<B>lowbrow, </B>noun, adjective.<DL COMPACT><DD> (Informal.) <DD><I>noun </I> a person who is not cultured or intellectual. <BR> <I>Ex. Ben ... said this powerful play was too powerful for a bunch of lowbrows like us (H. L. Wilson).</I> <DD><I>adj. </I> <B>1. </B>of or suitable for a lowbrow. <BR> <I>Ex. Generalizations about the proportion of support for highbrow and lowbrow activity in any community must of course be carefully checked (Harper's).</I> <DD><B> 2. </B>being a lowbrow; incapable of culture. </DL>
<B>lowbush blueberry,<DL COMPACT><DD> 1. </B>any one of several eastern North American bushes growing to a height of one or two feet, with small clusters of greenish-white flowers and a sweet, dark-blue berry; low blueberry. <DD><B> 2. </B>its berry. </DL>
<A NAME="lowchurch">
<B>Low-Church, </B>adjective.<DL COMPACT><DD> of or having to do with a party in the Anglican Communion that lays little stress on the priestly or Catholic character of the Church. </DL>
<A NAME="lowchurch">
<B>Low Church,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> a party maintaining Low-Church practices. </DL>
<A NAME="lowchurch">
<B>Low-Church, </B>adjective.<DL COMPACT><DD> of or having to do with a party in the Anglican Communion that lays little stress on the priestly character of the Church. </DL>
<A NAME="lowchurchman">
<B>Low Churchman,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> a person who favors Low-Church practices. </DL>
<A NAME="lowcomedy">
<B>low comedy,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> comedy of a broad subtle nature, relying more on boisterous physical action and ludicrous situations than on witty dialogue. </DL>
<A NAME="lowcost">
<B>low-cost, </B>adjective. =inexpensive.</DL>
<A NAME="lowcountry">
<B>low-country, </B>adjective.<DL COMPACT><DD> of the Low Countries; having to do with the Netherlands, Belgium, and Luxembourg. </DL>
<B>low-down</B> (1), adjective.<DL COMPACT><DD> (Informal.) <DD><B> 1. </B>low; mean; contemptible. <BR> <I>Ex. a low-down neighborhood. Giving me a broken pen in the trade was a low-down trick.</I> <DD><B> 2. </B>earthy. <BR> <I>Ex. Delightful low-down musical about Broadway's floating crap games (Time).</I> </DL>
<A NAME="lowdown">
<B>low-down</B> (2) or <B>lowdown, </B>noun.<DL COMPACT><DD> (Slang.) the actual facts or truth. <BR> <I>Ex. In an undertone he gave me the lowdown on them, contemptuously (Saul Bellow).</I> </DL>
<B>low-end, </B>adjective.<DL COMPACT><DD><B> 1. </B>including or comprising the low-income consumers; downscale. <BR> <I>Ex. [On tap ... were additional] new models in the high-end and low-end segments of the import market (Maynard M. Gordon).</I> <DD><B> 2. </B>least complicated or expensive of its kind. <BR> <I>Ex. Consumers are shifting away from the low-end game machines to the higher priced, higher capability personal computers (New York Times).</I> </DL>
<A NAME="lowenergy">
<B>low-energy, </B>adjective.<DL COMPACT><DD> of or having to do with the energy of elementary particles that have not been accelerated in particle accelerators; not high-energy. <BR> <I>Ex. low-energy electrons or neutrons.</I> </DL>
<A NAME="lower">
<B>lower</B> (1), verb, adjective, adverb.<DL COMPACT><DD><I>v.t. </I> <B>1. </B>to let down or haul down. <BR> <I>Ex. We lower the flag at night.</I> <DD><B> 2. </B>to make lower. <BR> <I>Ex. to lower the water in a canal, to lower the volume of the radio, (Figurative.) to lower the price of a car, to lower the steam pressure in a boiler. (Figurative.) The fan soon lowered the temperature of the room.</I> (SYN) decrease, diminish. <DD><B> 3. </B>(Figurative.) to bring down in rank, station, or estimation; degrade; dishonor. <DD><B> 4. </B>(Music.) to depress in pitch. <DD><I>v.i. </I> to sink or become lower. <BR> <I>Ex. The sun lowered slowly.</I> (SYN) descend, fall. <DD><I>adj. </I> (comparative of) <B>low</B> (1). <DD><B> 1. </B>more low; below others on a comparative scale. <BR> <I>Ex. (Figurative.) lower organisms, (Figurative.) lower prices.</I> <DD><B> 2. </B>consisting of representatives usually elected by popular vote. <BR> <I>Ex. the lower branch of a legislature.</I> <DD><B> 3. </B>Usually, <B>Lower.</B> (Geology.) being or relating to an earlier division of a period or system. <BR> <I>Ex. Lower Cretaceous.</I> <DD><I>adv. </I> comparative of <B>low</B> (1). </DL>
<A NAME="lower">
<B>lower</B> (2), verb, noun.<DL COMPACT><DD><I>v.i. </I> <B>1. </B>to look dark and threatening. <BR> <I>Ex. Dark lowers the tempest overhead (Longfellow).</I> (SYN) menace. <DD><B> 2. </B>to look angry or sullen; frown; scowl. (SYN) glower. <DD><I>noun </I> <B>1. </B>a dark and threatening look; gloominess. <DD><B> 2. </B>an angry or sullen look; frown; scowl. Also, <B>lour.</B> </DL>
<A NAME="lowerbound">
<B>lower bound,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> (Mathematics.) a number less than or equal to a given function. </DL>
<A NAME="lowercarboniferous">
<B>Lower Carboniferous,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> (Geology.) the name outside of North America for the Mississippian period of Carboniferous time. </DL>
<A NAME="lowercase">
<B>lower case,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> (Printing.) <DD><B> 1. </B>small letters, not capitals. (Abbr:) l.c. <DD><B> 2. </B>the frame or frames in which small letters are kept for hand setting. </DL>
<A NAME="lowercase">
<B>lower-case, </B>adjective, verb, <B>-cased,</B> <B>-casing.</B><DL COMPACT><DD> (Printing.) <DD><I>adj. </I> <B>1. </B>in small letters, not capitals. <DD><B> 2. </B>kept in or having to do with the lower case. <DD><I>v.t. </I> to print in small letters. </DL>
<A NAME="lowerclass">
<B>lower class,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> a class of society below the middle class, comprising unskilled and some semiskilled laborers, people who are chronically unemployed, and (sometimes) the working class in general. <BR> <I>Ex. Until a few decades ago the urban lower class was almost entirely white; every ethnic group, including the Anglo-Saxon Protestant one, contributed to it, and its outlook and style of life were strikingly similar to those of the present Negro lower class (Edward C. Banfield).</I> </DL>
<A NAME="lowerclass">
<B>lower-class, </B>adjective.<DL COMPACT><DD><B> 1. </B>of, having to do with, or included in the lower class. <BR> <I>Ex. lower-class neighborhoods.</I> <DD><B> 2. </B>of or having to do with the freshman and sophomore classes in a college, university, or high school. </DL>
<A NAME="lowerclassman">
<B>lowerclassman, </B>noun, pl. <B>-men.</B><DL COMPACT><DD> a freshman or sophomore in a college, university, or high school; underclassman. </DL>
<A NAME="lowercriticism">
<B>lower criticism,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> the critical study of a text, especially of the Bible, having in view the correction of copyists' errors, omissions, and additions, and other corruptions which have crept into the text since it was first written; textual criticism. </DL>
<A NAME="lowerfortyeight">
<B>Lower Forty-eight</B> or <B>Lower 48,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> (U.S.) the forty-eight states of the continental United States excluding Alaska. <BR> <I>Ex. People [leave] Anchorage and Fairbanks--let alone the more exacting wild. Some, of course, are interested only in a year or two's work, then to return with saved high wages to the Lower Forty-eight (John McPhee).</I> </DL>
<A NAME="lowerhouse">
<B>Lower House</B> or <B>lower house,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> the more representative branch of a lawmaking body that has two branches, made up of members usually elected by popular vote. The House of Representatives is the Lower House in the United States Congress. </DL>
<A NAME="lowering">
<B>lowering, </B>adjective.<DL COMPACT><DD><B> 1. </B>dark and threatening; gloomy. <BR> <I>Ex. a gloomy and lowering day (Francis Parkman).</I> <DD><B> 2. </B>frowning; scowling; angry-looking. Also, <B>louring.</B> adv. <B>loweringly.</B> </DL>
<A NAME="lowermast">
<B>lower mast,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> the lowest section of a mainmast, on which the mainsail is carried. </DL>
<B>lowest common denominator,<DL COMPACT><DD> 1. </B>(Mathematics.) <B>=least common denominator.</B> <DD><B> 2. </B>that which most fully expresses the feelings or opinions of a large number of persons or a group in general. </DL>
<A NAME="lowestcommonmultiple">
<B>lowest common multiple,</B> =least common multiple.</DL>
<A NAME="lowestoft">
<B>Lowestoft, </B>noun.<DL COMPACT><DD><B> 1. </B>a softly colored blue-and-white china produced in England in the second half of the 1700's. <DD><B> 2. </B>porcelain made in China for foreign export, especially to England and America, mistakenly thought to have been made at Lowestoft in England. </DL>
<A NAME="lowexplosive">
<B>low explosive,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> an explosive used as a propellant, as for the shell in a gun, rather than to destroy by its own force. </DL>
<A NAME="lowfrequency">
<B>low-frequency, </B>adjective.<DL COMPACT><DD> of or having to do with a frequency ranging from 30 to 300 kilohertz. <BR> <I>Ex. low-frequency sound waves.</I> </DL>
<A NAME="lowgear">
<B>low gear,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> the gear that gives the greatest force and the least speed in an automobile; low. </DL>
<A NAME="lowgerman">
<B>Low German,</B><DL COMPACT><DD><B> 1. </B>the Germanic speech of the Low Countries (Dutch, Flemish, etc.). <DD><B> 2. </B>the German dialect of northern Germany; Plattdeutsch. </DL>