middlebrow
Noun: A person who has conventional tastes and interests that are neither intellectual (highbrow) nor unsophisticated (lowbrow). A middlebrow enjoys and appreciates cultural products, ideas, or entertainment that are accessible, moderately serious, and often popular, without seeking out highly avant-garde or academic works.
The term is used to describe a person's cultural preferences and intellectual habits. It can be neutral, but is sometimes used in a mildly derogatory way to imply a lack of adventurous or deep intellectual curiosity, favoring safe, mainstream culture instead. - As a typical middlebrow, he enjoys bestselling historical novels and popular science documentaries. - The magazine's content is aimed squarely at the middlebrow, making complex topics approachable.
- As an adjective: Although primarily a noun, "middlebrow" can function attributively as an adjective to describe cultural products intended for such an audience.
- The festival offered a lineup of middlebrow cinema, appealing to a broad audience.
- It was criticized as a middlebrow interpretation of the classic philosophy.
- Middlebrowism (noun): The attitudes, tastes, or characteristics typical of a middlebrow.
- The author's essays critique the middlebrowism of contemporary publishing.
- Generalist: A person competent in several different fields or activities (neutral, less focused on cultural taste).
- Mainstream: (When used to describe a person's tastes) Conforming to prevailing ideas or tastes.
- Highbrow: A person with highly cultured, intellectual, or scholarly tastes.
- Lowbrow: A person with uncultivated, non-intellectual tastes.
- The middle ground: While not an idiom with "middlebrow," this phrase relates conceptually, referring to a position between two extremes.
- His artistic taste occupies the middle ground between experimental and purely commercial.
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someone who is neither a highbrow nor a lowbrow
