lowbrow

• low-brow

A bahuvrihi compound of low +‎ brow, Americanism, circa 1902. Refers to the (by that time discredited) pseudoscience of phrenology, which suggested that a person of low intelligence and sophistication would possess a lower brow-line than someone of greater intelligence and sophistication.

• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˈloʊbɹaʊ/
• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈləʊbɹaʊ/

lowbrow (comparative more lowbrow, superlative most lowbrow)

1. Unsophisticated, not intended for an audience of intelligence, education or culture.

   The Three Stooges are known for their lowbrow slapstick humor consisting of foolish action for the masses.

lowbrow (countable and uncountable, plural lowbrows)

1. (countable) Someone or something of low education or culture.
2. (uncountable, art) An underground populist visual art movement that arose in the Los Angeles area in the late 1960s, inspired by comics, punk music, graffiti, etc.

• See Thesaurus:idiot

• highbrow

• highbrow
• middlebrow
• no-brow

• ESC, 2003. Re:highbrow, middlebrow, lowbrow, The Phrase finder.
• Robert Hendrickson, 1997. Encyclopedia of Word and Phrase Origins (New York: Facts on File)