Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- intransitive verb To gain with effort or despite difficulty; reach.
- intransitive verb To succeed in accomplishing; bring about: synonym: perform.
- intransitive verb To accomplish something successfully; perform at a standard or above standard level.
from The Century Dictionary.
- To perform or execute; accomplish, as some great enterprise; finish; carry on to a prosperous close.
- To gain or obtain, as the result of exertion; bring about, as by effort.
- Synonyms Effect, Accomplish, etc. (see
perform ), bring about, work out. - To acquire, win, obtain, get.
- To come to an end.
- To accomplish some enterprise; bring about a result intended.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- transitive verb To carry on to a final close; to bring out into a perfected state; to accomplish; to perform; -- as, to
achieve a feat, an exploit, an enterprise. - transitive verb To obtain, or gain, as the result of exertion; to succeed in gaining; to win.
- transitive verb obsolete To finish; to kill.
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- verb to gain with effort
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
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Examples
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I think public opinion has already hardened, and about the only thing he can realistically hope to achieve is to stop the bleeding in his poll numbers.
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All Clinton can hope to achieve is to make certain that Obama does not win against McCain. chris
Clinton, McCain camp fire back over Obama energy remarks 2008
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Paul Flynn has rushed to Alun Cairn's defence, although all he seems to achieve is to remind us just how ancient he really is:
Archive 2008-06-01 2008
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All they seem to achieve is to make martyrs of the likes of Griffin and Irving, surely a daft result if ever.
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All they seem to achieve is to make martyrs of the likes of Griffin and Irving, surely a daft result if ever.
Archive 2007-11-25 2007
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All three of us are very interested in writing and publishing and other creative things, so part of what we hope to achieve is to puttogether a book that we can be proud of.
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So another part of what we hope to achieve is to bring a really good idea to life – which I think is part of what drives every creative project.
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I think that a respectable goal that most students would like to achieve is to get criticisms or critiques on some of their most well-developed ideas, stories, essays, artworks, etc.
The semester is over Nancy A. McKeand 2005
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But what we have been able to achieve is to provide more and more care on an ambulatory and community basis.
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The end result which we are really trying to achieve is to change public attitudes toward our market economy system.
Of Myths and Men 1978
hernesheir commented on the word achieve
Railroad telegraphers' shorthand for "What will be the expense of action?" --1906 US Railway Assn. Standard Cipher Code.
January 19, 2013