dislodge

From Middle English disloggen, from Old French deslogier. Compare French déloger.

• (UK) IPA^(key): /dɪsˈlɒdʒ/

• Audio (Southern England)

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• Rhymes: -ɒdʒ

dislodge (third-person singular simple present dislodges, present participle dislodging, simple past and past participle dislodged)

1. (transitive) To remove or force out from a position or dwelling previously occupied.
   • 1898, J. Meade Falkner, chapter 4, in Moonfleet, London, Toronto, Ont.: Jonathan Cape, published 1934:

     Yet I hoped by grouting at the earth below it to be able to dislodge the stone at the side; but while I was considering how best to begin, the candle flickered, the wick gave a sudden lurch to one side, and I was left in darkness.

   • 1961 March, C. P. Boocock, “The organisation of Eastleigh Locomotive Works”, in Trains Illustrated, page 160:

     In 1955, No. 30783, after a collision with an H15 4-6-0 at Bournemouth in which its right-hand cylinder was dislodged, required very extensive frame renewals.

   • 2020 August 26, Andrew Mourant, “Reinforced against future flooding”, in Rail, page 61:

     Hinshelwood says he had "the biggest smile on my face for a long time" when he learned no rocks from the 2019 project had been dislodged by the 2020 deluge.

2. (intransitive) To move or go from a dwelling or former position.
   • 1667, John Milton, “Book VI”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], […], →OCLC; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: […], London: Basil Montagu Pickering […], 1873, →OCLC:

     Where Light and Darkness in perpetual round / Lodge and dislodge by turns.

3. (transitive, figurative) To force out of a secure or settled position.
   • 2012 November 7, Matt Bai, “Winning a Second Term, Obama Will Confront Familiar Headwinds”, in New York Times‎:

     The country’s first black president, and its first president to reach adulthood after the Vietnam War and Watergate, Mr. Obama seemed like a digital-age leader who could at last dislodge the stalemate between those who clung to the government of the Great Society, on the one hand, and those who disdained the very idea of government, on the other.