. 1. the policy or practice of segregating Black people

   2. ( as modifier )

      jim-crow laws

2. 1. a derogatory term for a Black person

   2. ( as modifier )

      a jim-crow saloon

3. an implement for bending iron bars or rails

4. a crowbar fitted with a claw

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Jim Crow Cultural  

1. A descriptive term for the segregation of institutions, businesses, hotels, restaurants, and the like. It also refers to the laws that required racial segregation.

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Other Word Forms

• jim-crowism noun

Etymology

Origin of Jim Crow

An Americanism dating back to 1830–40; so called from the name of a song sung by Thomas Rice (1808–60) in a minstrel show

Example Sentences

The Cold War simmered, Emmett Till had been murdered less than a year earlier and in Montgomery, Ala., a young minister named Martin Luther King Jr. was challenging Jim Crow.

From The Wall Street Journal • Jan. 31, 2026

“The film speaks to the Black experience in America within these borders of 1930s Jim Crow South,” Coogler mused.

From Los Angeles Times • Dec. 22, 2025

The Court held that the formula was an anachronism from the Jim Crow era and didn’t account for racial progress.

From The Wall Street Journal • Oct. 13, 2025

Board of Education led to the Court deeming segregation in public education to be unconstitutional, dismantling the separate but equal doctrine and marking the end of the Jim Crow era.

From Salon • Sep. 10, 2025

The damage done by the minstrel’s complicity in the Jim Crow regime was considerable.

From "The New Jim Crow" by Michelle Alexander