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bourgeois

/bʊɹʒˈwɑː/adjective, noun, verb

bourgeois is an adjective meaning “Of or relating to the middle class (often derogatory), and their presumed overly conventional, conservative, and materialistic values” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). It is spelled B-O-U-R-G-E-O-I-S and has 2 syllables, and it appears 2.5 times per million words in written English (wordfreq, 2021 data).

What does bourgeois mean?

adjective

  1. 1

    Of or relating to the middle class (often derogatory), and their presumed overly conventional, conservative, and materialistic values.

    bourgeois opinion

  2. 2

    Of or relating to the bourgeoisie, the third estate of the French Ancien Regime.

  3. 3

    Of or relating to the capitalist class, (usually derogatory) the capitalist exploitation of the proletariat.

noun

  1. 1

    The middle class.

  2. 2

    rareAn individual member of the middle class.

  3. 3

    derogatoryA person of any class with bourgeois (i.e., overly conventional and materialistic) values and attitudes.

  4. 4

    An individual member of the bourgeoisie, the third estate of the French Ancien Regime.

  5. 5

    A capitalist, (usually derogatory) an exploiter of the proletariat.

  6. 6

    datedA size of type between brevier and long primer, standardized as 9-point.

verb

  1. 1

    To make bourgeois.

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

How do you pronounce bourgeois?

  • UK /ˈbɔːʒ.wɑː/
  • UK /ˈbʊəʒ.wɑː/
  • US /bʊɹʒˈwɑː/

As a noun (“A size of type between brevier and long primer…”): /bəːˈdʒɔɪs/, /bəɹˈd͡ʒɔɪs/.

Bourgeois has 2 syllables (counted from its American pronunciation in the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary).

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: En-uk-bourgeois.ogg, En-us-bourgeois.ogg, En-au-bourgeois.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).

Forms of bourgeois

  • more bourgeois comparative
  • most bourgeois superlative
  • burgeois
  • bourgeoises present, singular, he/she/it
  • bourgeoising participle, present
  • bourgeoised participle, past

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

How common is bourgeois?

Bourgeois appears 2.5 times per million words in written English, the 17,122nd most frequent word form in the list.

Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).

Bourgeois in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese

LanguageWords
Frenchbourgeois (of or relating to the middle class), bourgeoise (individual member of the middle class), petit-romain, gaillarde (9-point type)
Germanbourgeois, bürgerlich (of or relating to the middle class), Bourgeois (individual member of the middle class), Borgis (9-point type), spießig, spießbürgerlich (conventional, conservative and materialistic)
Portugueseburguês (of or relating to the middle class), burguesa (individual member of the middle class)
Spanishburgués (of or relating to the middle class), breviario (9-point type), aburguesado (conventional, conservative and materialistic)

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Translations are Wiktionary's, by sense; a linked word has its own PlainSpell page.

Where does bourgeois come from?

Unadapted borrowing from French bourgeois (“a class of citizens who were wealthier members of the Third Estate”), from Old French burgeis (“town dweller”), from Frankish *burg, ultimately from Proto-Germanic *burgz (“stronghold; city”) (whence borough). Doublet of burgess; compare also burgish.

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).