Meaning & use
displace
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Meanings
verbtransitive
To force people or animals to leave the place where they normally live.
Grammar: Takes an object: The war displaced thousands of families.
Patterns
- displace someone
- be displaced by something
- displaced people
The rising sea has displaced whole villages along the coast.
More than a million people were displaced by the earthquake.
The dam displaced local farmers from their land.
verbtransitive
To take the place of something, especially so that the original is no longer used or available.
Grammar: Takes an object: Email has largely displaced traditional letters.
Patterns
- displace something
- be displaced by something
Online news has slowly displaced printed newspapers.
The new material could displace steel in car manufacturing.
In many offices, video calls have displaced business travel.
verbtransitivetechnical
To move something out of its usual position, especially in science or engineering.
Grammar: Takes an object: The weight displaced the water.
Patterns
- displace something
- displace water
The stone displaced a small amount of water in the jar.
The earthquake displaced the ground by several centimeters.
A floating object displaces its own weight in water.
Word forms
| third person singular | displaces |
|---|---|
| past tense | displaced |
| past participle | displaced |
| -ing form | displacing |
Common combinations
- displaced persons
- The camp provides shelter for displaced persons.
- be displaced by
- Many workers were displaced by machines.
- displace the population
- The flood displaced the entire population of the town.
- displace water
- The heavy object displaced a lot of water.
Synonyms and how they differ
- replace
- Replace means one thing takes the place of another, often deliberately; displace often suggests force or pressure.
- evict
- Evict is a legal term for forcing someone out of a property; displace is broader and can be caused by war, disaster, or economics.
- uproot
- Uproot emphasizes pulling people away from their home and roots; displace focuses on the loss of place.
Opposites
Word family
- displacement noun
- The act of forcing people or things out of place, or the amount moved.
- displaced adjective
- Forced to leave home, as in displaced families.
Commonly confused: displace or replace?
displace vs replace
Replace means to put something new in the place of something old; displace means to force something out of its place, often unintentionally.
Practice
The new highway project will ______ hundreds of residents from their homes.
Choose one answer.
Displace means to force people out of their homes. Replace would mean to put new residents in their place, which is not the meaning here. Disposal is a noun, and display means to show.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “displace”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.