journalist
Americannoun
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journalists
plural
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a person who practices the occupation or profession of journalism.
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a person who keeps a journal, diary, or other record of daily events.
noun
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a person whose occupation is journalism
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a person who keeps a journal
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of journalist
Explanation
A journalist is a person whose job involves writing nonfiction stories for newspapers, magazines, or online news sites. If you are reading or hearing a news story, you have a journalist to thank for providing that story. One type of journalist is a reporter, who researches topics and interviews people before writing a story or producing a piece for TV. Editors, photographers, and columnists can also be described as journalists, particularly if they work for a newspaper. Another kind of journalist is a person who regularly writes in a journal or diary. Journalist comes from the Old French jornel, "day" or "day's work," which became journal, "daily publication."
Vocabulary lists containing journalist
Journalism
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"Hip-Hop as Culture" and "I Am Somebody"
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This Week in Words: Current Events Vocabulary for April 1–April 7, 2023
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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.
See Examples For:
He cites Black cultural figures like the queen of salsa Celia Cruz, American fashion journalist André Leon Talley, the late French singer and dancer Josephine Baker and political activist Assata Shakur as guiding lights.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 15, 2026
Between 2003 and 2006, Lindsay worked as a freelance journalist in Egypt.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 15, 2026
If you scroll through Twitter, you might encounter Tanden engaging in a testy back-and-forth with progressive journalist Mehdi Hasan.
From Slate ● Oct. 15, 2026
An AFP journalist reported that slogans were spraypainted in Hebrew on the exterior walls, including "just because we are quiet doesn't mean we are asleep".
From Barron's ● Oct. 14, 2026
As a journalist, she was no stranger to being hung up on, but this time irritated her more than most.
From "Little Fires Everywhere" by Celeste Ng
“I don’t expect this environment to begin to become significantly easier over the next few years,” Leiters told journalists last week as he unveiled a highly anticipated turnaround plan.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 16, 2026
Zacharia held her first White House press briefing on Tuesday with an unusually short press conference where she answered questions from three journalists.
From Barron's ● Oct. 15, 2026
Some of today’s young journalists still document leaders and public figures with big talk and questionable ethics.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 13, 2026
During the trial, prosecutors presented testimony from Los Angeles and Las Vegas police investigators, journalists and Davis’ own 2019 memoir about the killing as evidence against him.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 13, 2026
Though many of the journalists who came to Stay at the yellow house had tried to teach me, I had not learned.
From "Krik? Krak!" by Edwidge Danticat
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Get a wordDefinitions 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.
