Skip to main content
Glite Dictionary
to emancipate

to emancipate

19 7.0
To set someone free from unfair control or rules so they have equal rights
  • verb
  • /ɪˈmæn.sɪ.peɪt/
  • Formal
: emancipar
  • The court decided to emancipate the minors from their guardianship, allowing them to make their own choices.
  • emancipated slaves
  • emancipated women
  • emancipated people

If we educate, then people will free themselves, emancipate themselves from racism.

Examples

  • Education, having made him critical, knows that its business is to emancipate people.

    Academic text (1991)

  • The church I go to is the one that emancipated the slaves... that gave women the right to vote.

    The Contender (2000)

  • Okay, so Honey suggested that you emancipate yourself from us.

    3 Generations (2016)

  • Maybe you could hire a lawyer and legally emancipate yourself.

    Max Keeble's Big Move (2001)

  • If we educate, then people will free themselves, emancipate themselves from racism.

    Robinson Erhardt

  • In fact, pressure to emancipate slaves had been on him as early as 1861.

    Academic text (1999)

  • In other ways, she was the new and emancipated woman, intent on finding her own way in the world.

    Fiction book (1993)

  • He got lots of attention because he filed to place himself in a foster home to sort of emancipate himself from his parents.

  • Such considerations were in the forefront of the congressional debate over protecting recently emancipated former slaves.

    Academic text (2002)

  • On 9 May 1862, General David Hunter unilaterally issued a proclamation emancipating slaves who were then under martial law.

    Academic text (1999)

Synonyms

to free
vsto emancipate
544 1.0

To release someone or something that is held

focuses on giving legal and social equal rights not general release
to set free
vsto emancipate
226 2.7

To let a person or animal go after keeping them in a place where they could not leave

is about legal social rights and equality not just physical release
to liberate
vsto emancipate
202 4.3

Set someone free from prison or unfair control

focuses on removing legal or social restrictions and granting rights
to manumit
vsto emancipate
  • Archaic
1 9.9

To free someone from slavery

sets people free in law and society not only from slavery
to enfranchise
vsto emancipate
1 8.5

To give someone full citizenship and rights, often after slavery

means legal equality and rights rather than only physical release
to affranchise
vsto emancipate
  • Archaic
9.9

To free someone from slavery or forced work

gives legal and social equal rights beyond just release

Antonyms

to oppress
100 6.5

To treat people cruelly or unfairly using power to limit their rights

to enslave
  • NSFW
99 5.7

To force a person to work for someone else and take away their freedom

How Free

to liberate
202 4.3
to emancipate
  • Formal
19 7.0
release
282 1.8

Surface Forms

emancipate infinitive
emancipated past
emancipated past participle
emancipating present participle
emancipates third person singular

Morphology

emancipate = emancip + ate

The verb contains the suffix '-ate' but the stem 'emancip-' is not a standalone English word and its meaning is not recoverable by typical learners from the visible parts.

Etymology

Emancipate comes from Latin parts e- meaning 'out' and manus meaning 'hand', the same root as in manual. So, to emancipate someone is to take them 'out of another person's hand', which is why the word means to free people from control or slavery.