roust
Americanverb (used with object)
-
rousts,
present (3rd person singular)
-
rousted,
past participle, past
-
rousting
present participle
verb
Other Word Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
-
roustsimple
-
roustssimple
-
have roustedperfect
-
has roustedperfect
-
am roustingprogressive
-
are roustingprogressive
-
is roustingprogressive
-
have been roustingperfect progressive
-
has been roustingperfect progressive
Past
-
roustedsimple
-
had roustedperfect
-
was roustingprogressive
-
were roustingprogressive
-
had been roustingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of roust
First recorded in 1650–60; perhaps alteration of rouse 1
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.
See Examples For:
I’d be the guy who falls asleep at 10, waking when authorities shine spotlights and blare Kenny G songs at my house to roust me out to vote.
From Slate ● Jan. 26, 2024
Pinto, whose family fled Venezuela after her husband, an ex-government soldier, disobeyed orders to roust another family, said she and other migrants understand that their path to economic stability will be long.
From Washington Post ● Nov. 20, 2022
Advocates for the homeless ardently protest efforts to roust the encampments, arguing people have nowhere else to go.
From Salon ● Jun. 22, 2022
After police officers arrived, they hurried to roust anyone they could find: The guests staying in nearby hotels.
From New York Times ● Dec. 25, 2020
A roust allowed Chandler to replenish his jars.
From "The Underground Railroad: A Novel" by Colson Whitehead
Sept. 16, 2019: The Tulsa Police Department finds Crawford’s body and rousts the local Nixonville.
From Slate ● Dec. 16, 2019
He rousts past Coleman and lays back for Krychowiak, arriving on the edge of the box to thunk wide.
From The Guardian ● Oct. 11, 2015
But truly the word, "Woman's Suffrage," rousts him up as quick as a mouse duz a drowsy cat, so, sez he, "I can't let you go, Samantha, into any such dangerous and onwomanly affair."
From Samantha on the Woman Question by Marietta Holley
I tell you, when anybody gets into political life, ambition rousts up in 'em: path-master don't satisfy me.
From Sweet Cicely — or Josiah Allen as a Politician by Marietta Holley
Eastern on July 20, bleary-eyed kids were rousted from their beds so they could tell their grandchildren they witnessed an epic event.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 29, 2026
Thousands fled Maui after the fires rousted them from their resort hotels and sent them scrambling from their sun chairs on Tuesday.
From Seattle Times ● Aug. 10, 2023
There is a strong chance that the quiet English degree-bearer in your life has already read the piece by Nathan Heller, who rousted several bewildering quotes from top-level Harvard academics.
From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 1, 2023
One man was even rousted from sleep at 6 a.m., with helicopters circling overhead, and taken to jail in his underwear.
From Salon ● Sep. 3, 2022
Though the janitors in Commons rousted me every night at closing time, I doubt they ever realized they spoke to the same boy twice.
From "The Secret History" by Donna Tartt
Since then, a new mayor has accelerated the pace of rousting encampments.
From Seattle Times ● Jul. 17, 2022
“On more than one occasion, I have gone down to the police who are stopping and rousting the kids around Washington Prep because the kids are leaving after 7 o’clock,” she says.
From Los Angeles Times ● May 19, 2021
The years of pounding London’s streets and rousting out its ghosts are gone.
From The Guardian ● May 20, 2017
It is not as if police departments were ignoring inner-city communities before the practice of rousting suspects on drug corners was known by a fancy buzzword.
From Washington Post ● May 4, 2015
I tried rousting them by leaning into them and whispering, “Velia, Delia, wake up. Wake up girls,” but they were out cold, so I closed my eyes and prayed.
From "Summer of the Mariposas" by Guadalupe García McCall
Random Word
Spin the wheel and learn a new word!
Get a wordDefinitions 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.
