middle-class
[mid-l-klas, -klahs]
- of, relating to, or characteristic of the middle class; bourgeois: middle-class taste; middle-class morality.
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Origin of middle-class
First recorded in 1890–95
middle class
- a class of people intermediate between the classes of higher and lower social rank or standing; the social, economic, cultural class, having approximately average status, income, education, tastes, and the like.
- the class traditionally intermediate between the aristocratic class and the laboring class.
- an intermediate class.
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Origin of middle class
First recorded in 1760–70
Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2018
Examples from the Web for middle-class
Contemporary Examples
As a white, educated, Western, middle-class male, I possess most of the unearned privilege the world has to offer.
Memo to all Republican contenders: The GOP is now the home of white working- and middle-class voters.
The Affordable Care Act was always a short-term political loser with respect to middle-class voters.
For us, the police embrace nothing if not working- and middle-class values and morality.
Middle-class Congolese like himself, called “évolué,” or “evolved,” were hunted down for having ties with the Europeans.
Historical Examples
This middle-class sentiment, or socialism, or whatever it may be, is rotten.
Strife (First Series Plays)John Galsworthy
I had read, in books by English writers, of the British middle-class Pharisee.
Kent Knowles: QuahaugJoseph C. Lincoln
The Manila middle-class native, in particular, possesses none of this.
The Philippine IslandsJohn Foreman
That is the life of the middle-class woman, as you probably know.
The Daffodil MysteryEdgar Wallace
England's middle-class government was the ideal of human progress.
The Education of Henry AdamsHenry Adams
middle class
- Also called: bourgeoisie a social stratum that is not clearly defined but is positioned between the lower and upper classes. It consists of businessmen, professional people, etc, along with their families, and is marked by bourgeois valuesCompare lower class, upper class, working class
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- of, relating to, or characteristic of the middle class
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Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition
© William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins
Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012
Word Origin and History for middle-class
middle class
n.
1766; as an adjective, "characteristic of the middle class" (depreciative) it dates from 1893.
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Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2010 Douglas Harper
middle class
A social and economic class composed of those more prosperous than the poor, or lower class, and less wealthy than the upper class. Middle class is sometimes loosely used to refer to the bourgeoisie. In the United States and other industrial countries, the term is often applied to white-collar, as opposed to blue-collar, workers.
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Note
Values commonly associated with the middle class include a desire for social respectability and material wealth and an emphasis on the family and education.
The New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Third Edition
Copyright © 2005 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.