Definitions

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • verb transitive To settle (somewhere) with colonists.
  • verb transitive To settle (a species, group of people, or the like) in a new place as a colony.
  • verb intransitive To begin a new colony.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • verb settle as a colony; of countries in the developing world
  • verb settle as colonists or establish a colony (in)

Etymologies

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Examples

  • That party is the far-right Freedom Party (PVV), of Geert Wilders, the populist firebrand behind the anti-Islamic film Fitna, who has accused Muslims of trying to "colonise" his country.

    Geert Wilders, the ultra-right firebrand, campaigns to be Holland's prime minister Almere Peter Beaumont 2010

  • The Jews ARE the indigenous inhabitants, and as such cannot 'colonise' their own country.

    On Thursday, the Legg report will be published along with... 2008

  • South Africa did not want to "colonise" other country's, which it did not have the capacity to do, and would not itself "gain" from this, but would do it rather in the interests of Africa.

    ANC Daily News Briefing 2002

  • A cursory analysis of the issue of Jewish settlements reveals a calculated and systematic strategy to infiltrate and 'colonise' the Palestinian territories.

    ANC Today 2001

  • A cursory analysis of the issue of Jewish settlements reveals a calculated and systematic strategy to infiltrate and 'colonise' the Palestinian territories.

    ANC Today 2001

  • To 'colonise' those minds as Fred Phillips puts it.

    Scientific Blogging 2009

  • In much discourse about the Middle East, there is a widespread myth that Jews are interlopers from Europe and the US - white westerners who came to 'colonise' and 'steal land' from the 'native' Palestinian people to whom it rightfully belongs.

    San Francisco Sentinel 2009

  • The two events happened after our ancestors migrated out of Africa to colonise the rest of the world.

    We May All Have a Little Bit of Neanderthal Man in Us | Impact Lab 2010

  • Such advanced aliens would perhaps become nomads, looking to conquer and colonise whatever planets they can reach.

    Stephen Hawking: Avoid Contact With Aliens | Impact Lab 2010

  • It seems to me that the only hope for us here in the West is for the East to colonise the West and bring some of their values of wisdom and deep appreciation of life to our shallow underdeveloped society here, else we are doomed to becoming a society of lobotomised chimps fighting over washing machines crapped out like confetti by the far East.

    Cairo protests:The west has a duty to nurture democracy | Observer editorial 2011

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