master race

American  

noun

1. a people or nation, as the Germans during the Nazi period, whose members consider themselves genetically superior to all others and therefore justified in conquering and ruling them.

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master race British  

noun

1. German name: Herrenvolk.  a race, nation, or group, such as the Germans or Nazis as viewed by Hitler, believed to be superior to other races

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master race Cultural  

1. The expression used by the Nazis in Germany for the race they wanted to create — a pure race of white people suited to rule the world. Extermination was the Nazis' main tool for making the Germans pure. (See Holocaust.)

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Etymology

Origin of master race

First recorded in 1925–30

Example Sentences

Having absorbed on the basis of mutual tolerance people of so many lands and creeds, the U.S. has not and can have a "master race" complex or a "lawgiver" complex.

From Time Magazine Archive

Later, Archbishop Stepinac lashed out at the Nazi "master race" idea and condemned the execution of hostages as "inhuman and anti-Christian."

From Time Magazine Archive

An anthropology course would start with a talk on racial differences, enter a discussion of the master race theory, and wind up with well-documented proof that no race is superior.

From Time Magazine Archive

Were these creatures sprawled here in sleep ones that had known the domination of Those Others—though the fall of the master race of Astra must have occurred generations, hundreds of years in the past?

From Star Born by Norton, Andre