favorite son
noun
Simple meaning
A successful man from a particular area.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
fayverihtsuhnSay the bold part a little louder.
IPA pronunciation (US)
ˈfeɪvɚɪtˈsʌn
This word is pronounced essentially the same in American and British English, so one transcription covers both.
IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) is a standard way of writing speech sounds.
Definition
Everyday modern meanings first, grouped by part of speech.
noun
us
A successful man from a particular area.
US politics
A male candidate chosen by a state delegation for an initial ballot, in the knowledge that other delegations will not prefer this candidate, for the purpose of negotiation.
politics
A male party member to whom the leadership is likely to assign a prominent role.
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
Aura for this meaning
This meaning: A successful man from a particular area.
Used this way, favorite son is a reasonably familiar word with a clearly warm, approving pull. It quietly approves while staying precise.
- Emotional tone
- Positive
- Formality
- Neutral
- Intensity
- Moderate
- How common
- Moderately common
- Connotation
- Successful and accomplished
- Usage feel
- Precise and approving
Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.
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Dictionary data from Wiktionary via the Free Dictionary API. Simple meanings, combinations and word intelligence are built from verified reference data, no AI is used to load this page.