Skip to content

highbrow

noun

  1. noun, or adjective, synonymous with intellectual, and, as an adjective, a term also synonymous with elite, or generally carrying a connotation of high culture.
L321901 on Wikidata ↗

adjective

No English definition recorded for this entry.

L337356 on Wikidata ↗

Wiktionary

adj

Etymology: A compound of the words high + brow, first recorded usage in 1875. Referring to the (by that time discredited) science of phrenology, which suggested that a person of intelligence and sophistication would possess a higher brow-line than someone of lesser intelligence and sophistication.

  1. Intellectually stimulating, highly cultured, sophisticated.

    highbrow entertainment

    “He's so darn afraid you'll be offended if he smokes. You scare him. Every time he speaks of the weather you jump him because he ain't talking about poetry or Gertie—Goethe?—or some other highbrow junk. You've got him so leery he scarcely dares to come here.”

noun

Etymology: A compound of the words high + brow, first recorded usage in 1875. Referring to the (by that time discredited) science of phrenology, which suggested that a person of intelligence and sophistication would possess a higher brow-line than someone of lesser intelligence and sophistication.

  1. A cultured or learned person or thing.