race riot

noun

Definition of race riot

: a riot caused by racial dissensions or hatreds

Examples of race riot in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

In the days that followed, violent protests erupted and race riots ripped that city apart. — Fox News, "Graham on discussing Mueller probe with Trump, Iran policy," 9 Aug. 2018 The 1970s were marked by financial hardship and race riots; the '80s saw a plan to redevelop the city with beachside condominiums, which ultimately failed to take off. — Bridget Hallinan, Condé Nast Traveler, "The Golden Age of Asbury Park," 18 Sep. 2018 On May 30, 1921, thousands of white Tulsans instigated a race riot, brutally attacking the town’s African-American community—machine guns and even airplanes dropping turpentine conspired to destroy Greenwood. — Patrick Sisson, Curbed, "10 Streets that Changed America," 5 July 2018 This would change only when World War I produced a labor shortage which ignited the Great Migration of blacks north, where race riots ensued. — WSJ, "The North Helped Reconstruction’s Failure," 1 June 2018 In 1921, a race riot erupted in Tulsa as white mobs began looting and leveling the affluent black district of Greenwood over reports a black man had assaulted a white woman in an elevator; hundreds are believed to have died. — BostonGlobe.com, "This day in history," 31 May 2018 The course of the intersection, and the surrounding West End neighborhood, was forever changed 50 years ago Sunday when Louisville's deadly race riots erupted there. — Matthew Glowicki, The Courier-Journal, "In Louisville's Parkland neighborhood, the scars of 1968 riots are still visible," 26 May 2018 Photo: Bettmann Archive/GETTY IMAGES The pro-Malay policy emerged after 1969 race riots in Kuala Lumpur in which hundreds of ethnic Chinese were killed. — James Hookway, WSJ, "Affirmative Action Drove Many Chinese Malaysians Abroad. Now They’re Thinking About Coming Home.," 17 May 2018 Take Shaw, a historical centre of black culture in Washington which limped into the 1970s as a shadow of itself after a series of race riots. — The Economist, "In praise of gentrification," 21 June 2018

These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'race riot.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.