Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun A movie about frontier or cowboy life; a western.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun informal, humorous A movie or television show about cowboy or frontier life; a western movie.

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[From the prominence of horses, known for their taste for oats, in such films.]

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Examples

  • Variously dubbed the "oater," the "shoot-em-up," or a "blood and thunder" novel, the western emerged during Grey's lifetime as a major literary genre and remains one of the singular American contributions to literature and the cinema.

    Zane Grey, Romancing the West May, Stephen J. 1997

  • Now, they're barely a separate category in Netflix and, if you order an old-fashioned "oater" from Netflix, it usually triggers some rueful "sorry, but this will take more time" email as Netflix desperately taps inventories scattered across the country.

    Information Today News Breaks 2009

  • Now, they're barely a separate category in Netflix and, if you order an old-fashioned "oater" from Netflix, it usually triggers some rueful "sorry, but this will take more time" email as Netflix desperately taps inventories scattered across the country.

    Information Today News Breaks 2009

  • Now, they're barely a separate category in Netflix and, if you order an old-fashioned "oater" from Netflix, it usually triggers some rueful "sorry, but this will take more time" email as Netflix desperately taps inventories scattered across the country.

    Information Today News Breaks 2009

  • I can happily watch Grahame in anything, so I decided to sit there and watch this oater while going through my morning routine (in the end, I ended up watching roughly three quarters).

    2009 August : Scrubbles.net 2009

  • I can happily watch Grahame in anything, so I decided to sit there and watch this oater while going through my morning routine (in the end, I ended up watching roughly three quarters).

    Weekly Mishmash: August 9-15 : Scrubbles.net 2009

  • The craggy, mellowing Eastwood directs himself admirably in this scenic, first-class oater, which strikes an ideal balance between character piece and action film as it portrays a rapidly changing way of life.

    John Farr: The Hard-Won Legacy of Gene Hackman 2010

  • Who'd 'uv thunk it? ... historical semi-accuracy in a Durango Kid oater?

    Laramie Bill Crider 2008

  • The craggy, mellowing Eastwood directs himself admirably in this scenic, first-class oater, which strikes an ideal balance between character piece and action film as it portrays a rapidly changing way of life.

    The Hard-Won Legacy of Gene Hackman 2010

  • Watch the based-on-a-real-memoir “Cowboy” with Jack Lemmon or “3:10 to Yuma”; both show off a quality that he shared with Jimmy Stewart in their oater roles, that of men whose thin veneer of control or conventionality could be stripped away in a moment.

    100 Mysteries: the Green Glove – The Bleat. 2009

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