Etymology

lowbrow

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Today it means: Unsophisticated, not intended for an audience of intelligence, education or culture. Full definition →

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The story

A bahuvrihi compound of low + brow. An Americanism whose first use appears c. 1902. Refers to the (by that time discredited) pseudoscience of phrenology, which suggested that a person of low intelligence and sophistication would possess a lower brow-line than someone of greater intelligence and sophistication.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.