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🛂 A migrant center 👦 A youth jail
detention camp

detention camp

2 3.2
A place where refugees or migrants are kept temporarily while officials decide if they can enter the country
  • noun
  • /dɪˈtɛnʃən kæmp/
translation icon : centro de detención
  • In an angry sermon, his father has denounced the relocation of Japanese-Americans to detention camps and outraged the town.
  • Guantanamo detention camp
  • detention camp in Bosnia
  • Serbian-run detention camp

Examples

  • I then met her two days later in a detention camp.

    Blog text (30)

  • And they put them all in this detention camp in Georgia.

  • Women and children are herded into a detention camp as their farms burn in the background.

    Fiction book (1992)

  • The government announced that new asylum seekers would be held in a detention camp while their applications were processed.

  • Families are often separated when individuals are placed in a detention camp to await their immigration hearings.

  • Human rights organizations are advocating for better conditions in detention camps to ensure the safety and dignity of migrants.

Synonyms

detention centre
vsdetention camp
  • UK
36 4.6

A place where people are kept for a short time, like prisoners or migrants, while their case is decided

is for holding refugees and asylum seekers while entry or status is decided

Antonyms

freedom
∞ 1.0

The right to act, speak, or think as you want without being stopped

release
279 1.8

An act of letting someone or something go free from being held

How Secure

prison
∞ 1.0
detention camp
2 3.2
detention centre
  • UK
36 4.6
holding cell
33 4.1

Surface Forms

detention camp singular
detention camps plural
detention camps plural

Morphology

detention + camp

The meaning is directly and compositionally derived from 'detention' (being kept in custody) + 'camp' (a temporary site where people stay), so a B1 learner who knows both constituents can readily infer a place where people are held temporarily. This compound follows a common noun+noun pattern and has close cross-linguistic equivalents, making the sense predictable despite some domain-specific nuance about migrants or asylum seekers.

Etymology

Detention camp comes from the simple image of detention (being held) and a camp (a temporary, fenced place). Imagine asylum seekers kept in one of these camps while officials check their papers, so the phrase means 'a place where migrants or asylum seekers are held while their status is decided'.