Usage of Colored
The adjective meanings of colored relating to race were formerly in common and widespread use well into the 20th century, although attitudes toward them had changed by the 1960s. In most nonhistorical contexts, these uses of colored are now considered unacceptable; the terms Black and African American are preferred. The adjective colored remains in the full name of the NAACP (the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People), a civil rights organization founded in the early 20th century. The use of colored in this name is not regarded as offensive. The adjective colored is also occasionally still used in self-reference by Black people, but its use by others is offensive.
Usage of Colored
The noun colored was formerly in common and widespread use well into the 20th century, although attitudes toward it had changed by the 1960s. In most nonhistorical contexts, this use of colored is now considered unacceptable.
Examples of colored in a Sentence
Kelly Lawler, USA Today, 4 Sep. 2025
But inside, slabs of colored glass, hunks of polished resin, and sundry material experiments gleam like mirages in the sunlight that streams in from the ceiling and windows.
—Hannah Martin, Architectural Digest, 4 Sep. 2025
The design readily recognizable by its steel tubes and colored metal panels is today part of the permanent design collection of the Museum of Modern Art in New York.
—Lily Templeton, Footwear News, 4 Sep. 2025
Hope then asked to hold the pup, who has curly sandy-colored fur and wagged her tail as the 6-year-old held her in her arms (with a little help from her mom).
—Hannah Sacks, People.com, 2 Sep. 2025
Zones 3-9 The brightly colored flowers of Oriental poppies (Papaver orientale), with their delicate, papery petals, bloom in mid to late spring, sometimes until early summer.
—Rita Pelczar, Better Homes & Gardens, 2 Sep. 2025
Fortnum & Mason stocks it, and earlier this year Harrods launched the golden-colored Cygnet 77, which gets its hue from 55 weeks of resting in ex–Welsh whiskey casks.
—Tori Latham, Robb Report, 1 Sep. 2025
But there are other decorating moves that may date your home in ways far sneakier and more subtle than your mom’s once-beloved avocado-colored range.
—Betsy Cribb Watson, Southern Living, 31 Aug. 2025
Stores are set inside quaint-looking houses with porticoes and pastel-colored clapboard sidings.
—Caroline Reid, Forbes.com, 28 Aug. 2025
Cite this Entry
“Colored.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/colored. Accessed 9 Sep. 2025.
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