reanimate

verb

re·​an·​i·​mate (ˌ)rē-ˈa-nə-ˌmāt 

reanimated; reanimating; reanimates

transitive + intransitive

: to animate or become animated again: such as

a

: to bring (someone or something) back to life or to come back to life

As the defrosting jellyfish seemed to reanimate under the faucet's running water, the restaurant's chef asked if he should salt the boiling water.

—Jason Horowitz

… Nathan would sit in the kitchen … watching Eleanor smoke cigarettes and squeeze lemons into her diet Coke, of which she drank sixty ounces a day—enough, as Major Ray often declared, to reanimate a dead body.

—Michael Chabon

b

: to regain vitality or to restore vigor and zest to (someone or something)

When she reanimates, the words just spill from her, small speedy bubbles sliding under and around each other …

—Andrew Corsello

… serves to reanimate the old debates about the relationship between form and content …

—Jed Perl

reanimation

(ˌ)rē-ˌa-nə-ˈmā-shən 

noun

plural reanimations

… discusses the post-Soviet decline, fall, and reanimation of the notorious Soviet secret police agency.

—Roland Green

This isn't just a captivating retelling; it's a creative reanimation of these indelible characters who are still breathing down our necks across the millennia.

—Ron Charles

Synonyms

• recharge
• regenerate
• rejuvenate
• rekindle
• renew
• resurrect
• resuscitate
• revitalize
• revive
• revivify
• rewake
• rewaken

Examples of reanimate in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

When the film opens, Alejandro is working at a cryogenic facility where dying people pay large sums of money to be frozen in the hope of being reanimated in the future. —Elisabeth Garber-Paul, Rolling Stone, 5 Mar. 2024

The union was worried that studios could use artificial intelligence to reanimate dead actors, or to create a digital Frankenstein out of the body parts of real actors. —Gene Maddaus, Variety, 9 Nov. 2023

Poor Things, adapted by Tony McNamara from Alasdair Gray’s 1992 novel, stars Stone as Bella Baxter, a woman reanimated with the brain of her unborn child. —Jack Smart, Peoplemag, 22 Feb. 2024

Lovelace is a key figure in the development of the computer, and the perfect subject to be reanimated in this way. —Charlie Fink, Forbes, 17 Feb. 2024

The controversy reanimated a scandal from Mayorkas’s time as U.S. Attorney. —Jonathan Blitzer, The New Yorker, 17 Feb. 2024

Dredged from the river after committing suicide, Bella Baxter (Emma Stone) is reanimated, possessing the body of a woman and the brain of a baby. —Maureen Lee Lenker, EW.com, 3 Sep. 2023

Stocks of other regional banks have also swung sharply lately, reanimating uncomfortable memories of last year’s banking crisis. —Stan Choe, Fortune, 9 Feb. 2024

On a random summer day in Oslo, the recently deceased are reanimated, an unexplained event marked by flocks of panicked birds, power outages, traffic lights on the fritz and car alarms spontaneously going off. —David Rooney, The Hollywood Reporter, 20 Jan. 2024

Word History

First Known Use

1611, in the meaning defined above

Medical Definition

reanimate

transitive verb

re·​an·​i·​mate (ˈ)rē-ˈan-ə-ˌmāt 

reanimated; reanimating

: to restore to life : revive

reanimation

-ˌan-ə-ˈmā-shən 

noun