Herman Wouk
Did you know?
Burgeon arrived in Middle English as burjonen, a borrowing from the Anglo-French verb burjuner, meaning "to bud or sprout." Burgeon is often used figuratively, as when writer Ta-Nehisi Coates used it in his 2008 memoir The Beautiful Struggle: "… I was in the burgeoning class of kids whose families made too much for financial aid but not enough to make tuition payments anything less than a war." Usage commentators have objected to the use of burgeon to mean "to flourish" or "to grow rapidly," insisting that any figurative use should stay true to the word's earliest literal meaning and distinguish budding or sprouting from subsequent growing. But the sense of burgeon that indicates growing or expanding and prospering (as in "the burgeoning music scene" or "the burgeoning international market") has been in established use for decades and is, in fact, the most common use of burgeon today.
Examples of burgeon in a Sentence
Leo Barraclough, Variety, 5 Feb. 2026
The sector represents a critical lifeline and a burgeoning economic driver for Kenya.
—Kate Nishimura, Sourcing Journal, 5 Feb. 2026
The burgeoning demand has caused breaches in stadium security, with guides flagging instances of tour participants entering the top deck with backpacks and even rolling suitcases going unchecked.
—Steve Henson, Los Angeles Times, 5 Feb. 2026
Broadcom has a burgeoning custom business focusing on chips called ASICs, which some experts believe may be more efficient for some artificial intelligence workloads.
—Kif Leswing, CNBC, 4 Feb. 2026
See All Example Sentences for burgeon
Cite this Entry
“Burgeon.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/burgeon. Accessed 10 Feb. 2026.
Copy CitationKids Definition
burgeon
verb
