Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- transitive verb To keep within certain limits; confine or limit.
- transitive verb To inhibit or restrain; hold back.
- transitive verb To compel by physical, moral, or circumstantial force; oblige.
- transitive verb To produce in a forced or inhibited manner.
from The Century Dictionary.
- In general, to exert force, physical or moral, upon, either in urging to action or in restraining from it; press; urge; drive; restrain.
- Hence To urge with irresistible power, or with a force sufficient to produce the effect; compel; necessitate; oblige.
- To confine or hold by force; restrain from escape or action; repress or compress; bind.
- To check; repress; hinder; deter.
- To force.
- In mech.: To prevent the occurrence of (motion), except in a particular direction: as, the relative motions of the parts of any machine are always constrained.
- To prevent the operation of the motion of (a material point or body), except in a particular and definite manner: as, to
constrain a part of a mechanism.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- transitive verb To secure by bonds; to chain; to bond or confine; to hold tightly; to constringe.
- transitive verb To bring into a narrow compass; to compress.
- transitive verb To hold back by force; to restrain; to repress.
- transitive verb To compel; to force; to necessitate; to oblige.
- transitive verb obsolete To violate; to ravish.
- transitive verb To produce in such a manner as to give an unnatural effect.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- verb transitive to
force physically , by strongpersuasion orpressurizing ; tocompel ; tooblige - verb transitive to keep within close
bounds ; toconfine - verb transitive to
reduce a result in response tolimited resources
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- verb hold back
- verb restrict
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
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Examples
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Even with the targeted procurement it is not enough to develop and empower women owned businesses, another constrain is the supply side.
SPEECH BY MAMPE RAMOTSAMAI DURING A PUBLIC WORKS BUDGET VOTE DEBATE 2004
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The Obama administration's new nuclear arms reduction agreement with Russia has been beset by a chorus of conservative claims that it will "constrain" U.S. efforts to develop missile defenses, in the words of Charles Krauthammer, among many others.
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The Obama administration's new nuclear arms reduction agreement with Russia has been beset by a chorus of conservative claims that it will "constrain" U.S. efforts to develop missile defenses, in the words of Charles Krauthammer, among many others.
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The Association must so present its work to the churches as to "constrain" them to give; drag them by the chains of Christian duty to give; those who can of their abundance abundantly; those who must of their penury, with this tremendous self-sacrifice.
The American Missionary — Volume 43, No. 01, January, 1889 Various
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But He delights to be held by beseeching hands, and our wishes 'constrain' Him.
Expositions of Holy Scripture St. Luke Alexander Maclaren 1868
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It will lay on you a far more solemn and awful clutch, and like a jailer with his hand on the culprit's shoulder, will 'constrain' you into the presence of the Judge.
Expositions of Holy Scripture: the Acts Alexander Maclaren 1868
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However, the Government did not want to "constrain" the commission from considering other options, including a compulsory levy.
icCoventry 2010
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"We kind of constrain ourselves in a way to come up with different solutions to different problems."
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"We kind of constrain ourselves in a way to come up with different solutions to different problems."
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"We kind of constrain ourselves in a way to come up with different solutions to different problems."
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