short for promenade promenade concert
informal short for promenade
1890–95, short for promenade
p(rogrammable) r(ead)-o(nly) m(emory)
A prom is a formal dance at the end of a school year. For many American high schools, the senior prom is a big deal. Kids get dressed up and then get embarrassed by parents who take too many photos. Students going to a prom will sometimes rent limousines to get there, and dress in fancy gowns and tuxedos. The prom itself is generally a much fancier version of a school dance, often held in a hotel or a gussied-up school gymnasium. The word dates from the late nineteenth century, an American English shortening of promenade, which means "to stroll," but also "to dance in couples with joined hands."
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"It's just crazy that a prom dress can cost so much," 18-year-old Carlota White Gonzalez says.
From BBC • May 21, 2026
The suits and dresses have all been donated from prom dress shops that are closing down and businesses, or from people who have worn them once and never again.
From BBC • May 21, 2026
Ah’Mari said he had little interest in typical high-school activities like prom or yearbook and kept his eyes on “the finish line”—his NIL deal.
From The Wall Street Journal • May 10, 2026
Saphiera Stillwell, 17, wears a prom dress, with a sticker price of $1,300, at the Positive Results Center 10th annual Prom Dress & Tux Gift-Away and Resource Fair at the Sheraton Gateway Los Angeles Hotel.
From Los Angeles Times • Apr. 25, 2026
He nods happily as if I just said we were going to go to prom together or something.
From "A Good Kind of Trouble" by Lisa Moore Ramée
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.
