🧑‍🌾 A rural person 🌲 A wild forest 🏞️ Rural and remote

backwood

7.9

From a remote rural area that has few modern facilities

adjective
/ˈbækˌwʊd/

Informal

: rural

The backwood community had no paved roads or modern conveniences.

Examples

They live in a backwood community with no access to the internet.
His backwood upbringing shaped his views on modern society.
They moved to a backwood village far from the nearest city.
She enjoyed the quiet life in a backwood area surrounded by forests.
They moved to a backwood village far from the nearest city.
The backwood community had no paved roads or modern conveniences.
She enjoyed the quiet life in a backwood area surrounded by forests.

Synonyms

backcountry

vsbackwood

5.4

In wild areas far from towns and roads

is more negative and stresses lack of modern facilities

Antonyms

modern

∞ 1.4

Relating to the present time and new ways of doing things

urban

571 2.5

About a city or town rather than the countryside

How Remote

isolated

56 3.8

remote

218 3.6

backwood

Informal

7.9

outlying

5 5.0

rural

392 2.5

Surface Forms

backwood positive

Morphology

backwood = back + wood (semi-transparent) = back + wood

The components 'back' + 'wood' are recognizable, but the adjectival meaning 'unsophisticated/lacking modern facilities' is an idiomatic generalization rather than a strictly literal compound reading.

Etymology

Backwood comes from the simple parts back ('behind' or 'remote') and wood ('forest'). So, when a place is called backwood, it means it is far from towns and not very modern or developed.