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Definition of incarcerate
incarcerated
;incarcerating
transitive verb
1 : to put in prison
2 : to subject to confinement
From the M-W Editors
incarcerate was our Word of the Day on 10/07/2013. Hear the podcast!
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Examples of incarcerate in a Sentence
the state incarcerated over 1900 people last year
Recent Examples of incarcerate from the Web
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Jurisdictions that violate the policy would lose access to federal grants for law enforcement, terrorism, national security, immigration or incarcerating undocumented immigrants. ‘
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She was sentenced to two years probation plus time served after having been incarcerated in 2015, CBS reported.
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At the time, Rogers was incarcerated for convictions on 22 counts of securities violations.
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Prodigy was incarcerated for three and a half years for criminal possession of a weapon. Because of this, book contributor Laura Checkoway gleaned much from handwritten notes that Prodigy would send her while behind bars.
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Sometime between advocating for the civil rights of the incarcerated and meeting with the Justice Department about the Eric Garner case, Reverend Al Sharpton discovered the selfie this week.
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At the time of his death, Evans was incarcerated for killing and dismembering his girlfriend.
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As Scoota was rising to the top of Baltimore's rap scene, Catchings was incarcerated and battling ongoing legal troubles.
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David Frodsham is now incarcerated at the state prison in Kingman.
These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'incarcerate'. Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.
Did You Know?
A criminal sentenced to incarceration may wish his or her debt to society could be canceled, but such a wistful felon might be surprised to learn that incarcerate and cancel are related. Incarcerate comes from incarcerare, a Latin verb meaning "to imprison." That Latin root comes from carcer, Latin for prison. Etymologists think that cancel probably got its start when the spelling of carcer was modified to cancer, which means "lattice" in Latin-an early meaning of cancel in English was "to mark (a passage) for deletion with lines crossed like a lattice." Aside from its literal meaning, incarcerate can also have a figurative application meaning "to subject to confinement," as in "people who are incarcerated in their obsessions."
Origin and Etymology of incarcerate
Latin incarceratus, past participle of incarcerare, from in- + carcer prison
INCARCERATE Defined for English Language Learners
incarcerate
playDefinition of incarcerate for English Language Learners
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: to put (someone) in prison
Law Dictionary
Origin and Etymology of incarcerate
Latin incarceratus, past participle of incarcerare, from in- in + carcer prison
Learn More about incarcerate
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See words that rhyme with incarcerate Thesaurus: All synonyms and antonyms for incarcerate Spanish Central: Translation of incarcerate Nglish: Translation of incarcerate for Spanish speakers Britannica English: Translation of incarcerate for Arabic speakers
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