middlebrow

American  

[mid-l-brou] / ˈmɪd lˌbraʊ /

noun

Informal.

1. a person of conventional tastes and interests in matters of culture; a moderately cultivated person.

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middlebrow British  

/ ˈmɪdəlˌbraʊ /

noun

1. a person with conventional tastes and limited cultural appreciation

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adjective

1. of or appealing to middlebrows

   middlebrow culture

Other Word Forms

• middlebrowism noun

Etymology

Origin of middlebrow

1920–25; middle + brow, on the model of highbrow, lowbrow

Explanation

A middlebrow is someone whose tastes are neither highbrow nor lowbrow. They're somewhere in between. A highbrow is someone with classy, sophisticated tastes. A lowbrow is someone with vulgar, uncultured tastes. A middlebrow, therefore, is someone with tastes that fall somewhere in the middle. A middlebrow might enjoy both lowbrow and highbrow entertainment, such as the rodeo or the opera. Or they might enjoy things that fall smack in the middle as far as sophistication goes. If you like art that's about halfway between classy and trashy, you might be a middlebrow.

Example Sentences

But no one before or since has fallen into paroxysms of indignant rage over the alleged vapidity of middlebrow cultural efforts quite like Macdonald.

From Salon • Apr. 19, 2026

America’s most middlebrow casual restaurant, with America’s squarest CEO, selling fried cheese and margaritas and fajita plates that you can eat off for days.

From Slate • Aug. 11, 2025

This framing device, which has the clunky air of a middlebrow play, provides a convenient if stagy way of breaking down his biography into manageable parts.

From Los Angeles Times • Aug. 9, 2024

Like its competitor, House Beautiful, House & Garden was then a middlebrow publication devoted to recipes, D.I.Y. decorating and handicrafts.

From New York Times • Oct. 30, 2023

Every now and then a racy book about lowlife—Tobacco Road, for example—would catch the public fancy, but for a surprisingly long time middlebrow fiction in America was about upper-middle-class life.

From "Class Matters" by The New York Times