Agitate
verb ·Common ·High school level
Definitions
- 1 To disturb or excite; to perturb or stir up (a person). transitive
"He was greatly agitated by the news."
- 2 change the arrangement or position of wordnet
- 3 To cause to move with a violent, irregular action; to shake. transitive
"to agitate water in a vessel"
- 4 cause to be agitated, excited, or roused wordnet
- 5 To participate in political agitation (sense 3).
"NAMBLA is working to build a coalition of gay, lesbian, progressive and civil liberties groups to agitate against the increasing state attacks on gay men who associate with boys."
Show 7 more definitions
- 6 move or cause to move back and forth wordnet
- 7 To set in motion; to actuate. obsolete, transitive
- 8 move very slightly wordnet
- 9 To discuss or debate. archaic, transitive
"Your speech at the time a bill for the regency was agitated now lies before me."
- 10 try to stir up public opinion wordnet
- 11 To mull over, or think deeply about; to consider, to devise. archaic, transitive
"Politicians agitate desperate designs."
- 12 exert oneself continuously, vigorously, or obtrusively to gain an end or engage in a crusade for a certain cause or person; be an advocate for wordnet
Antonyms
All antonymsExample
More examples"They sent agents to agitate the local people."
Etymology
From Middle English agitat(e) (“set in motion”), borrowed from Latin agitātus, perfect passive participle of agitō (“to put in motion”) (see -ate (verb-forming suffix)), frequentative of agō (“to drive, move, push”), see -tō. Cognate with French agiter. See also act and agent.
Related phrases
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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.