Table of Contents
Definition of Bride
(noun) A woman about to be married or who is recently married.
Examples of Bride
- Michelle Obama, bride of Barack Obama.
- Marge, bride of Homer on the The Simpsons.
Bride Pronunciation
Syllabification: bride
Audio Pronunciation
Phonetic Spelling
- American English – /brIEd/
- British English – /brIEd/
International Phonetic Alphabet
- American English – /braɪd/
- British English – /brʌɪd/
Usage Notes
- Plural: brides
- A woman about to be married is the bride-to-be.
- A bride married to someone in the military during wartime is called a war bride.
- A gender-neutral term for bride or groom is partner.
- In contrast, a recently married or soon to be married man is called a groom or bridegroom.
Additional Information
- Family and Kinship Resources – Books, Journals, and Helpful Links
- Word origin of “bride” – Online Etymology Dictionary: etymonline.com
Related Terms
- bigamy
- common-law marriage
- endogamy
- exogamy
- family of orientation
- family of procreation
- extended family
- marriage
- monogamy
- open marriage
Works Consulted
The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language. 5th ed. 2011. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.
Bruce, Steve, and Steven Yearley. 2006. The SAGE Dictionary of Sociology. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE.
Merriam-Webster. (N.d.) Merriam-Webster Dictionary. (http://www.merriam-webster.com/).
Oxford University Press. (N.d.) Oxford Dictionaries. (https://www.oxforddictionaries.com/).
Princeton University. 2010. WordNet. (https://wordnet.princeton.edu/).
Random House Webster’s College Dictionary. 1997. New York: Random House.
Wikipedia contributors. (N.d.) Wiktionary, The Free Dictionary. Wikimedia Foundation. (http://en.wiktionary.org).
Cite the Definition of Bride
ASA – American Sociological Association (5th edition)
Bell, Kenton, ed. 2015. “bride.” In Open Education Sociology Dictionary. Retrieved February 9, 2025 (https://sociologydictionary.org/bride/).
APA – American Psychological Association (6th edition)
bride. (2015). In K. Bell (Ed.), Open education sociology dictionary. Retrieved from https://sociologydictionary.org/bride/
Chicago/Turabian: Author-Date – Chicago Manual of Style (16th edition)
Bell, Kenton, ed. 2015. “bride.” In Open Education Sociology Dictionary. Accessed February 9, 2025. https://sociologydictionary.org/bride/.
MLA – Modern Language Association (7th edition)
“bride.” Open Education Sociology Dictionary. Ed. Kenton Bell. 2015. Web. 9 Feb. 2025. <https://sociologydictionary.org/bride/>.