Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- adjective Easily managed or controlled; governable.
- adjective Easily handled or worked; malleable.
from The Century Dictionary.
- Capable of being touched, handled, or felt; palpable.
- Easily handled or wrought.
- Hence Manageable; governable; easily led; docile; pliant.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- adjective Capable of being easily led, taught, or managed; docile; manageable; governable.
- adjective obsolete Capable of being handled; palpable; practicable; feasible.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- adjective Capable of being easily led, taught, or managed;
docile ;manageable ;governable . - adjective Capable of being
shaped ;malleable . - adjective mathematics Sufficiently
operationalizable oruseful to allow a mathematicalcalculation to proceed toward a solution. - adjective computer science Of a decision problem,
algorithmically solvable fast enough to be practicallyrelevant , typically inpolynomial time.
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- adjective readily reacting to suggestions and influences
- adjective easily managed (controlled or taught or molded)
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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I was what they call a tractable child, being, in fact, too little interested in the world as it was to resent any duties cast upon me.
Lore of Proserpine Maurice Hewlett 1892
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Interestingly, many pop boooks say the opposite; Oriental sighthounds, huskies, laikas are not neccessarily "tractable"-- they figure things out, and you must work with them.
The Tazi Girls 2005
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He did not become docile by any means, but he was tractable, which is to say that he did as he was bidden with a minimum of urging; he was intelligent, divining, and learned quickly.
The Boss of the Lazy Y Charles Alden Seltzer 1908
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The concluding phrase seems admirably chosen, when we consider the means of making people "tractable" which the magistrates of the Bay had in their hands, and were not slow to exercise, as Underhill himself had experienced.
Among My Books First Series James Russell Lowell 1855
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Many experts say that Armenia still has forces that are more realistic about the situation in the country and may be more "tractable" in dialogue with Turkic neighbors.
Today.Az 2010
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While not the only possible way of measuring a concept as multifaceted as religiosity, the index is an empirically tractable, conceptually coherent, and intuitively compelling method of doing so.
American Grace Robert D. Putnam 2010
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When through a process of law the common people have lost their homes, they will be more tractable and more easily governed by the strong arm of the law applied by the central power of leading financiers.
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Actually acourding to my thesaurus it is but no matter feel free to subsutute any of the following terms if you like. circumscribed, limited, restricted, tractable, accountable, complaisant, compliant, restricted, submissive, yielding the result is the same in any case.
A California Ruling 2009
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“Training,” on the other hand, “is for slaves, for loyal subjects, for tractable employees, for willing consumers, for obedient soldiers.”
Deconstructing Obama Jack Cashill 2011
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The naturally aspirated BMW engine was so tractable the car could accelerate from 30-225 mph in sixth gear.
The Best Sports Car, and Why to Skip It Dan Neil 2011
briwref commented on the word tractable
Because of my pig-headedness, I trend towards the intractable
July 26, 2009