Futurama

//ˌfjuːt͡ʃəˈɹɑːmə// noun

noun ·Rare ·Advanced level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    A palpable depiction of a (usually sensational) vision of the future.

    "Today we are apt to think of a fair as a mileless potpourri of trylons and flood-lighted futuramas, but in the yesterdays of our greatgrandfathers, a fair meant a cattle show."

Example

More examples

"Today we are apt to think of a fair as a mileless potpourri of trylons and flood-lighted futuramas, but in the yesterdays of our greatgrandfathers, a fair meant a cattle show."

Etymology

A generalised application of Futurama, the name of an exhibit-cum-ride at the 1939–40 New York World’s Fair that presented a possible model of the world twenty years thence (1959–60). The name of the exhibit derives from the English word future and the suffix -rama, meaning "a wide view of", which ultimately comes from the Ancient Greek word ὅρᾱμᾰ (hórāmă, “a sight”, “a spectacle”, “a speculation”) — as in panorama or diorama.

Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.