Word of the Day

: November 2, 2024

extricate

verb EK-struh-kayt

What It Means

To extricate someone or something is to free or remove that person or thing from an entanglement or difficulty, such as a trap or a difficult conversation.

// She hasn't been able to extricate herself from her legal problems.

// It took all afternoon to extricate the tractor from the mud.

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extricate in Context

“When you've spent your entire life achieving highly—from school into jobs—it can be incredibly difficult to extricate yourself from the mentality that your professional success defines your worth.” — Julia DiPrete, Business Insider, 3 Jan. 2024

Did You Know?

Oh what a tangled web the English language weaves. Extricate, for example, may remind you of extract, another word applied when something is removed, but we can tease them apart. Although extricate and extract resemble each other, to extract something is to remove it using methods that often involve physical force, as in “the dentist had to extract my tooth.” Extricate, on the other hand, is more often used for the act of freeing someone or something from a difficult or tangled situation, which can, but need not, involve literal yanking or pulling. Extricating yourself from an awkward conversation, after all, can be as simple as announcing “I need to take this call!” and shuffling off with phone to ear. Extricate comes from the Latin verb extricare, which combines the prefix ex- (“out of”) with the noun tricae, meaning “trifles or perplexities.”