Selma
proper nounnounattested in dialogue
- //ˈsɛlmə//
A female given name.
proper noun
- 1
A female given name.
- 2
A surname.
- 3
A placename A community in Nova Scotia, Canada.
- 4
A placename A village in Graubünden canton, Switzerland.
- 5
A placename A place in the United States. A city, the county seat of Dallas County, Alabama; named for James Macpherson's Ossianic poem The Songs of Selma.
So when King – who had been in Atlanta for “Bloody Sunday” – telegrammed Parks about returning to Alabama to take part in a third mass march from Selma to Montgomery, her immediate answer was “Why, of course.”
- 6
A placename A place in the United States. A city in Fresno County, California; named for early resident Selma Michelson.
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A placename A place in the United States. A city in Texas.
- 8
A placename A place in the United States. A town in North Carolina; named for the city in Alabama.
- 9
A placename A place in the United States. A town in Indiana.
- 10
A placename A place in the United States. A census-designated place in Josephine County, Oregon.
- 11
A placename A place in the United States. A census-designated place in Virginia.
- 12
A placename A place in the United States. An unincorporated community in Arkansas.
- 13
A placename A place in the United States. An unincorporated community in Iowa.
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A placename A place in the United States. An unincorporated community in Kansas.
- 15
A placename A place in the United States. An unincorporated community in Missouri; named for the place in the Ossian cycle.
- 16
A placename A place in the United States. An unincorporated community in Ohio.
Etymology
Taken to use in the 19th century when similar-sounding names, Elma, Thelma, Alma, Wilma, etc. were in vogue. Perhaps a shortening of Anselma, or from the name of a place in the James Macpherson's Ossian cycle of epic poems, itself from Scottish Gaelic sealladh + math (“good vision”). In some cases perhaps borrowed from Turkish Selma, from Arabic سَلْمَى (salmā).
noun
- 1
figurativeA confrontation where authorities brutally repress those wanting civil rights, similar to Bloody Sunday in Selma, Alabama.
Eventually, our place and response may be viewed as a historic turning point, another Selma for the nation and world.
Shelby County has become the new Selma.
"I don't know how many Selmas you have in your memory," she said. "I have a lot in mine."
How Many Selmas? Still another city in the south Is learning the hard way that the Negro will settle for nothing less than first class citizenship.
Forms
- plural
- Selmas