Word.ws English Dictionary

Motown

US/ˈmoʊtaʊn/

Motown proper noun: detroit.

Proper noun

Motown

  1. (informal) Detroit.

Noun

Motown (uncountable)

  1. (attributive, often) A style of popular soul music strongly associated with Motown Records.
    • They may be a rock band, but their retro style shows a heavy Motown influence.
  2. (slang) A jack and a five as a starting hand in Texas hold 'em.

Origin of Motown

Blend of motor + town; see Motor City. The poker slang comes from jacks and fives sounding similar to Jackson 5, associated with Motown popular music.

Questions about Motown

What does Motown mean?
Motown means detroit.
What part of speech is Motown?
Motown can be a proper noun or a noun.
How do you pronounce Motown?
Motown is pronounced /ˈmoʊtaʊn/ (US).

Words near Motown in the dictionary

  1. mototaxista
  2. mototaxistas
  3. motour
  4. motours
  5. Motovun
  6. Motown
  7. Motowner
  8. Motowners
  9. Motownesque
  10. Motownish
  11. Motozintleco

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: Motown (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.

Last updated:

Cite this entry: “Motown.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/motown. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.