proletarian
Americanadjective
-
pertaining or belonging to the proletariat.
-
(in ancient Rome) belonging to the lowest or poorest class of the people.
noun
adjective
noun
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of proletarian
Explanation
Working class, blue collar, plebeian and certainly not aristocratic — that's what the adjective proletarian means. Proletarian has roots in the Latin word proles, which means "offspring." That's because back in ancient Rome, a proletarian was a member of the proletariat, the class of society that had no wealth and didn't own property. The only thing these proletarians had to offer was their hard work and their children. Today's proletarians are a little better off; they're considered the working class and just might have better benefits through their unions than some white-collar workers out there.
Vocabulary lists containing proletarian
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Power Suffix: -arian
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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.
Mr. Franzia did more than poke a proletarian finger in the wine industry’s elite image.
From New York Times ● Sep. 15, 2022
They identified with the agrarian and proletarian revolutions and mingled with European artists who fled to Mexico from both world wars.
From Seattle Times ● Aug. 10, 2022
The social critic Mike Davis once called these “stealth houses” that hide their “luxurious qualities with proletarian or gangster facades.”
From Los Angeles Times ● May 4, 2022
He bought it at a junk shop in the proletarian district, a junk shop that will become very important, and he starts writing on it.
From Salon ● Nov. 3, 2021
Or they would disappear, alter themselves out of recognition, learn to speak with proletarian accents, get jobs in a factory, and live out their lives undetected in a back street.
From "1984" by George Orwell
Definitions 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.
