coerce

Etymology

From Latin coercere (“to surround, encompass, restrain, control, curb”), from co- (“together”) + arcere (“to inclose, confine, keep off”); see arcade, arcane, ark.

verb

  1. (transitive) To restrain by force, especially by law or authority; to repress; to curb.
  2. (transitive) To use force, threat, fraud, or intimidation in an attempt to compel one to act against their will.
    They coerced their children into going to the country park.
  3. (transitive, computing) To force an attribute, normally of a data type, to take on the attribute of another data type.

Attribution / Disclaimer All definitions come directly from Wiktionary using the Wiktextract library. We do not edit or curate the definitions for any words, if you feel the definition listed is incorrect or offensive please suggest modifications directly to the source (wiktionary/coerce), any changes made to the source will update on this page periodically.