noun
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the act of confining or the state of being confined
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the period from the onset of labour to the birth of a child
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physics another name for containment
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of confinement
Explanation
If you're dealing with confinement to a jail cell, or your classroom, or the broom closet, you're stuck there and you can't leave. Confinement means you're being held and you can't move freely. Confinement doesn't have to be punishment. If you've got a contagious disease, your doctor may recommend confinement to your hospital room. Puppies sometimes prefer confinement in a crate to sleeping in an open room. You may also come across an old-fashioned use of the word confinement, referring to a woman in childbirth, which goes back to when women retired to their rooms to give birth and recuperate. Confinement contains the Latin root finis, "end, limit” — confinement certainly is limiting.
Vocabulary lists containing confinement
Vocabulary from "Community is the 'killer app' missing from virtual reality" by Dmitri Williams
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"The Bet" by Anton Chekhov
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Farewell to Manzanar
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Ellwood later recalled: 'I was still under a kind of Confinement, unless I would have run about the Country bare-headed, like a Mad-Man'.
From Science Daily • May 7, 2026
The hearing took place on the fourth day of the mass trial at the so-called Terrorism Confinement Center, southeast of San Salvador.
From Barron's • Apr. 24, 2026
Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem speaks during a tour of the Terrorist Confinement Center on March 26.
From Los Angeles Times • Sep. 11, 2025
They were held in the notorious Terrorism Confinement Center, known as CECOT, which was originally built to hold accused gang members.
From BBC • Jul. 21, 2025
Confinement gave full play to the disease in the others.
From Alcohol: A Dangerous and Unnecessary Medicine, How and Why What Medical Writers Say by Allen, Martha Meir
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
