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Glite Dictionary
👦 To remove foreskin 👧 To remove clitoral tissue
to circumcise

to circumcise

3 8.3
To cut away the skin or tissue around a girl's clitoris
  • verb
  • /ˈsɜrkəmˌsaɪz/
  • NSFW
translation icon : practicar la mutilación genital femenina
  • You don't circumcise your daughters, so why should you circumcise your sons?
  • circumcised as a child

So to me, this is where everybody they start arguing at the the specifics like whether we should circumcise a girl or not.

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Examples

  • What about all those women being circumcised in Africa, the Middle East, and Southeast Asia?

    Blog text (8)

  • And well, in parts of East Africa, they circumcise women and it's like, OK, that's a Saudi problem.

    Dr Sheen Gurrib

  • I heard they circumcise women, too. - How you gonna do that?

    Barbershop (2002)

  • I also believe that since girls are not circumcised, neither should boys be.

    Blog text (8)

  • So to me, this is where everybody they start arguing at the the specifics like whether we should circumcise a girl or not.

    Tom Bilyeu

  • Researchers often estimated that 50 to 60 percent of Egyptian women have been circumcised.

    Academic text (2003)

  • Although the study cannot tell us exactly how many young girls are being circumcised today, it does illustrate the magnitude of the issue.

    Academic text (2003)

  • Given the fact -- I assume it is a fact -- that most of those women who were circumcised as children would, if they only knew what they were missing, have preferred to remain intact.

    Academic text (1998)

  • Instead, her mother took two girls to a clinic to be circumcised, and this child died, presumably from excessive anesthesia (Digges, 1999).

    Academic text (2003)

  • According to the custom of her culture, the woman has been circumcised.

Surface Forms

circumcise infinitive
circumcised past
circumcised past participle
circumcising present participle
circumcises third person singular

Morphology

circumcise = circum (semi-transparent) = circum + cise

The literal composition 'circum' (around) + 'cise' (cut) yields 'cut around', but the morpheme 'cise' is not a standalone English word and the specialized medical/traditional sense is not obvious to an average learner.

Etymology

Circumcise comes from Latin parts circum- ('around') and -cise ('to cut'). It literally means 'cut around', so it describes cutting away the tissue that covers the clitoris in some traditional or medical practices.