as in settler
a person who settles in a new region the first colonizers of Easter Island must have faced untold challenges

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Example Sentences

Examples are automatically compiled from online sources to show current usage. Read More Opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.
Recent Examples of colonizer In 1545, Spanish colonizers greedy for precious metals established a mining town named Potosí in current-day Bolivia, more than 13,000 feet high, at the foot of a mountain that was rumored to be made of silver. Tim Vernimmen, Smithsonian Magazine, 21 Mar. 2025 Sussan Ley, the deputy leader of Mr. Dutton’s party, marked the holiday by likening the arrival of British colonizers to Elon Musk’s ambitions to settle Mars. Victoria Kim, New York Times, 4 Feb. 2025 Over the centuries, colonizers came and went, and in 1721, Danish missionaries founded a permanent settlement at Godthåb (now Nuuk). Nicholas Derenzo, AFAR Media, 27 Feb. 2025 Some countries with long exposure to colonial elections, such as India and Jamaica, had a nonwhite middle class that spoke the colonizer’s language and lobbied the metropole state for electoral representation. Foreign Affairs, 14 Jan. 2025 See All Example Sentences for colonizer
Recent Examples of Synonyms for colonizer
Noun
  • Jean Baptiste Point DuSable, a Black man known as the city’s first non-native settler, sold his properties in Chicago.
    Kori Rumore, Chicago Tribune, 7 May 2025
  • In the 18th century, the Boston Tea Party helped tip the nation permanently toward coffee, and Scotch-Irish settlers kick-started American potato growing in New Hampshire.
    Yasmin Tayag, The Atlantic, 5 May 2025
Noun
  • One of the pioneers of the English-only movement was Samuel Ichiye Hayakawa, a naturalized American who was born in Canada, to Japanese parents, in 1906.
    Graciela Mochkofsky, New Yorker, 19 May 2025
  • The Oscar-winning artist last trod the boards 10 years ago, portraying DNA pioneer scientist Rosalind Franklin in Anna Ziegler’s play Photograph 51, directed by Michael Grandage.
    Baz Bamigboye, Deadline, 19 May 2025
Noun
  • Virginia is recognized as the birthplace of American wine, since colonists attempted the craft in the early 17th century.
    Tara Massouleh McCay, Southern Living, 4 Apr. 2025
  • The seeds that burst into the formation of a new country were planted as early as 1760 when Boston became the center of patriotic zeal and resistance to what some colonists felt was unfair treatment by the government of British King George III.
    Mary Ann Grossmann, Twin Cities, 23 Mar. 2025
Noun
  • From 18th-century colonial ports to Harlem ballrooms and modern red carpets, the Black dandy has consistently used tailoring as a way to reclaim autonomy in a world designed to deny it.
    Sughnen Yongo, Forbes.com, 5 May 2025
  • France, which also lost a war in Vietnam, sent a minister to last year's celebrations of the 70th anniversary of the end of the battle of Dien Bien Phu, when French colonial rule collapsed.
    Minh Nguyen and Francesco Guarascio, USA Today, 1 May 2025

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“Colonizer.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/colonizer. Accessed 23 May. 2025.

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