samba
US/ˈsɑmbə/
samba noun: a Brazilian ballroom dance or dance style.
Noun
samba (countable and uncountable, plural sambas)
- A Brazilian ballroom dance or dance style.
- A Brazilian musical genre, to which the aforementioned dance is danced, which has its roots in West Africa via the slave trade.
- And when the samba played, the sun would set so high / Ring through my ears and sting my eyes, your Spanish lullaby1986, “La Isla Bonita”, in True Blue, performed by Madonna
- They thought of, I don’t know, monkeys and caipirinhas and samba.”2007 September 20, Eric Wilson, “Blame It on Rio and Gisele”, in The New York Times, archived from the original on 18 Sep 2020
Verb
samba (third-person singular simple present sambas, present participle sambaing, simple past and past participle sambaed)
- To dance the samba.
- In front of an audience, he tends to have a freer conversation with himself. The right conditions turn him into an extrovert. He sambas, in the Santo Amaro style.2022 February 7, Jonathan Blitzer, “How Caetano Veloso Revolutionized Brazil’s Sound and Spirit”, in The New Yorker, →ISSN, archived from the original on 24 Feb 2022
Proper noun capitalized: Samba
Samba
- A town and district of Jammu and Kashmir, India.
samba meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Marathi and Urdu
samba in Hindi
- साम्बा, सांबा
samba in Tamil
- சம்பா, சாம்பா
samba in Marathi
- सांबा, साम्बा, सांबा कडे
samba in Urdu
- سامبا
More languagesFewer languages
- samba in Bengali
- সাম্বা
- samba in Telugu
- సాంబా, సామ్బా, సంబా
- samba in Malayalam
- സാംബ, സാംബാ, സാംബയിലേക്ക്
- samba in Kannada
- ಸಾಂಬಾ, ಸಂಬಾ, ಸಾಂಬಾಗೆ
- samba in Punjabi
- ਸਾਂਬਾ, ਸਾਮਬਾ, ਸੰਬਾ
- samba in Gujarati
- સામ્બા, સાંબા, સામબા
- samba in Odia
- ସାମ୍ବା, ସମ୍ବା, ସାମ୍ବାଙ୍କୁ
- samba in Nepali
- साम्बा, सम्बा, साम्बालाई
- samba in Tagalog
- samba
Examples of samba in a sentence
- They thought of, I don’t know, monkeys and caipirinhas and samba.”
- Four basics, four whisks, three samba walks, one side-samba walk, then two botafogos, four voltas and a maypole.
- The drifters were coming back to play the guitar, sing modinhas, invent sambas they would later sell to famous samba singers in the city.
Forms of samba
| Noun | |
|---|---|
| plural | sambas |
| Verb | |
| third-person singular present | sambas |
| present participle | sambaing |
| past participle | sambaed |
| past | sambaed |
Origin of samba
Borrowed from Brazilian Portuguese samba, from a Bantu language. Doublet of semba.
Words formed from samba
- sambadrome
- samba school
- samba whistle
Phrases with samba
Questions about samba
- What does samba mean?
- Samba means a Brazilian ballroom dance or dance style.
- What is samba in Hindi?
- Samba in Hindi is साम्बा, सांबा. See Samba meaning in Hindi.
- What part of speech is samba?
- Samba can be a noun, a verb or a proper noun.
- How do you pronounce samba?
- Samba is pronounced /ˈsɑmbə/ (US).
- What is the plural of samba?
- The plural of samba is sambas.
Words near samba in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: samba (page history and authors); Samba (page history and authors); samba (Hindi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); samba (Tamil, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); samba (Marathi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); samba (Urdu, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); samba (Bengali, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); samba (Telugu, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); samba (Malayalam, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); samba (Kannada, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); samba (Punjabi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); samba (Gujarati, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); samba (Odia, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); samba (Nepali, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license). 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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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-samba.wav.
Cite this entry: “samba.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/samba. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.