provincial

American  

[pruh-vin-shuhl] / prəˈvɪn ʃəl /

adjective

1. belonging or peculiar to some particular province; local.

   the provincial newspaper.

2. of or relating to the provinces.

   provincial customs; provincial dress.

3. having or showing the manners, viewpoints, etc., considered characteristic of unsophisticated inhabitants of a province; rustic; narrow or illiberal; parochial.

   a provincial point of view.

   Synonyms:

   small-town, rural

4. (often initial capital letter) noting or pertaining to the styles of architecture, furniture, etc., found in the provinces, especially when imitating styles currently or formerly in fashion in or around the capital.

   Italian Provincial.

5. History/Historical. of or relating to any of the American provinces of Great Britain.

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noun

1. a person who lives in or comes from the provinces.

2. a person who lacks urban sophistication or broad-mindedness.

3. Ecclesiastical.

   1. the head of an ecclesiastical province.

   2. a member of a religious order presiding over the order in a given district or province.

provincial British  

/ prəˈvɪnʃəl, prəˌvɪnʃɪˈælɪtɪ /

adjective

1. of or connected with a province

2. characteristic of or connected with the provinces; local

3. having attitudes and opinions supposedly common to people living in the provinces; rustic or unsophisticated; limited

4. denoting a football team representing a province, one of the historical administrative areas of New Zealand

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noun

1. a person lacking the sophistications of city life; rustic or narrow-minded individual

2. a person coming from or resident in a province or the provinces

3. the head of an ecclesiastical province

4. the head of a major territorial subdivision of a religious order

Other Word Forms

• interprovincial adjective
• nonprovincial adjective
• nonprovincially adverb
• provinciality noun
• provincially adverb
• quasi-provincial adjective
• quasi-provincially adverb
• semiprovincial adjective
• semiprovincially adverb
• subprovincial adjective
• unprovincial adjective
• unprovincially adverb

Etymology

Origin of provincial

First recorded in 1300–50; Middle English (noun and adjective), from Latin prōvinciālis, from prōvinci(a) province + -ālis -al ¹

Example Sentences

The California types risk being overly provincial here, as if movie and TV production aren’t already being dispersed to global production centers and, indeed, into cyberspace with AI.

From The Wall Street Journal

Also on the list were several other military officers and a number of provincial officials including Sun Shaochong, the former party chief of the Inner Mongolia region.

From BBC

In the part of the forest they control, he and other Romee youngsters heave logs to be burned and turned into charcoal, then sent by canoe to the provincial capital Kisangani.

From Barron's

His live-streamed remarks, made to provincial officials and other company chiefs, has been widely circulated on Chinese social media and covered by local news.

From BBC

In the provincial capital Banda Aceh, student groups and civil society organisations have descended on the local parliament to demand greater mobilisation of national resources.

From Barron's

Related Words

• local
• rural