Library / English Dictionary

ELECT

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

 I. (noun) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

An exclusive group of people

Example:

one of the elect who have power inside the government

Synonyms:

chosen; elect

Classified under:

Nouns denoting groupings of people or objects

Hypernyms ("elect" is a kind of...):

elite; elite group (a group or class of persons enjoying superior intellectual or social or economic status)

Derivation:

elect (select by a vote for an office or membership)

elect (selected as the best)

 II. (adjective) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

Elected but not yet installed in office

Example:

the president elect

Classified under:

Adjectives

Similar:

incoming (arriving at a place or position)

Sense 2

Meaning:

Selected as the best

Example:

elite colleges

Synonyms:

elect; elite

Classified under:

Adjectives

Similar:

selected (chosen in preference to another)

Derivation:

elect (an exclusive group of people)

 III. (verb) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

Choose

Example:

I elected to have my funds deposited automatically

Classified under:

Verbs of thinking, judging, analyzing, doubting

Hypernyms (to "elect" is one way to...):

choose; pick out; select; take (pick out, select, or choose from a number of alternatives)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s something
Somebody ----s somebody
Somebody ----s to INFINITIVE

Derivation:

elective (not compulsory)

Sense 2

Meaning:

Select by a vote for an office or membership

Example:

We elected him chairman of the board

Classified under:

Verbs of political and social activities and events

Hypernyms (to "elect" is one way to...):

choose; pick out; select; take (pick out, select, or choose from a number of alternatives)

Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "elect"):

co-opt (choose or elect as a fellow member or colleague)

reelect; return (elect again)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s somebody

Sentence example:

They elect him as chairman

Derivation:

elect (an exclusive group of people)

election (a vote to select the winner of a position or political office)

elective (subject to popular election)

elector (a citizen who has a legal right to vote)

electorate (the body of enfranchised citizens; those qualified to vote)

eligible (qualified for or allowed or worthy of being chosen)

Credits

 Context examples: 

This point was just arranged, when a visitor arrived to tear Emma's thoughts a little from the one subject which had engrossed them, sleeping or waking, the last twenty-four hours—Mrs. Weston, who had been calling on her daughter-in-law elect, and took Hartfield in her way home, almost as much in duty to Emma as in pleasure to herself, to relate all the particulars of so interesting an interview.

(Emma, by Jane Austen)

But at last, after a futile year of flight, he accepted the inevitable and elected to remain at the cottage where first he had killed the rabbit and slept by the spring.

(Love of Life and Other Stories, by Jack London)

When summer came on, he elected to sweat out a hot and dusty existence in the city and to toil incessantly.

(The Sea-Wolf, by Jack London)

But he did not have it in him to be angry with the love-master, and when that god elected to laugh at him in a good-natured, bantering way, he was nonplussed.

(White Fang, by Jack London)

After the Easter recess, Sir George Lynn, who was lately elected member for Millcote, will have to go up to town and take his seat; I daresay Mr. Rochester will accompany him: it surprises me that he has already made so protracted a stay at Thornfield.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

He then desired to know, What arts were practised in electing those whom I called commoners: whether a stranger, with a strong purse, might not influence the vulgar voters to choose him before their own landlord, or the most considerable gentleman in the neighbourhood?

(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)

But it was his concern that they leave him alone in his isolation, get out of his way when he elected to walk among them, and at all times acknowledge his mastery over them.

(White Fang, by Jack London)