Word.ws English Dictionary

Mid-Atlantic

Mid-Atlantic proper noun: the middle of the East Coast of the United States, typically consisting of New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Delaware, Virginia, West Virginia, and Washington, DC.

Proper noun

Mid-Atlantic

  1. The middle of the East Coast of the United States, typically consisting of New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Delaware, Virginia, West Virginia, and Washington, DC.
    • This will feel like a dream compared to the chilly high temperatures forecast from the mid-Atlantic to New England, where you’ll be lucky to see the mercury in the thermometer climb out of the 40’s.2021 January 16, Derek Van Dam, “Northeast will be wet and chilly while Southern California should sizzle during holiday weekend”, in CNN
  2. Used alone, with "the".
    • All the best hydrographers, both of this country and of the United States, agree in the conclusion that the Florida Current dies out in the mid-Atlantic, losing all the attributes by which it had been previously distinguished—[…]1880 April, William B. Carpenter, “The Deep Sea and its Contents”, in The Nineteenth Century, volume 7, number 38, page 609
    • They gave us a wonderful cheer, wished us good luck by wireless, then headed out for the mid-Atlantic to take up their posts.1919 November, Commander John H. Towers, “The Great Hop”, in Everybody's Magazine, volume XLI, number 5, Ridgeway Company, page 11
  3. Used alone, after a verb or preposition of location, without "the".
    • Cyclones coming from Labrador work round this hump to the S.E., and die out in mid-Atlantic.1875, Ralph Abercromby, letter to the editor, in Sir Norman Lockyer (editor), Nature, Volume 12, Number 311 (14 October 1875), Macmillan and Co., page 514
    • I made my way up and found we were hurtling out toward mid-Atlantic.1906 January, Edwin Fowler, “At Bay”, in The Metropolitan Magazine, volume XXIII, number IV, page 440
  4. Used as an attributive modifier in compounds such as "mid-Atlantic current" and "Mid-Atlantic Ridge": located in, or otherwise relating to, the mid-Atlantic. See: Mid Atlantic Ridge
    • As they appear today these approaches are first, the north Atlantic chain of islands connecting northern Europe with Labrador; second, the mid-Atlantic currents setting steadily westward from the African coast to South America and the West Indies; third, […]1910, W. H. Holmes, “Some Problems of the American Race”, in American Anthropologist, Volume 12, Number 2 (April–June 1910), the American Anthropological Association, page 173
    • The gabbros from both the Mid-Atlantic Ridge and Mid-Indian Oceanic Ridge, showing a wide range in the FeO/MgO ratio (0.30–2.90), suggest a marked trend of fractionation (Fig. 1-3).1982, Roger Hékinian, Petrology of the Ocean Floor, Elsevier Scientific Publishing Company, →ISBN, page 11
  5. (figuratively) Used as an attributive modifier in compounds such as "mid-Atlantic accent" and "mid-Atlantic English": half-American, half-European; combining American and European elements.
    • ‘That lecturer sure is a pain in the ass, man,’ said Keith, in a contrived, mid-Atlantic accent.1982, John Cornelius, Liverpool 8, Liverpool University Press, published 2001, →ISBN, page 29
    • With English, however, the notion that there is a given standard, be it BrE or AmE, is currently being undermined by the tendency of Europeans to mix features of AmE and BrE, which along with traces of a mother tongue accent and mother-toungue-based discourse strategies, now characterize the...2002, Marko Modiano, “Standardization processes and the mid-Atlantic English paradigm”, in Andrew Robert Linn, Nicola McLelland, editors, Standardization: Studies from the Germanic Languages, John...

Adjective

Mid-Atlantic (not comparable)

  1. Of or relating to this region.

Examples of Mid-Atlantic in a sentence

  • New evidence hints at the possibility that a landmass might have existed in the mid-Atlantic as recently as 12,000 years ago and that […]2005, Kendall F. Haven, Wonders of the Sea, Libraries Unlimited, →ISBN, page 78:
  • Just before invasion of Normandy in June 1944, three additional stations, requested by the Army, were located far out in mid-Atlantic.1957, Malcolm Francis Willoughby, The U.S. Coast Guard in World War II, Ayer Publishing, published 1980, →ISBN, page 128:
  • The plan was that the Niagara would lay its half of the cable first and the Agamemnon would then take over when they reached mid-Atlantic.2011, Andrew Wheen, Dot-Dash to Dot.com: How Modern Telecommunications Evolved from the Telegraph to the Internet, Springer, →ISBN, page 20:
  • Instead, British historian Dr Alfred Price has suggested that, had a smaller number of these bombers been available a year later, the results in the mid-Atlantic battle might have been very different.2007, David Owen, Anti-Submarine Warfare: An Illustrated History, Naval Institute Press, →ISBN, page 103:

Origin of Mid-Atlantic

From mid- + Atlantic.

Phrases with Mid-Atlantic

Questions about Mid-Atlantic

What does Mid-Atlantic mean?
Mid-Atlantic means the middle of the East Coast of the United States, typically consisting of New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Delaware, Virginia, West Virginia, and Washington, DC.
How do you use Mid-Atlantic in a sentence?
New evidence hints at the possibility that a landmass might have existed in the mid-Atlantic as recently as 12,000 years ago and that […]
What part of speech is Mid-Atlantic?
Mid-Atlantic can be a proper noun or an adjective.

Words near Mid-Atlantic in the dictionary

  1. mid-air
  2. Mid-America
  3. Mid-American
  4. Mid-Americans
  5. mid-April
  6. Mid-Atlantic
  7. Mid-Atlantic Ridge
  8. mid-August
  9. mid-autumn
  10. Mid-Autumn Festival
  11. Mid-Autumn Festivals

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: Mid-Atlantic (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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Cite this entry: “Mid-Atlantic.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/mid-atlantic. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.