unshackle

verb

Definition of unshacklenext
as in to liberate

Related Words

Relevance

Dissimilar Words

Example Sentences

Examples are automatically compiled from online sources to show current usage. Read More Opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.
Recent Examples of unshackle And at the end of that war, in 1989, Iran was able to recover because basically it was unshackled. — Isaac Chotiner, New Yorker, 27 Apr. 2026 With his presidency unshackled, his military and other policy decisions are reshaping the economy in real time — and clouding the economic outlook. — Matt Peterson, CNBC, 21 Mar. 2026 Still, lawmakers believe embracing nuclear energy is essential to unshackle the Philippines from volatile global energy markets. — Lorela U. Sandoval, Christian Science Monitor, 25 June 2026 Where Ann Lee sought to dance herself clean from the Church of England (and its oppressive insistence that suffering is the surest path to heaven), Fastvold was and remains similarly determined to unshackle herself from the gospel truths of modern film production. — David Ehrlich, IndieWire, 1 Dec. 2025 See All Example Sentences for unshackle
Recent Examples of Synonyms for unshackle
  1. liberate
  2. emancipate
  3. unchain
  4. unfetter
  5. enfranchise
  6. unbind
  7. unmoor
  8. uncage
Verb
  • When the United States invaded the Philippines during the Spanish-American War, Twain naively imagined that the country would be liberated and turned into a republic.
    — Ron Chernow, The Atlantic, 2 July 2026
  • Automation that was meant to liberate becomes a maze of fragile scripts and blame-shifting alerts.
    — Expert Panel®, Forbes.com, 1 July 2026
Definition of liberate
Verb
  • Finally, David ends the episode with a discussion of Shakespeare’s Othello and how ancient plays can emancipate readers from some of their modern prejudices.
    — David Frum, The Atlantic, 17 June 2026
  • The long shadow of the occupation Twenty-three years after George Bush and Tony Blair resolved that Iraqis were to be emancipated, the country remains captive to a masquerade of power.
    — Nabil Salih, Time, 26 May 2026
Definition of emancipate
Verb
  • The nationwide standalone 5G that the carrier announced Wednesday essentially unchains that service from 4G LTE, allowing devices to connect to the network without first requiring a setup via AT&T’s older and slower network.
    — PC Magazine, PC Magazine, 9 Oct. 2025
  • When Henson refused to unchain herself from the fence, California Highway Patrol arrested her.
    — Kate Talerico, The Mercury News, 7 Aug. 2024
Definition of unchain
Verb
  • The Safdies are pointedly effective in capturing the way in which a chaotic city’s overall rhythm goes on unfettered even as a character experiences a horrific disruption or glitch in one small part of it.
    — Jon Caramanica, New York Times, 15 Dec. 2019
  • By manufacturing satellite components in space, Made In Space hopes to unfetter some of those launch constraints.
    — Eric Berger, Ars Technica, 2 Aug. 2019
Definition of unfetter
Verb
  • The state is an outlier in taking days to count most votes, but supporters of the system say it is designed to enfranchise more people while protecting against fraud.
    — Praveena Somasundaram, Washington Post, 6 June 2026
  • The Radical Republican Congressman Thaddeus Stevens, as Michael Waldman writes in The Fight to Vote, was even blunter than Sumner about the necessity of enfranchising Black men.
    — Adam Serwer, The Atlantic, 19 May 2026
Definition of enfranchise
Verb
  • This work unbinds the body from centuries of Western imagery, freeing it from representation and opening it to abstraction.
    — Mame-Diarra Niang, Artforum, 2 Nov. 2025
  • But for Buddhists, dying is an opportunity to unbind from the past and start again.
    — Amanda Whiting, Vulture, 16 Mar. 2025
Definition of unbind
Verb
  • The film should be highly disturbing, but the dramatic tension never gels, despite composer Christopher Stacey’s efforts to unmoor us by injecting discordant strings beneath mundane scenes.
    — Peter Debruge, Variety, 18 Feb. 2023
  • To accommodate Campos’s cavalry, P.S.G. has had to unmoor Leandro Paredes, Ander Herrera, Georginio Wijnaldum, Idrissa Gueye, Julian Draxler, Ángel Di Maria and Xavi Simons this summer, too.
    — Rory Smith, New York Times, 2 Sep. 2022
Definition of unmoor
Verb
  • With the help of the wise and mysterious maid Willie May (Latifah) and a stubborn new girl in school played by Mills, the boy must decide whether to set the tiger free and in turn uncage his emotional grief.
    — Etan Vlessing, The Hollywood Reporter, 30 Aug. 2019
Definition of uncage

Browse Nearby Words

unsexy
unshackle
unshackled
See all Nearby Words

Cite this Entry

“Unshackle.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/unshackle. Accessed 8 Jul. 2026.

Copy Citation
Last Updated: - Updated example sentences
Love words? Need even more definitions?

Subscribe to America's largest dictionary and get thousands more definitions and advanced search—ad free!

More from Merriam-Webster

Word of the Day

Listen to the pronunciation of gambol

See Definitions and Examples »

Popular in Grammar & Usage

See More

Is that lie 'bald-faced' or 'bold-faced'?

'A' or 'an'? What about before 'h'? An Indefinite Article Guide

Why is '-ed' sometimes pronounced at the end of a word?

Commonly Misspelled Words

How to Use Em Dashes (—), En Dashes (–) , and Hyphens (-)
See More

Popular in Wordplay

See More

14 Phobias You Probably Haven't Heard Of

The Longest Long Words List

One-Word Oxymorons: Bittersweet, Spendthrift, and More

Ten Words Ending with a Silent ‘T’

12 Lovely and Unusual Words for the Natural World
See More

Popular

See More

Is that lie 'bald-faced' or 'bold-faced'?

14 Phobias You Probably Haven't Heard Of

The Longest Long Words List
See More

Games & Quizzes

See All
Play Quordle: Guess all four words in a limited number of tries. Each of your guesses must be a real 5-letter word.
Quordle Can you solve 4 words at once?
Play Blossom: Solve today's spelling word game by finding as many words as you can using just 7 letters. Longer words score more points.
Blossom Pick the best words!
Play Missing Letter: a crossword with a twist. Each of the 25 puzzle words start with a different letter of the alphabet. Which letter is missing?
The Missing Letter A daily crossword with a twist
hangman letters and game
Hangman Lightning Round Figure out which word fits in the blanks.
See All