scholar

American  

[skol-er] / ˈskɒl ər /

noun

1. a learned or erudite person, especially one who has profound knowledge of a particular subject.

   Synonyms:

   savant

2. a student; pupil.

3. a student who has been awarded a scholarship.

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scholar British  

/ ˈskɒlə /

noun

1. a learned person, esp in the humanities

2. a person, esp a child, who studies; pupil

3. a student of merit at an educational establishment who receives financial aid, esp from an endowment given for such a purpose

4. a school pupil

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Related Words

See pupil ¹.

Other Word Forms

• nonscholar noun
• nonscholarly adjective
• scholarless adjective
• scholarliness noun
• scholarly adjective

Etymology

Origin of scholar

First recorded before 1000; from Late Latin scholāris, equivalent to Latin schol(a) school ¹ + -āris -ar ¹; replacing Middle English scoler(e), Old English scolere, from Late Latin, as above

Example Sentences

Though scholars have traced the origins of nearly all the six score or so known Lincoln photos, this one remained undocumented.

From The Wall Street Journal

One of our more bracing memories is a lunch at the Cato Institute with a dozen or so of its scholars.

From The Wall Street Journal

Frank Dikötter is an iconoclast historian who immerses himself in the primary sources more thoroughly than any other Western scholar of 20th-century China.

From The Wall Street Journal

He speculated that scholars and Americans in general were too disheartened by Vietnam to want to contemplate a traumatic rupture like the Civil War.

From The Wall Street Journal

Emails between Epstein and dozens of scholars, Tramo among them, show how professors aggressively pursued donations in the hopes of getting a slice of the financier’s estimated $600 million.

From Los Angeles Times

Related Words

• academic
• doctor
• intellectual
• philosopher
• professor
• scientist
• student
• teacher