Meaning & use
subjugation
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Meanings
noununcountable
The act of defeating a people or country and forcing it to obey, usually by violence.
Grammar: No plural or article: the subjugation of a nation.
Patterns
- the subjugation of someone
The empire's subjugation of neighboring tribes took decades.
Historians describe the subjugation of the region as brutal.
The novel is about the subjugation of a small island nation.
noununcountable
A condition in which one group is kept powerless and under another's control.
Grammar: Often used for social or political situations: the subjugation of women.
Patterns
- the subjugation of a group
- subjugation to someone
Her book examines the long subjugation of women in the law.
They rebelled against years of subjugation by the landowners.
He wrote about the quiet subjugation of workers by unfair contracts.
Common combinations
- the subjugation of a people
- The treaty ended the subjugation of a people.
- political subjugation
- They fought against political subjugation.
- escape subjugation
- The refugees escaped subjugation by fleeing the capital.
- years of subjugation
- After years of subjugation, the village revolted.
- military subjugation
- Military subjugation rarely lasts forever.
Synonyms and how they differ
- domination
- Domination is a broader word for power over others and need not involve conquering.
- oppression
- Oppression stresses the cruel treatment that follows, whereas subjugation stresses the act of bringing a group under control.
- conquest
- Conquest is the winning of a place by force, and does not always imply continued harsh control.
- enslavement
- Enslavement is narrower and means making people into slaves.
Opposites
Word family
- subjugate verb
- to bring under control by force
- subjugator noun
- a person who conquers and controls others
- unsubjugated adjective
- never conquered
Commonly confused: subjugation or subjugate?
subjugation vs subjugate
Subjugate is the verb and subjugation is the noun, so say they sought to subjugate the region, not subjugation the region.
Practice
The rebels fought for years to end the ___ of their homeland by a foreign army.
Choose one answer.
Subjugation means conquering and controlling a people by force. Subscription is a regular payment for a service, so it has nothing to do with armies.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “subjugation”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.