variants
or carney
or carnie
plural carnies or carneys
often attributive
2
: a person who works with a carnival
Examples of carny in a Sentence
Recent Examples on the Web
The piece follows Liliom, a hopelessly romantic carny whose passion gets the better of him in a dingy amusement park at the height of America’s Great Depression.
—
Lauren Warnecke, Chicago Tribune, 3 Mar. 2026
And that corpse really gets around, in carny museums and in the sideshow accompanying a transcontinental race and then in a couple of schlock movies.
—Jackson McHenry, Vulture, 28 Apr. 2025
As fun as watching modern-day WWE shows is, doing a deep dive into wrestling's weird, sometimes tragic history and carny origins gives you a deeper respect for how much wrestlers and the business have evolved since the early 20th century.
—Brian Truitt, USA TODAY, 7 Mar. 2025
The carny’s clockwork arrival honored an event even kids as small as Pontiac knew.
—Carly Tagen-Dye, Peoplemag, 7 May 2024
See All Example Sentences for carny
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Lauren Warnecke, Chicago Tribune, 3 Mar. 2026
And that corpse really gets around, in carny museums and in the sideshow accompanying a transcontinental race and then in a couple of schlock movies.
—Jackson McHenry, Vulture, 28 Apr. 2025
As fun as watching modern-day WWE shows is, doing a deep dive into wrestling's weird, sometimes tragic history and carny origins gives you a deeper respect for how much wrestlers and the business have evolved since the early 20th century.
—Brian Truitt, USA TODAY, 7 Mar. 2025
The carny’s clockwork arrival honored an event even kids as small as Pontiac knew.
—Carly Tagen-Dye, Peoplemag, 7 May 2024
See All Example Sentences for carny
Cite this Entry
“Carny.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/carny. Accessed 12 Mar. 2026.
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