Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- v. To submit (oneself) passively; accept as inevitable: I resigned myself to a long wait in line.
- v. To give up (a position, for example), especially by formal notification.
- v. To relinquish (a privilege, right, or claim). See Synonyms at relinquish.
- v. To give up one's job or office; quit, especially by formal notification: resign from a board of directors.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- To assign back; return formally; give up; give back, as an office or a commission, to the person or authority that conferred it; hence, to surrender; relinquish; give over; renounce.
- To withdraw, as a claim; give up; abandon.
- To yield or give up in a confiding or trusting spirit; submit, particularly to Providence.
- To submit without resistance; yield; commit.
- To intrust; consign; commit to the care of.
- Synonyms To abandon, renounce, abdicate. Resign differs from the words compared under forsake in expressing primarily a formal and deliberate act, in being the ordinary word for giving up formally an elective office or an appointment, and in having similar figurative use.
- To submit one's self; yield; endure with resignation.
- To give up an office, commission, post, or the like.
- n. Resignation.
- To sign again.
Wiktionary
- v. proscribed alternative spelling of re-sign.
GNU Webster's 1913
- v. To sign back; to return by a formal act; to yield to another; to surrender; -- said especially of office or emolument. Hence, to give up; to yield; to submit; -- said of the wishes or will, or of something valued; -- also often used reflexively.
- v. To relinquish; to abandon.
- v. obsolete To commit to the care of; to consign.
WordNet 3.0
- v. leave (a job, post, or position) voluntarily
- v. give up or retire from a position
- v. part with a possession or right
- v. accept as inevitable
Etymologies
- re- + sign (Wiktionary)
- Middle English resignen, from Old French resigner, from Latin resignāre, to unseal : re-, re- + signāre, to seal (from signum, mark, seal; see sekw-1 in Indo-European roots). (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“As for Romney, it will be an amusing game to count how many times he will repeat the phrase "resign in disgrace" over the next week as he attempts to focus voters' attention on Gingrich's career in the House of Representatives.”
“Both men pleaded guilty to fraud on Thursday, and if the plea is accepted by the court, they'll spend 87 months in prison, be forced to resign from the bench and the bar, and lose their pension benefits.”
“Suggesting that Jones should resign is defensible without appealing to perfection.”
If we can’t make mistakes, then we can’t do science | Serendipity
“Since there is no upside for McDonnell to keep fighting to keep his promise to Sledd - which is why Sledd didn't resign from the boards - then the new Secretary needs to "take one for the team" and agree to resign.”
“On the plus side, she will resign from the Senate and then ... she can be fired from the Sec State spot.”
“And the FTC's probeof the ties between the boards of Google and Apple precipitated Eric E. Schmidt, Google's chairman and chief executive, to resign from the Apple board, and Arthur Levinson, a member of the board of directors of both companies to resign from Google's board.”
“Like when she promised to resign from the Senate so she could run for governor of Texas a few months ago ...”
“In the firestorm that followed, Mollohan was forced by Pelosi to resign from the Ethics Committee where he served as the ranking Democrat.”
“Mayor Michael Sullivan - no relation to the district attorney - is calling on Stokes to resign from the District F committee seat to which he was elected in November.”
“In 1999 the University at Buffalo Law School graduate was forced to resign from the legal profession during a state professional disciplinary proceeding.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘resign’.
-
GRE Barrons Wordlist
A complete Barron's Wordlist for GRE preparation. Your online flashcard replacement.
abase, abash, abate, abbreviate, abdicate, aberrant, aberration, abet, abeyance, abhor, abject, abjure and 4087 more...
-
Interesting words
A list of words that are odd or words that I have looked up.
concupiscence, brize, scree, scoria, forestaff, spanaemia, valetudinarianism, distasture, pyrethrum, laudanum, gentian, bicameral and 11184 more...
-
EN-HU - important words for a HU inte...
Words only (I left out the expressions) from Geza Kerenyi's EN-HU interpreters' dictionary. Most of them pose some difficulty when interpreted between HU and EN in either or both directions.
abalone, abrasive, abstractionist, abstruse, abysmal, academia, accessibility, accessible, acclimate, accolade, accompanist, achiever and 1469 more...
-
EU Buzz - Lisbon Treaty
All words of the Lisbon Treaty
(Persons' names, foreign and grammatical words have been eliminated, MWEs have been split up into individual words. Capitalization has been retained if r...health, follow, condition, meeting, minister, beginning, chapter, information, language, remain, covered, respect and 2614 more...
-
Odd Anagrams
Sets of anagrams that have contrasting or related meanings.
casual, causal, parental, paternal, prenatal, atoners, senator, treason, listen, silent, dictionary, indicatory and 110 more...
-
Autantonyms
Words with mutually exclusive double meanings. Also, here are some:
QUASI-AUTANTONYMS: slow up/slow down; bar/debar; bone/debone; burn up/burn down; fat chance/slim chance; fill in/fil...clip, cleave, sanction, handicap, fast, jibe, secrete, aloha, bimonthly, bolt, cheerio, commencement and 139 more...
-
zzyyxx's Words
plethora, drout, functional, rye, wring, doubt, cognative, weird, gnaw, surcease, rend, languish and 438 more...
-
Basic English Vocabulary
Very basic words for ESL students.
a, abandon, ability, able, abortion, about, above, abroad, absence, absolute, absolutely, absorb and 4334 more...
-
my dictionary
able, abnormally, abroad, absent, abstract, acceptable, acceptance, access, accessible, accession, according to, account and 4551 more...
-
Euphemisms
Mostly awful and political.
information campaign, enemy combatant, person of interest, collateral damage, friendly fire, detention centre, children overboard, asylum seeker, health care, national interest, economic management, redeployment and 114 more...
-
ash
ash
abash, abate, abbreviate, abdicate, aberrant, aberration, abet, abeyance, abhor, abide, abject, abjure and 4874 more...
-
-gn words
Quite simply, words that end with -gn. You can blame Old French for that orthography, it seems.
feign, benign, malign, sign, impugn, reign, deign, eloign, align, coign, consign, ensign and 9 more...
-
Tunie: Hejira
By Joni Mitchell
I'm traveling in some vehicle
I'm sitting in some cafe
A defector from the petty wars
That shell shock love away
There's comfort in melancholy<...defector, mirror, bound, particle, chicken scratching, forceps, trembling, porous, thaw, resign, moment, moody and 2 more...
-
chesspark's Words
gambit, en passant, strategy, exchange, attack, resign, draw, check, endgame, protect, threat, win and 31 more...
-
Silent "G"
align, resign, design, campaign, diaphragm, foreign, gnome, gnat, sign, gnaw, gnash, phlegm and 2 more...
-
etymology
preferential, hind, kindling, nonsignificant, intervening, mistakenly, syntactic, streamlined, impassion, impure, involuntary, plaint and 57 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for resign.

reesetee Haha! Just so. Dec 13, 2007
kewpid To be fired. Dec 13, 2007
oroboros Contronymic in the sense: re-up vs. quit. Jan 27, 2007