roust
Americanverb (used with object)
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rousts,
present (3rd person singular)
-
rousted,
past participle, past
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rousting
present participle
verb
Other Word Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
-
roustsimple
-
roustssimple
-
have roustedperfect
-
has roustedperfect
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am roustingprogressive
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are roustingprogressive
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is roustingprogressive
-
have been roustingperfect progressive
-
has been roustingperfect progressive
Past
-
roustedsimple
-
had roustedperfect
-
was roustingprogressive
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were roustingprogressive
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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
Asking the cops to roust them out of the building would have been terrible optics.
From Salon ● May 1, 2022
The officers rushed to roust nearby residents out of their homes and clear the avenue.
From New York Times ● Jan. 1, 2022
“What will we do once we catch him? I’ve been teaching myself to pinkie whistle. I might be able to roust someone up to help us.”
From "The Detective's Assistant" by Kate Hannigan
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
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
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
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
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
SPANAWAY, Pierce County — Shortly after 5 a.m. on Christmas Day, Kathryn Henkel and her family were rousted by an unfamiliar quiet, a signal something was wrong.
From Seattle Times ● Dec. 30, 2022
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
Then, late that afternoon, he rousted him out and put him on the bus, with the rest of the boys, headed for the regatta course.
From "The Boys in the Boat: Nine Americans and Their Epic Quest for Gold at the 1936 Berlin Olympics" by Daniel James Brown
Since then, a new mayor has accelerated the pace of rousting encampments.
From Seattle Times ● Jul. 17, 2022
They described rushing into buildings and rousting residents — “scaring the bejesus” out of at least one of them.
From New York Times ● Dec. 27, 2020
“We’re not going to solve anything by rousting people, but rather by dealing with it by creating a solution.”
From Los Angeles Times ● Apr. 24, 2018
In July, FBI agents raided his condominium in Alexandria, rousting Manafort and his wife from bed with a search a warrant — a tactic rarely employed in white-collar criminal cases.
From Washington Post ● Mar. 28, 2018
“Why on earth are you rousting me at this insane hour? Some of us are trying to sleep.”
From "The Girl Who Drank the Moon" by Kelly Barnhill
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.
