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folklore

noun

Simple meaning

The tales, legends, superstitions, and traditions of a particular ethnic population.

Pronunciation

Say it like this:

fohklawr

Say the bold part a little louder.

US device voice
IPA pronunciation (US)

ˈfoʊklɔɹ

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.

Word Review

Definition

Everyday modern meanings first, grouped by part of speech.

noun

  1. The tales, legends, superstitions, and traditions of a particular ethnic population.

  2. by extension

    The tales, superstitions etc. of any particular group or community.

  3. mathematicsslang

    The collective of proofs or techniques which are widely known among mathematicians, but have never been formally published.

Word at a Glance

Difficulty
B2 · Upper Intermediate (estimated)
Frequency
Moderately Common
Formality
Technical
Typical Use
Varies by meaning

Word Aura™

How this word commonly comes across.

Aura for this meaning

This meaning: The tales, legends, superstitions, and traditions of a particular ethnic population.

Used this way, folklore is a reasonably familiar word that usually carries little praise or criticism of its own. It usually sounds natural in a wide range of settings.

Emotional tone
Neutral
Formality
Neutral
Intensity
Not strongly marked
How common
Moderately common
Connotation
Matter-of-fact
Usage feel
Neutral and straightforward

Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.

More ways to use folklore

  • “The children enjoyed listening to stories from local folklore.”noun

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Common Patterns and Combinations

How this word naturally appears with others.

Tales

folklore society

Unwritten

american folklorejewish folklore

Other combinations

western folkloreirish folkloresouthern folklorefolklore researchlocal folklore

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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.