How to Use minstrel in a Sentence

minstrel

noun
  • Edna St. Vincent Millay was unofficially the minstrel of Maine, as her poetry celebrates its coast and countryside.
  • There was a good 70, 80 years of that with the minstrel shows.
    — Ron Hart, Billboard, 29 Mar. 2018
  • Wade believes the minstrel in these new texts was more of a local performer.
    — Laura Baisas, Popular Science, 31 May 2023
  • My eyes are wide, the type of wide that white people would imitate during minstrel shows.
    — Brooklyn White, Teen Vogue, 11 Mar. 2018
  • Most are records of payments made to minstrels, listed by their first names and instruments played.
    — Jennifer Ouellette, Ars Technica, 15 June 2023
  • Burr, written as a minstrel vaudevillian, was played by Mandy Patinkin.
    — Jackson McHenry, Vulture, 19 Mar. 2026
  • Depending on the tale, the flutist was a minstrel, shaman, trader or trickster.
    — Bridget Alex, Discover Magazine, 9 Oct. 2020
  • Piety becomes psychedelia in an image of a once well-meaning minstrel whose mind has been newly turned on and tuned in.
    — Adam Gopnik, The New Yorker, 20 Mar. 2023
  • But what is the difference between their portrayal and that of the actors in minstrel shows?
    — Brianna Holt, Quartzy, 1 Nov. 2019
  • Fifty crafters, a luncheon, a huge bake sale, take-a-chance table and strolling minstrels will be part of the festivities.
    — courant.com, 27 Nov. 2019
  • Singing for your supper is a romantic notion with roots in the medieval minstrels of Europe.
    — Hector Saldana, ExpressNews.com, 13 June 2019
  • Worse yet is the portrayal of the Africans, which multiple critics compared to minstrel shows.
    — Jesse David Fox, Vulture, 30 July 2025
  • Posters of 20th-century blackface performers and minstrel shows line the walls.
    — Savannah Eadens, The Courier-Journal, 29 Aug. 2019
  • Hurt drew inspiration from disparate sources, including ragtime and music from minstrel and medicine shows.
    — Sonja Anderson, Smithsonian Magazine, 23 Feb. 2024
  • And with fiddles, accordions, guitars and her current instrument of choice, the minstrel banjo.
    — Chris Willman, Variety, 25 June 2026
  • After the deed is done, the queen agrees to marry the murderous brother, but on the eve of the wedding, a minstrel finds a piece of the dead brother’s bone in the forest.
    — Georgia Rowe, The Mercury News, 14 Jan. 2017
  • Sorry, those little white gloves have their root in minstrel shows, intensely racist vaudeville acts whose repercussions are still seen in today’s media.
    — Sophia Carter-Kahn, The Verge, 27 Apr. 2018
  • The Man), takes its name from a legendary character of Colombian folklore who is an archetype of the traveling minstrel.
    — Judy Cantor-Navas, Billboard, 14 Nov. 2017
  • Richard left home to join a minstrel show run by a man known as Sugarloaf Sam, occasionally appearing in drag.
    — Anchorage Daily News, 9 May 2020
  • In the Middle Ages, minstrels often traveled from taverns and fairs to entertain people.
    — Laura Baisas, Popular Science, 31 May 2023
  • The 130-year-old brand features a Black woman who was originally dressed as a minstrel character.
    — NBC News, 18 June 2020
  • Social media posts decried the dark skin tone, many likening it to the blackface minstrels of the 19th century that promoted racial stereotypes.
    — Colleen Barry, chicagotribune.com, 4 May 2018
  • Circuses, tent revivals, minstrel shows, magicians and more could credit Hatch Show Print for helping pack venues.
    — Jon Waterhouse, CNN, 7 June 2017
  • Just a week ago, there were allegations about Heinz Ketchup's campaign's likeness of minstrel blackface, for which the brand issued an apology.
    — Dr. Marcus Collins, Forbes, 14 Oct. 2024
  • The opera’s plot centers on the tension between carnal love and spiritual purity, with Tannhäuser, a minstrel, caught between the two realms.
    — Jeremy Eichler, BostonGlobe.com, 3 Feb. 2023
  • While Guardian speculates the title is a reference to minstrel shows, the outlet also points to a 1985 Prince song with the same name.
    — Zoe Haylock, The Hollywood Reporter, 14 Feb. 2018
  • Among the departures from Twain’s text is a subplot involving Jim performing in a minstrel troupe and donning blackface alongside the white actors.
    — Lauren Michele Jackson, The New Yorker, 26 Mar. 2024
  • The Black characters that appeared on-screen closely resembled the clownish stereotypes popularized by the minstrels.
    — Literary Hub, 25 Mar. 2026
  • They were published in the North and South, performed in racist minstrel shows and polite parlors, and sung by abolitionists and defenders of enslavement alike.
    — Christopher Lynch, The Conversation, 1 July 2026
  • Batiste is not a reprobate minstrel like late-night regular Lil Nas X; yet the weakness of both is held in equivalent esteem by the cultural mainstream.
    — Armond White, National Review, 6 Apr. 2022

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'minstrel.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

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