tea party

See synonyms for tea party on Thesaurus.com
noun
  1. a social gathering, usually in the afternoon, at which tea and light refreshments are served.

  2. (initial capital letters) a conservative political movement in the U.S. that opposes taxes and government spending: named in reference to the Boston Tea Party of 1773.

Origin of tea party

1
First recorded in 1770–80

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2024

How to use tea party in a sentence

  • You think that if a man's charming, that's the end of him, and that all he's good for is to amuse a few old ladies at a tea party.

    First Plays | A. A. Milne
  • The parlour, having once been a ware-room, was unusually large and well adapted for a tea-party.

    The Garret and the Garden | R.M. Ballantyne
  • It is not over the virtues of a curate-and-tea-party novel that people are abashed into high resolutions.

    The Pocket R.L.S. | Robert Louis Stevenson
  • Worby remembered hearing the old lady tell this dream at a tea-party in the house of the chapter clerk.

    A Thin Ghost and Others | M. R. (Montague Rhodes) James
  • You cite the case of some who are admirable tea-party oracles, but who cannot utter half a dozen sentences in the tribune.

British Dictionary definitions for tea party (1 of 2)

tea party

noun
  1. a social gathering in the afternoon at which tea is served

British Dictionary definitions for Tea Party (2 of 2)

Tea Party

noun
  1. (in the US) a political movement, associated with the right wing of the Republican Party, favouring reduction in taxation and government spending

Origin of Tea Party

2
C21: after the Boston Tea Party

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012