Meaning & use
poster girl
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Meanings
nouncountableinformal
a woman or girl seen as a perfect example of a quality, idea, or movement.
Grammar: Countable; often used in the pattern 'the poster girl for something'.
Patterns
- the poster girl for something
- a poster girl of something
She became the poster girl for the healthy-eating campaign.
The young athlete was the poster girl of the Olympic Games.
He called her the poster girl for everything wrong with the system.
nouncountable
a woman whose picture appears on a poster to advertise something.
Grammar: Countable; used literally for models or celebrities in advertising.
Patterns
- a poster girl for a brand
The perfume company chose a famous singer as its poster girl.
She was the poster girl for a travel agency in the 1990s.
Word forms
| plural | poster girls |
|---|
Common combinations
- the poster girl for
- She is the poster girl for the new generation of scientists.
- become a poster girl
- He became a poster girl after the film was released.
- the poster girl of
- The city was the poster girl of urban renewal.
Synonyms and how they differ
- figurehead
- Figurehead suggests a leader with little real power; poster girl focuses on being a public symbol.
- poster child
- Poster child is more common and can refer to any gender, but it often suggests a victim or a problem.
Word family
- poster boy noun
- The male equivalent, meaning a man or boy used as a symbol.
- poster child noun
- A person or thing seen as a typical example, often of a problem.
Commonly confused: poster girl or poster child?
poster girl vs poster child
Poster child is more general and often negative; poster girl specifically refers to a female symbol.
Practice
She became the ______ for the campaign to save the library.
Choose one answer.
The fixed phrase is 'the poster girl for something'. The singular form is needed after 'the', and 'of' or 'to' do not fit this pattern.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “poster girl”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.