Definition

1. Noun:
   • A person who operates a farm: A farmer is someone who owns, manages, or works on a farm, cultivating land, raising crops, and/or breeding livestock.

Usage

• The word "farmer" is a countable noun. It refers to a person whose primary occupation is agriculture.
• It is used to describe individuals engaged in various scales of farming, from small family farms to large commercial operations.

Examples

• Noun:
  • The farmer woke up at dawn to milk the cows.
  • Local farmers are concerned about this year's drought.
  • She is a third-generation farmer who grows organic vegetables.

Advanced Usage

• "Gentleman farmer": A person who owns and runs a farm but does not rely on it as their main source of income.
  • After retiring from the city, he became a gentleman farmer, raising a few sheep for pleasure.
• "Dirt farmer": (Informal, often US) A farmer who works a small, often poor, farm.
  • The novel tells the story of a dirt farmer struggling during the Great Depression.

Variants and Related Words

• Farm (n/v): The land and buildings used for growing crops and rearing animals; to cultivate land.
• Farming (n): The activity or business of operating a farm.
• Farmhand (n): A worker employed on a farm.
• Farmstead (n): A farm and its buildings.

Synonyms

• Agriculturist: A person who is an expert in agriculture.
• Grower: A person who grows a particular type of crop.
• Rancher: A person who owns or works on a large farm, especially one for raising cattle or sheep.
• Cultivator: A person or thing that cultivates land.

Phrasal Verbs / Related Phrases

• To farm out:
  • To send work to be done by someone else.

    • The company farms out its customer service operations.
  • To put a child into someone else's care.

    • In the past, poor families sometimes farmed out their children to work.

Related Idioms

• "A farmer's market": A market where local farmers sell their produce directly to the public.
  • We buy all our fresh fruit and vegetables at the Saturday farmer's market.
• "A farmer's tan": (Humorous) A suntan that covers only the neck and forearms, typically from working in a T-shirt outdoors.
  • After a summer of yard work, he was sporting a classic farmer's tan.

Noun

1. an expert on cooking whose cookbook has undergone many editions (1857-1915)
2. United States civil rights leader who in 1942 founded the Congress of Racial Equality (born in 1920)
3. a person who operates a farm