Word.ws English Dictionary

America at home

America at home noun: the height of luxury, comfort, or modernity.

Noun

America at home (uncountable)

  1. (Ireland, dated, informal) The height of luxury, comfort, or modernity.
    • "Tis America at home," Hickey said, putting turf on the smoking fire.1962 October 6, Edna O'Brien, “Come Into The Drawing Room, Doris [later retitled "Irish Revel"]”, in The New Yorker, page 52
    • "Tis America at home," James said as he nodded to the waitress for more coffees.1979, Edna O'Brien, “A Woman by the Seaside”, in A Rose in the Heart (short story collection), →ISBN, page 111

Examples of America at home in a sentence

  • 'This is America at home,' Moran boasted.1990, John McGahern, Amongst Women, →ISBN, page 62:
  • Do-be, it was America at home, let me tell you, but then when the fine weather came it was up the ladder and down, bringing pump water up to fill the tank[…]2000, Christopher Nolan, The Banyan Tree, →ISBN, page 177‑8:

Origin of America at home

Originally, and more literally, the state of enjoying the comfortable life associated with emigrating to America while remaining "at home" in Ireland (thus having the best of both worlds). E.g.: * Conyngham Crawford Taylor (1887), The Queen's jubilee and Toronto "called back" from 1887 to 1847, page 387: “As landlords in Canada expect their tenants to pay their rent when due, Mr. Kilbride would not improve his position by emigrating to this country, as, to use a common Irish expression, he appears to have a "very good America at home."” * 1971, Thomas P. Flanagan, Seanad Éireann debates 19 May 1971 Vol.70 no.4 p.5 c.292: *: She asked me if I was the man who was in charge of the turf production and I said I was. She began to praise me and bless me because she said they had England and America at home. In other words, the earnings from turf production on a family basis were equivalent to what they would have got in England and America if the family had emigrated.

Questions about America at home

What does America at home mean?
America at home means the height of luxury, comfort, or modernity.
How do you use America at home in a sentence?
'This is America at home,' Moran boasted.
What part of speech is America at home?
America at home is a noun.

Words near America at home in the dictionary

  1. Amerenglish
  2. Ameretat
  3. Amerexit
  4. Ameriboo
  5. America
  6. America at home
  7. America First
  8. America Firster
  9. America Firsters
  10. America's Cup
  11. America's Dairyland

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: America at home (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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