Engagement

3 definitions found

From The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48 [gcide]:

  Engagement \En*gage"ment\, n. [Cf. F. engagement.]
     1. The act of engaging, pledging, enlisting, occupying, or
        entering into contest.
        [1913 Webster]
  
     2. The state of being engaged, pledged or occupied; specif.,


        a pledge to take some one as husband or wife.
        [1913 Webster]
  
     3. That which engages; engrossing occupation; employment of
        the attention; obligation by pledge, promise, or contract;
        an enterprise embarked in; as, his engagements prevented
        his acceptance of any office.
        [1913 Webster]
  
              Religion, which is the chief engagement of our
              league.                               --Milton.
        [1913 Webster]
  
     4. (Mil.) An action; a fight; a battle.
        [1913 Webster]
  
              In hot engagement with the Moors.     --Dryden.
        [1913 Webster]
  
     5. (Mach.) The state of being in gear; as, one part of a
        clutch is brought into engagement with the other part.
  
     Syn: Vocation; business; employment; occupation; promise;
          stipulation; betrothal; word; battle; combat; fight;
          contest; conflict. See {Battle}.
          [1913 Webster]

From WordNet (r) 2.0 [wn]:

  engagement
       n 1: a hostile meeting of opposing military forces in the course
            of a war; "Grant won a decisive victory in the battle of
            Chickamauga"; "he lost his romantic ideas about war when
            he got into a real engagement" [syn: {battle}, {conflict},
             {fight}]
       2: a meeting arranged in advance; "she asked how to avoid
          kissing at the end of a date" [syn: {date}, {appointment}]
       3: a mutual promise to marry [syn: {betrothal}, {troth}]
       4: the act of giving someone a job [syn: {employment}]
       5: employment for performers or performing groups that lasts
          for a limited period of time; "the play had bookings
          throughout the summer" [syn: {booking}]
       6: contact by fitting together; "the engagement of the clutch";
          "the meshing of gears" [syn: {mesh}, {meshing}, {interlocking}]
       7: the act of sharing in the activities of a group; "the
          teacher tried to increase his students' engagement in
          class activities" [syn: {participation}, {involvement}, {involution}]
          [ant: {non-engagement}, {non-engagement}, {non-engagement}]

From Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0 [moby-thes]:

  212 Moby Thesaurus words for "engagement":
     Olympic games, Olympics, absorbed attention, absorption, action,
     affair, affiance, agreement, allurement, alternation, application,
     appointment, arrangement, assignation, association, attempt, banns,
     banns of matrimony, bargain, battle, berth, bespeaking, betrothal,
     betrothing, betrothment, billet, blandishment, blind date, booking,
     borscht circuit, bout, briefing, business, cajolement, cajolery,
     circuit, coaction, coaxing, cochairmanship, combat, commission,
     commitment, complementary distribution, complicity, concentration,
     concours, concurrence, condominium, conflict, conning,
     contemplation, contest, contract, contribution, cooperation,
     copartnership, copartnery, cotenancy, covenant, date, deal,
     deep study, deep thought, derby, double date, effort,
     embarrassment, employment, encounter, engagement book, engaging,
     engrossment, enlistment, enmeshment, entanglement, enterprise,
     espousal, exhortation, fight, game, games, get-together, gig, go,
     gymkhana, handfasting, having a part, hiring, hortation, immersion,
     implication, inclusion, incumbency, inducement, intentness,
     interaction, interchange, intercommunication, intercourse,
     interlacing, intermeshing, interplay, intertwining, interview,
     interweaving, interworking, invitation, involution, involvement,
     jawboning, job, joint chairmanship, joint control, joint ownership,
     joint tenancy, joust, lobbying, marriage contract,
     marriage proposal, match, matching, meditation, meet, meeting,
     mesh, meshing, monomania, moonlighting, obligation, obsession,
     offer of marriage, office, opening, operation, partaking,
     participation, partnership, persuasion, place, plan,
     playing engagement, pledge, plight, plighted faith, plighted troth,
     position, post, preaching, preachment, preengagement,
     preoccupation, profound thought, program, project, promise,
     proposal, proposition, quid pro quo, rally, rapt attention,
     recognizance, relation, rencontre, rendezvous, reservation,
     retainment, run, sales talk, salesmanship, second job, seesaw,
     selling, service, sharing, single-mindedness, situation, snow job,
     soft soap, solicitation, spot, stand, station, studiousness, study,
     suasion, submersion, suffrage, sweet talk, taking on, task, tenure,
     test, tilt, tit for tat, tour, tournament, tourney, trial, troth,
     tryst, understanding, undertaking, vacancy, vaudeville circuit,
     venture, verbal agreement, visit, voting, wheedling, word, work,
     working on