Ejecting

Part of speech: verb

Definitions

1. Forcing or throwing something out suddenly from a place or container
2. Expelling an object or substance by applying pressure or a driving force
3. Causing something to be removed or discharged from a particular location or situation

Etymology: Latin "ēiciō" combined "ē-" (a form of "ex", meaning "out") with "iaciō", "to throw", so its core picture is simply hurling something outward. The Latin past participle "ēiectum" meant "that which is thrown out," and English took the verb from French "éjecter," which carried the same sense of expelling or casting out. The most surprising twist is that the "eject" that ended up in English owes something to a mathematician. W. K. Clifford, the English geometer, coined the noun form "object" in its modern sense of a thing acted upon, by analogy with "subject," and the "ejectum" of Latin was reshaped into a matching term. Clifford's coinage shows how deliberately a technical pair of words could be built from older Latin material. The verb now covers everything from a pilot leaving a crashing aircraft to a disc being removed from a drive. Its participle "ejecting" is simply the form used for that action in progress, the forceful sending out of something from a confined space.

Synonyms: expelling, dislodging, casting out

Antonyms: admitting, allowing, welcoming